Andy and Steph's house

week 17 - 01/11 through 01/15

2010-02-20T11:07:00.000-08:00

The garage roof and siding were started.

The bathroom lights were installed.

And the kitchen continues to progress. Here are a couple of shots of the counters and the new appliances!

And a look at the range hood from the living room side.

week 16 - 01/04 through 01/08

2010-02-20T10:38:00.000-08:00

Partially to catch up and partially because the finish work won't show you the big changes that we've been displaying so far. From here on out, the pictures will mostly be of things as they're completely finished.

The soffit was completed.

The porch boards were all laid and most of the ceiling was completed.

The majority of the tiling in the bathrooms is now complete.

And vanity tops were placed and plumbed.

Day 74 - 12/29

2010-01-03T23:05:00.000-08:00

The cabinets we have were all set.

The deck progress continues.

And after being treated like an know-nothing ass for weeks by Mastercraft doors, Menards decided to take it back, easing my pain greatly. The Mastercraft front door frame wasn't square, was poorly constructed (gaps in joints, missing framing cleats...) and the door itself was warped.
We ordered a new door that will hopefully be ready in 7-10 days...
Again, stay away from Mastercraft doors.

Day 73 - 12/28

2010-01-03T22:54:00.000-08:00

Finishing closets! Here's the master closet (the other side is the same, but reversed).

Work began on the deck.

And some of the cupboards arrived. We were fairly certain that they would never arrive. I'm not convinced that the remainder will ever show up. All the lowers are here though, so at least we can get measured for countertops and move on with the kitchen renovation.

Day 72 - 12/23

2010-01-03T22:41:00.000-08:00

Mostly clean-up today. But some of the finer finish work was completed.

Day 71 - 12/22

2010-01-03T22:33:00.000-08:00

The siding is completed!

Day 70 - 12/21

2010-01-03T22:27:00.000-08:00

More finish work, including most of the railing now being completed.

Some of the closet hardware was placed as well.

Day 69 - 12/18

2009-12-19T20:46:00.000-08:00

The refinishing of the floors was completed! Unfortunately, we were warned at about 3PM that we would not be able to walk on the floors until 8AM the next morning.

In the end though, the floors are definitely worth it.

Day 68 - 12/17

2009-12-19T20:32:00.000-08:00

More base was set upstairs and down.

The downstairs windows were trimmed out, both sash and casing were placed.

And some more of the stair rail was set!

Day 67 - 12/16

2009-12-19T19:52:00.000-08:00

We have carpet! It really feels like the project is drawing to a close. We're looking forward to getting started with moving our things back into the living space in the house and the carpet is the step we've been waiting on to begin the move-back.

Alex found the carpet overage in the closet and immediately jumped in!

Day 66 - 12/15

2009-12-15T21:14:00.000-08:00

More finish work is being completed every day. Almost all of the baseboard is placed now.

I'm not even sure how all of this will look when it's completed, but they keep working on the stairs.

And we got home to find that our contractor did us a huge favor by moving everything off the floor in the bedrooms and stuffing it into the bathrooms. Everything has to be out of the way for the carpet that's arriving tomorrow! Tomorrow is the day that will make it feel like we've gotten somewhere after all this time.

Day 65 - 12/14

2009-12-15T21:03:00.000-08:00

Finally, the finish work is really happening!
Quite a lot of the base for the stair rails was laid today.

And the baseboard is being placed with all due speed.

And here are some signs of things to come.

Day 64 - 12/11

2009-12-15T20:53:00.000-08:00

We came home to see the door barred after a weekend away (well, taped more than barred I suppose).

Inside the house, the floors had been refinished. This is just the stain coat, the varnish will come later. I can't even tell where the old walls were, much less the floor patches. Everything looks beautiful.

Day 63 - 12/10

2009-12-13T01:54:00.000-08:00

The heating guy came to place the vent covers. Nothing else happened that we can see.

Day 62 - 12/09

2009-12-13T01:40:00.000-08:00

Getting repetetive here... More windows were trimmed out.

The glass block window finally arrived and was set in the small bathroom!

Day 61 - 12/08

2009-12-13T01:31:00.000-08:00

More doors were set.

