It was a long weekend filled with some rough work – poor Ryan even needed stitches in his wrist after cutting himself on the concrete. Saturday Ryan finished up the jack hammering – which involved cutting his wrist, taking a break to drive to urgent care, coming home instead of waiting 3 hours – going back to jack hammering then going over to a friend’s house to get stitches at 5pm 🙂 Eventful and Productive – but not a fun project that’s for sure!
On Sunday – ryan spent the morning getting the wood and supplies needed, then fighting the rain while getting the doorway framed out.
It was a LONG day but just after the kids got tucked into bed the door install was finished up!
There is still work to do – mortar for above the door, trim around it, new patio outside of it etc. Plus I have to install the lockset 🙂 BUT the hardest part is done and now we can get all the dirt that’s sitting in the basement out and clean up the basement!
In other progress I spent the weekend with the kids so my projects were small – I got the fan installed in my office, some furniture moved around some things unpacked from the basement and installed on my shelves and a door knob installed 🙂 Nothing flashy but enough to feel productive while watching and occupying 3 kids!
We’ve kept up the momentum on getting the playroom really truly finished. Before the party we were able to get the painting fully done!
Finished painting!Ready for furniture 🙂
Since the party we’ve kept up the work – I finished up most of the electrical in the playroom (waiting on switches before I can install the fan but outlets and recessed light switches are done).
We finished painting the shelves for the built-ins! And I’m already filling those up!
Shelves paintedShelves getting filled! I got to pull 2 boxes out of the basement of things that have been packed since we lived in NH!
I’ve been painting the storage base to my craft table and just finished the second coat on that last night!
Craft table – ready to get set up this weekend!
This table is going to be amazing – more storage and a big space for both the kids to craft and me to sew! I can’t wait for that to get set up!
I’m waiting on some new bookcases I ordered for the playroom before most of the toys move in but once that is set up I’ll get more pictures. By then the room should be finished fan and window wise (I have to scrape the paint off the windows still maybe this weekend).
In other big news – Ryan and his Dad started work on a new basement project on Monday – cutting a huge hole out of our basement wall to put in a new double door. It took all day and they made good progress but it will be most of this weekend working on it before the door is installed I bet.
Cuts had to be made from both sides to get through the 10″ of concreteFull day of progress – next up jack hammering to get it down to the bottom
Still to go – clearing out the rest of the concrete, cleanup then putting in a new header and installing the door!
We have piles of dirt still in the basement from one of our very first house projects – putting new support beams with footers in – we’ve been waiting for this door before we get that dirt out (rather than cart it up a flight of stairs in buckets) – so I’m excited to finally clean out and organize the basement after this project!
The house is really coming together. Maybe we’ll even take a break from house work soon – hahahaha!
It’s been a LONG while since I did a house update – we really took most of the summer off of house renovations but we are gearing up for a busy fall/winter!
The big project right now was emptying out the ‘office/craft room’ and the ‘playroom’. The playroom was already sheetrocked but not taped so now that’s ready to be taped -toys are distributed throughout the house (bedrooms and livingroom and diningroom) – nice and cozy ..ugg!
The office we had to do electrical (install lights), add strapping to the ceiling, build the walls in the closet for the washer/dryer, install the dryer vent and electrical for the washer/dryer (to be finished tonight actually). Sheetrock is being delivered today! To be installed next weekend and then hopefully start taping shortly after.
We built some shelves in the basement to hold the tools that were in the officeStrapping and lights added – we have temp lights strung right now to help work at nightNew wall and vent for dryer in the closetThe other thing that was being stored in there was our leftover flooring – we’re hoping this is enough we can floor the playroom with it and get that room finished next!
Ryan really wants to get our kitchen renovation done soon so our current plan is as follows :
Sheetrock office
Tape/Spackle office and playroom
Prim playroom and office
Set up and use office as is (move my office and maybe toys in there to unclutter diningroom)
Add flooring in playroom
Add doors and trim to playroom
Finish floors
Paint playroom
Set up playroom!!!!
Demo kitchen… yikes!
We’ll see – i’m thinking we’ll do kitchen after xmas – ryan wants it done before xmas … i just don’t see that happening!
This past weekend Ryan replaced the rotted sill plate under the front door and finished securing the smaller beam in the basement! Jacking up work is done!
New sill plate piece
On Sunday with the help of Ryan’s dad they got the rest of the demo done in preparation for putting in dormers. I had to unwire/rewire a bit and we will need to do cleanup (dumpster) eventually but for now we are ready for dormers as soon as we get good weather on a weekend!
Smaller bedroom – ready for a dormermaster bedroom ready for a dormer
We were hoping for no rain this weekend (3 day weekend) but that’s not going to work out so we’ll have to work on another project this weekend instead and hope the weekend after is better.
Technically we are done jacking up all 3 of the beams we installed (thanks to Ryan’s Dad’s help today – they got it finished up) but 2 of the beams are really finished (bracket installed). We have to drill holes in the steal brackets for the 3rd beam still.
Bracket with 4×4 in front as extra supportBeams with the extra supports/jacks removed
We still have some jacking up to do – we have another beam to add on the other side and the front needs to be jacked up to remove the rotted sill plate in one section and replace it.
Tuesday we are having someone come out to do some tests and design out our heating system (planning on doing a geothermal system). Once that work is done we can complete the planned demo and start working on the construction projects like dormers!
We had a very productive weekend. We got 2 beams (doubled LVLs) installed with jacks – the real posts are on order so we are waiting for those. In the mean time we were able to start jacking up the original beam and our 2 new beams. We can’t just jack up all the sag at once, just a little at a time so most nights this week we’ll go to the house and lift it a bit each time. We anticipate lots of cracks in the sheetrock and popped tiles but that’s a good sign and all repairable down the road!
A view of most of the beams – we have one more to install on the other side of the stairs but this is a great start.
The far beam was a ton of work – we couldn’t have done it without using dad’s sheetrock lift – that was his great idea!We also got our couch out of storage and now have a place to rest in the livingroom!
A productive weekend for sure. Next weekend is camping!!! Can’t wait and hoping for continued good weather.
Last weekend Ryan finished up the footings Friday night and Sunday morning.
They look great! We had trouble finding the right size adjustable posts and actually had to order them off of amazon of all places for building materials! We spent our day off (Monday) making some brackets to support the beams and starting to put the first one up. This is going to be a lot of work with Ryan doing it mostly by himself this weekend while I watch the kids. Hopefully we can get the beams up and start jacking them up (we need to raise the house quite a bit in some places so it can’t all be done at once.
Once this project is done we can start working upstairs … after labor day since we plan on camping again this year!
Ryan took Friday off last week and we spent the day at the lake house. I had the girls so didn’t do much myself but he got the insulation all removed from the basement ceiling!
On Sunday I did the final basement cleanup (sweeping and bagging up the tiny things – mostly mouse poop) and vacuuming. The basement is ready for the next step next weekend!
On Saturday Alex went up to camp with her grandparents so we had just Bella which meant I had some time to help out a bit when she napped. I got the tack pieces and trim out of the back room downstairs and Ryan and I started taking up the particle board in that room – upstairs we plan to leave it but in this room it was gross and had to come up – it’s not an easy project! We got about 1/2 done.
Ryan also got some trim removed upstairs (no pictures due to lighting). On Sunday we went around and removed all the window trim that we needed to so we could take measurements and get windows ordered. We didn’t plan to order this early but we already picked out the kind we want (Anderson 400) and they are having a 10% off sale this week so we decided to put the order in and we’ll have them when we need them. Always good to save some money.