All of them are now set and trimmed out, and the window trim was begun.

The floors were patched in preparation for the floor finishing that will happen later this week.

Day 60 - 12/07

2009-12-13T01:14:00.000-08:00

More doors are being set every day.

The vanity tops were put in place but have yet to be set.

Day 59 - 12/04

2009-12-13T01:00:00.000-08:00

Doors are being set!

And a progress update on the small bathroom.

Day 58 - 12/03

2009-12-12T16:57:00.000-08:00

Doors are here and framed up, ready for placement.

The siding on the west side is still being placed.

And the tiling continues.

Day 57 - 12/02

2009-12-12T16:44:00.000-08:00

The siding is mostly completed on the south side of the house, the only thing left is the top of the chase, it will not be completed until the final inspection on the chimney inside.

The vanities arrive, here's a shot of the small bathroom vanity.

And here's the master bath. It's actually two 36 inch vanities that will be attached to one another.

The small bathroom vanity top was also here when we got home.

Here's a look at the continuing tiling happening in the small bathroom as well.

Day 56 - 12/01

2009-12-12T16:27:00.000-08:00

Slow day... The siding was completed on the south side of the house (almost).

Day 55 - 11/30

2009-12-12T16:17:00.000-08:00

More of the siding was completed.

The garage shingles arrived! This will be one of the last priorities. The garage (siding and roofing) can be completed log after everything on the inside so you won't see this finished for a while.

And on the inside, the master bath floor is grouted and ready for cabinets and a toilet.

And we started the tiling of the walls in the small bathroom.

Bonus Post - Paint!

2009-12-12T15:54:00.000-08:00

The Living Room

The Library

The Guestroom

The Third Bedroom

Alex's Room!

The master bedroom.

Days 52-54 - 11/26 through 11/28

2009-11-29T11:33:00.000-08:00

These few days are kind of a blur and we don't have a lot of pictures. The painting is near complete. Here's a shot of the master bedroom. Steph has been working feverishly on the painting (thanks again to Ryan and Lisa for showing up AGAIN to continue to help us out). Andy has continued to do miscellaneous work (sanding sheetrock fixing random devices, cleanup) along with more tile work.

The master bath floor was laid and is ready to be grouted.

The tub surround still hasn't been backed because there is no tub drain. Until we're certain that they can get a drain in there with the surround placed I'm going to leave it open.

The small bathroom floor is grouted and the bullnose is placed (neither pictured) and the wall is about 1/3 of the way complete. This is a pinwheel pattern using 4" and 12" tile and it's really coming along nicely.

Day 51 - 11/25

2009-11-29T11:17:00.000-08:00

Alex began painting her room!

With a pink ceiling and a purple walls this is definitely a little girl's room.

The 2nd bedroom is very green!

The master closet is now tile cutting central. The great thing about this saw is that the price dropped by $60 for black Friday so we were able to take advantage of the Home Depot's price protection and save some dough!

The small bathroom floor is completely laid.

The full tiles were laid in the master bath to provide points of reference for the imposing number of cuts that will be necessary to set the tiles at 45 degrees.

Day 50 - 11/24

2009-11-29T11:13:00.000-08:00

This seems like a slow day.
The north side of the house is completely sided.

The backer was placed in the small bathroom.

And the seemingly never-ending job of painting continues. The family room is well under way.

Day 49 - 11/23

2009-11-29T11:08:00.000-08:00

Most of the siding was placed on the north side of the house.

The front door was placed as well. With a couple of problems...

If you look closely you may see that the doorframe is wider at the top than the bottom. In addition to that issue, the door is not plumb with the frame. We've filed a complaint with the manufacturer, but don't know when and if a new door will arrive.

Of course the painting continues. Here is the ceiling in the 2nd bedroom upstairs.

And the bathrooms each received a final coat of paint. Now the backer can be placed and the tiling can start. This is a shot of the master bath. The closet to the right will be a bathroom linen and storage closet.

Day 47/48 - 11/21 through 11/22

2009-11-29T10:56:00.000-08:00

Continued priming. Thanks to Ryan and Lisa for the enormous amount of free labor that they've provided. Your reward is an appearance in the blog!

And we were able to start work on the ceilings as well!

Including the pink ceiling that Alex has been waiting to see!

Day 46 - 11/20

2009-11-29T10:49:00.000-08:00

The siding began today! The windows on the main floor were all wrapped and prepped for the coming siding.

The porch rim was put in place. The porch will ride on top of this rim. The porch will be one step up and the doorway will be the 2nd step. A little different than we had planned (a recessed step up to the porch) due to building codes. If the door ever swings up, there needs to be a place for snow to build up that will still allow the door to swing.

After a little bit of sheetrock patching...

We started to get the primer on the walls. That's Steph's dad in the foreground. He's been a huge help throughout this project. Thanks to him for the lights and the extra painting implements.

Day 45 - 11/19

2009-11-19T21:11:00.000-08:00

Today most of the ceilings were finished. Apparently this is called an "orangepeel knockdown." Apparently it's what all the higher end homes have... So there you have it. We had no idea what this was coming in, we're actually quite pleased with the look. Check out the closeup in the 2nd photo.

Day 44 - 11/18

2009-11-19T21:08:00.000-08:00

The only additional mudding done today was for the new basement closet.

The real excitement was that the insulation was blown into the attic and the skylights were cut into the bathroom ceilings! These will give us a great chance to bring some additional natural light into the only rooms where we didn't want to put large windows.

Day 43 - 11/17

2009-11-19T21:02:00.000-08:00

Yesterday the taping, today the mudding. The corner bead was tacked up and the "heavy coat" of mud was placed.

Day 42 - 11/16

2009-11-19T20:55:00.000-08:00

The taping begins! With all of the sheetrock in place, the seams were taped and some of the screw heads were mudded.

Every tool these guys have is caked with gypsum mud. Check out the bench.

Bonus Post! Alex, gettin' 'er done

2009-11-19T20:47:00.000-08:00

Day 40/41 - 11/14 through 11/15

2009-11-15T22:22:00.000-08:00

Andy did a lot of work over the weekend repairing and re-inforcing the subfloor. The first step was to replace some of the old planks.

If you're wondering why they needed to be replaced, check out these shots.

At one point, there were carpenter ants in this house. And they ate some of the planking. With the rotten boards out and new ones laid on saturday, Sunday was the day for laying some plywood subfloor on top of the planks.

This is 1/4 inch plywood. It will be covered with 1/4 inch tile board, and then the tile can be placed on top of that. The thin ply and tilebacker will mean that the tile won't rise too far above 3/4 floorboards.

Day 40 - 11/14

2009-11-15T22:13:00.000-08:00

The sheetrock was hung in one day. Now I feel like I can really walk you through the house. The new dining room:

The staircase up to the new floor:

The bonus space that will serve as our family room:

The library:

The hall and the linen closet (the doorways on either side mark the 2 smaller bedrooms:

The master bedroom:

The walk in closet:

The master bath:

The smaller bathroom off the hallway:

I'll have shots of the kitchen in the next post.

Day 39 - 11/13

2009-11-15T21:56:00.000-08:00

A massive delivery of sheetrock arrived! 5/8 for the upstairs ceilings and the kitchen, 1/2 for all the walls and 3/8 to cover the downstairs ceilings. With all the moving of walls and changing and things falling into the downstairs from up (via holes in the sheetrock...) there was just too much repair to do and the easiest and least expensive thing was to cover the old ceilings.

The garage was prepped for insulation as well.

Day 38 - 11/12

2009-11-15T21:49:00.000-08:00

The insulators came and did all of the exterior walls.

They also blew insulation in for the front porch roof. The 2nd picture is a great shot of the netting that they use to hold the insulation in place.

Day 37 - 11/11

2009-11-15T21:42:00.000-08:00

The chase was extended today! We can officially have some fires now!

The cold air returns for the 2 smaller bedrooms had mistakenly been placed right next to the doorways. They were moved to more suitable locations today.

The basement closet was framed up. This closet was created due to the heating and cooling shaft and the cold air return shaft running through this room and up.

Andy wired a 3-way switch for the basement! It's like a luxury that we've been living without all these years. And there was minimal sheetrock damage done in the process.

Day 36 - 11/10

2009-11-15T21:30:00.000-08:00

The support for the hood was placed today.

Day 35 - 11/09

2009-11-15T21:29:00.000-08:00

More wiring was completed today. Not much from the carpenters lately. The kitchen cabinet measurements were taken today!
The bathroom fans were set up.

The outside lights and outlets were all wired.

The kitchen counter outlets were placed as well.

Day 34 - 11/06

2009-11-15T21:21:00.000-08:00

Slow Firday - the wiring is almost all done!
Here's one of the bedrooms.

Here are the recessed fixtures for the library.

Here is the Hall fixture, it will be right over the staircase.

Day 33 - 11/05

2009-11-06T21:18:00.000-08:00

A lot of miscellaneous things were finished today.
The lower overhang was framed up , sheeted and shingled.

The face frame linen closet for the master bathroom was framed.

And the wall that will support the breakfast bar was framed.

The skylight for the small bathroom was placed!

And the siding arrived! Somewhere under that blue tarp is our green house!

Day 32 - 11/04

2009-11-06T20:53:00.000-08:00

The tubs were both set today!

The house was all wrapped up.

Last night, we picked up about 1/2 ton of tile and put it in the dining room for the time being. This will be all of the tile for the two bathrooms.

The new back door is in! In addition to that, this picture shows the new kitchen window that was set today.

Day 31 - 11/03

2009-11-06T20:43:00.000-08:00

Almost all of the plumbing was wrapped up today!

A frame was built for the master bath tub.

The frame is for this tub! The whirlpool for the master bath!

Here's the old school cast iron tub for the small bathroom.

And the final post was set for the porch.

Day 30 - 11/02

2009-11-06T20:30:00.000-08:00

After the big frame up every day will seem slow. Today they poured the final footing.

And they placed the skylight for the master bathroom.

Bonus Post! The kitchen of the future

2009-11-01T19:27:00.000-08:00

Here are a couple of computer generated views of our kitchen to be.

Day 29 - 10/30

2009-11-01T19:24:00.000-08:00

We have walls! We have rooms! Our dreams are starting to look like a reality!
Here is the morning picture of some of the wall frames ready for placement.

The front bedroom:

The back bedroom:

The master bedroom:

The "bonus" space:

This will be the library where we'll position some comfy chairs and a row of built in bookcases around the corner.

Day 28 - 10/29

2009-11-01T18:28:00.000-08:00

The floors were glued today! Everything is tacked down and ready for interior walls.

In addition to that the framing around the chimney and cold air return for the upstairs was placed.

And the headroom for the staircase was established.

Since we're working with an existing structure and trying to keep the walls upstairs and down in position to give us maximum hallway space. As a result, the stairs will land and there will be a bit of a cut-out in the upstairs floor plan to create headroom above the first 2 stairs below the landing.

Day 27 - 10/28

2009-11-01T17:53:00.000-08:00

The spray foam insulation was well... sprayed today. Here is a shot of the front porch roof

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The foam was also sprayed on the inside of the rim of the upstairs.

Since many of the floorboards were pulled up for the the spray foam we were able to get a good look at some of the plumbing and heating.

The lights by the front door were wired on the correct side! (Initially this switch was placed behind the swing of the front door)

Day 26 - 10/27

2009-10-27T21:04:00.000-07:00

Not a lot to report today, I was here for the heating rough-in inspection. Once complete, framing was placed around the heating stack for the second floor here in the first floor closet.
With everything in that closet we reduced the opening from 5 feet to 4 feet as well.

The bit of wall left to demo (at the end of the old hall) was also removed. leaving the nice big opening that we'll have on the way into the dining room. The marks on the floor are where the old wall used to be. It made a corner and went into the blue bedroom.

And the downstairs bathroom fan was vented out the back of the house. It's there just above the glass block window.

Day 25 - 10/26

2009-10-27T20:59:00.000-07:00

The big reveal! The blue tarp came down right away in the morning revealing the new configuration of the front windows for all of the neighbors to see!

The tarp came off because the shingles arrived and the roof was finally finished (with the exception of gutters, soffits, fascia...).

The heating rough in was finished, including a chimney that vents outside!

Quite a lot of the electrical was done. Unfortunately quite a lot will also be re-done, like these switches that were placed behind the front door. Other than those types of changes the first floor is wired and ready to go.

The wood floors were removed from the dining room. Initially we were going to place oak in the old kitchen as well so we'd have the wood floors flowing throughout the first floor, but we changed our tune when we started to consider the durability of tile by the often used back door.

Day 24 - 10/23

2009-10-23T19:27:00.000-07:00

The heating guy was the first one in today and he started piling up things like this.

He would later turn them into ductwork for the upstairs as well as this...

It's the heat run and the cold air return for the upstairs. Here's another shot.

When we got home the cold air returns were functioning and the heat run was stubbed out (for now) right next to the new staircase!

We can easily tread our way upstairs now! This is a huge and exciting development.

We also got a little insight into the next few days. Shingles on Monday, along with completed plumbing heating and electrical rough-ins and then the insulation and framing will start upstairs. Keep watching, it will start to go very quickly from here.

Day 23 - 10/22

2009-10-23T19:12:00.000-07:00

The header was placed at the front of the porch and then the temporary supports were put back in place.

The temporary wall was removed from the upstairs and the size has really become apparent.

And the plumbing was roughed in. Here's the upstairs...

Here's the flow through to the waste pipe (inside the kitchen wall)...

And here is where the new plumbing attaches to the waste pipe.

Day 22 - 10/21 - Phillies win the National League!

2009-10-21T20:00:00.000-07:00

The footings are poured for the front porch!

Soon the posts will be in place, the headers will be set and we'll really begin to see the look of the front of the house take shape.

The sheetrock was pulled from the remaining kitchen wall in order to facilitate the plumbing.

So... the fridge has been moved to the other side of the room.

Here's a climpse of the plumbing work done upstairs.

Day 21 - 10/20

2009-10-21T19:49:00.000-07:00

We arrived home to find the house tarped once again. For good reasons this time though.

The tarp is up to keep the footings holes from filling in with water as it rains... some more... again. Here's a shot of one of the holes.

On the inside, the new windows were placed in the front of the house! We have 2 nice big 3 foot windows right in the center of the ground floor.

To clear the way for the new windows, the front door was moved to its new temporary home (until the new door arrives). The front door will now enter into the living room. This is a change of plans now that we've seen the location of the staircase that will lead upstairs. Moving the door over will really keep the open feel that we want in the main floor.

Prep work began for the heating. This is a shot of the holes cut in the bandroom wall for the chimney to the upstairs and the cold air return that will come back down from the upstairs. Several of the floor cut outs for the upstairs heating were also made (but not pictured).

Day 20 - 10/19

2009-10-19T20:18:00.000-07:00

We have our first wall downstairs! This will be the guestroom. Once I get window coverings in here we'll probably be staying in this room for most of the duration of this project.

With walls comes... the first door!

Also today, the picture window that used to be in the bay window in the southeast corner of the house was moved to the dining room.

The new front door is ordered and framed in where the picture window used to be.

Outside, a couple of the footings were dug and the siding was finally removed from the fireplace chase - matching it to the rest of the house.

Bonus Post! Our original plans

2009-10-18T09:01:00.000-07:00

I was going to post these in the beginning... but I forgot, so I'm doing it now and calling it a bonus!
Here is the original 1st floor setup. It's drawn to scale. The dining room is in the upper left, then going clockwise - the kitchen, the bathroom, the green bedroom, the red bedroom, the blue bedroom (all clustered on the right side of the house), the attic access (stairs) and the living room (lower left).

Here is the new 1st floor plan:
The upper left is the new huge kitchen! Again clockwise - the unchanged bathroom, the new guestroom (the green room re-vamped), the dining room and the living room. Note that the attic access stairway becomes the new stairway down, the stairs will land, then turn to the dining room.

Here is the upstairs plan:
The upper left is the master closet (walk-in) then the master bath, then a small bathroom (mimicking the downstairs bathroom), then two larger (kids') bedrooms, a family room/library and then back to the master bedroom.

Here is the outside of the house, looking from the northeast corner:

Day 19 - 10/16

2009-10-17T10:34:00.000-07:00

The kitchen wall is gone. As the project continues the sheer size of the new kitchen becomes more and more impressive. The counters and cabinets will shrink the space to a certain degree, but things are going to be very spacious. I can't wait to start cooking in here!

The drop ceiling in the dining room is gone! There used to be a 2x6 header that dropped the ceiling in the dining room. It was purely for the effect of seperating the dining room from the living room. Now that the entire dining room will be part of the kitchen the drop ceiling becomes even more useless. I'm glad to see it go.

Day 18 - 10/15

2009-10-17T09:54:00.000-07:00

New walls downstairs - here is the futre main floor coat and storage closet:

Here is the wall for the future guestroom (formerly the green room):

We'll be putting a larger window into the guestroom as well. In order to make it a bedroom, we needed an egress window and were consistenly disappointed with the small crank style egress window we had previously. The large window you can see on the left side of the bedroom wall picture (above) is the one that will go here on the east wall of the guestroom.

The kitchen demo begins!

We're picking siding and shingles! The green siding (left) is the one we'll be using and the shingles in the lower right of the display (right) are the color of choice.

Day 17 - 10/14

2009-10-17T09:41:00.000-07:00

More new windows! Not much else to show you today. The electrician has been getting wiring ready for the upstairs, but pictures of wires don't make for great viewing.

Day 15 - 10/12 - Phillies move on to the NLCS!

2009-10-13T20:58:00.000-07:00

We arrived home to find our floor plan very... open. Almost all the walls that will come down are down at this point. the sheetrock has been removed from the remainder of the front wall and the trim has all been removed from the windows.

2 shots showing the lack of walls between the red room and the green room. Check out the tape on the floor that outlines the walls of the new guest bedroom.

Where the closets used to meet.

Day 16 - 10/13

2009-10-13T19:59:00.000-07:00

Windows! We have windows upstairs in the front and on the south side. We also have a whole bunch of windows laying around the house for the downstairs. This is very cool indeed.

Day 14 - part two

2009-10-11T16:05:00.001-07:00

Of special note is this, we woke up to see the thermostat on Friday the 9th reading this:

We immediately turned on the furnace when we arrived home on Friday night and Saturday morning we woke up to this:

We really did gain use of the furnace in the nick of time!

Day 14 - 10/09

2009-10-11T15:53:00.000-07:00

Roof! And we can use the furnace!

Day 13 - 10/08

2009-10-11T15:39:00.000-07:00

The walls are eracted! We officially have a 2nd story! Alex danced all over the floor immediately!

Day 12 - 10/07

2009-10-11T15:34:00.000-07:00

A nice day! The gables were knocked down and the outer floorboards were tacked upstairs in preparation for some walls.

Day 11 - 10/06

2009-10-11T15:19:00.000-07:00

The bay window has been removed! The remainder of the demo is completed in the red and blue rooms. The hall closet has been removed. The sheetrock has been removed from the living room wall. Quite a bit of the trim has been pulled off around doorframes and the crown molding was removed from the living room.

Take note of the pocket door in the living room, we'll be re-using that upstairs for the master closet! We're trying to re-use a portion of the materials from the downstairs. It's original to the house and cool to us. The brick portion of the front siding will be used next spring when I re-line our firepit in the backyard and much of the trim will be re-used along with a couple of the original doors.

A big demo day, still raining and it's getting pretty cold for us to be living without using the furnace...

Day 10 - 10/05

2009-10-11T15:18:00.000-07:00

No evidence of any work done today.

Day 9 - 10/02

2009-10-11T15:07:00.000-07:00

Since the rain is stopping all of the work on the upstairs, demo begins downstairs! The wall between the red and blue bedrooms is removed, so are the closets and the sheetrock on the front walls. New sheetrock will be placed on the front wall; this is more of the fortification efforts that must be performed to accomodate our unorthodox design. Check out all of the red and clue sheetrock in the dumpster!

Day 8 - 10/01

2009-10-11T14:56:00.001-07:00

Our worst fears were realized when I woke up in the night to the sound of drips from the ceiling (note the cooler in the living room that caught the drips from multiple leaks, thanks Rainer!). Steph and I spent the morning clearing almost the entire main floor in order to save the furniture and keep the clothes dry. We only have a couple of pictures with the buckets since we didn't take any until the onslaught was complete.

Tarps were added to fortify our residence against the week of rain on the way.

Day 7 - 09/30

2009-10-11T14:47:00.000-07:00

Floor boards were temporarily placed for the workers to move more easily and the tarp was "firmed up" for the impending rains. It would rain for days, and we would suffer many trials as a result... Note that the first photo is the spot where the trusses were cut for the staircase.

Day 6 - 09/29

2009-10-11T14:25:00.000-07:00

The floor trusses are set! We now have a great idea of how big our upstairs will be!

Day 5 - 09/28 part 2

2009-10-11T13:37:00.000-07:00

A delivery of lumber arrived! Suddenly the project's scope really became evident as I saw the intimidating quantity of studs being laid out. The funny thing is, most of those would be used over a matter of a few days.

This also gives me the opportunity to show you the light fixture graveyard in the basement.

Day 5 - 09/28

2009-10-11T12:59:00.002-07:00

We now have only a few working electrical outlets and all the light fixtures have been taken down from the ceilings and replaced with single bulbs. Since all of the power for our home ran from the basement to the attic and then through the ceiling (even most of the outlets ran out of the attic and then through the walls) much of it was disconnected. Temporary light fixtures were placed. Oh, and the roof is now missing from the house. A temporary ceiling brace was also placed in the living room. With most of the rafters gone a tarp was placed to drain off the impending rain.

Day 4 - 09/25

2009-10-11T12:59:00.001-07:00

No report, a drizzly day...

Day 3 - 09/24

2009-10-11T12:41:00.000-07:00

All the siding is gone! We now live in a tarpaper shack. The crew removed the siding from both the house and the garage. There will be quite a bit of effort that goes into the plan. Since the upstairs will be overhanging the lower floor in the front, the additional bracing and footing requirements are myriad. Some of them include adding thicker plys to the corners of the house. We'll get to some of the others in future days. The first 2 pictures are the house, the 3rd picture is the garage.

There is also a shot of the dumpster filled with siding attached.

Day 2 - 09/23

2009-10-11T12:38:00.000-07:00

We arrived home to find a sheet of plywood covering a hole in the house that was cut in order to remove the attic insulation.

Day 1 - 09/22

2009-10-11T12:19:00.000-07:00

Not much to report on day one, but the signs of our dream becoming a reality were all over the front lawn! The trusses, rafters and quite a lot of the other lumber were delivered. The dumpster also arrived.

The kitchen pre-construction

2009-10-11T12:11:00.000-07:00

Since a huge portion of the reason that we wanted to do this was to replace the kitchen, I'm devoting one post to the kitchen alone. Just to put the kitchen into perspective, it measures 8 ft by 8 1/2 ft. I have 50 linear inches of counter space. That's about 4 square feet. Most of it is commonly occupied by dirty dishes. We're definitely getting a dishwasher...

The Interior - pre-construction

2009-10-11T06:12:00.000-07:00

Here are some shots of the interior of the house in the beginning. The living room will stay pretty much as is with the exception of the bay window (not in the interior picture - view the exterior entry). The dining room will become part of the kitchen of the future! The only bedroom that stays per the future floor plan is the green one. The other two bedrooms will be torn out and a dining room constructed in their place.

Our cozy living room, the Dining room and the 3 current bedrooms (10x10, 10x10 and 10x7)

The house pre-construction

2009-10-10T17:47:00.001-07:00

So we started trying to decide how to renovate our house (a 900 square foot "rambler" built in 1951) to create a little more space, add a bathroom and give me a larger kitchen.

We came up with the plan to add an upstairs. Then we started drawing the plans to configure the new space that we were planning to add. Then we discovered that with all that new space we could also re-configure the downstairs. After that the project took on a life of its own.

What started out as a way to add a little space turned into a complete overhaul of the above-ground portion of the house.

This is the opening entry, and with it some pictures of the exterior of the house as it stood in the beginning. Take note of the flagstone patio in the front. We lifted that and put it back down outside the back door where you see the river rock and stepping stones.