Day 38- MORE Drywall and a Door!

So do you remember the amazing wood paneling and great cabinet that we sledge-hammered out? And don't forget the ugly tile floor and barn fan? Needless to say I do not miss any of it.

Here it is with some fresh drywall and believe it or not the floor is actually wood underneath all of that drywall dust and mud you see below.
And here is what the 4th bedroom use to look like before I shrunk it and put in a back hallway, turned this closet into a laundry niche and added a back door...
So the wall to the left is my new office which gets a pocket door and this new fabulous door leads out to my new fabulous back yard!

but be careful because it is about a 42" drop once you step outside...I guess I might want to get some stairs built.

Day 30 & 31 It's been a month!

Wow- I really need to catch up with my blogs so I might keep the next ones short and sweet. :) So the rest of the weekend we finished insulating the attic and upstairs bathroom. It was very itchy (fyi: if you are clastrophobic I would suggest getting someone else to do it).

*Mental note to store in the back of your head in case you ever are adding more insultation to your attic or wherever: Wear long sleeves and gloves to avoid getting insulation in your skin, if you do get insulation all over your skin try not to scratch. Once you are done take a cold shower in order to keep your pores closed and not let the insulation into your skin. Once you feel like you got all the insulation off you can then take a hot shower.*

We also scraped some floors that weekend. Cheryl scraped the nasty glue off the wood floor in the dining room and Tiffany and I tackled the kitchen.

The stick-down/glue down tiles in the kitchen SUCKED. You had to scrape each one off with a crow bar and hammer and/or floor scraper and they came up in tiny pieces. When you got more than a 3"x3" piece there was cause for celebration!

Woot Woot!

Day 24- 1930's-40's Design

Besides the fact that the house itself was a Sears Roebuck house model in the 1930's there are only a few items I have found that might be original to the house...or at least very close to original. Under three layers of floor in the Main Bathroom I found this black and gold 3"x3" checkerboard patterned linoleum floor. If it would have been tile I might have been able to salvage it but since it was linoleum (which actually use to be made completely from flax) it was damaged from water and tore easily when trying to get the layer of plywood off of the top of it. It definitely could have been the original flooring to the bathroom. It was laid right on top of the wood structure of the house and then it looked like there was an orange carpet placed over it at some point and then sometime within the last 10 years they installed a 13x13 sticky tile down over plywood. It was very hard to get all of those layers up so I did ask for some strong muscle assistance.

The other piece in the house that I love is the built-in curio cabinet. I am not sure when it was built, but I love the style and character. You can tell it has been painted many times...and I am not going to keep the blue. I would try and strip it but since my kitchen cabinets are going to be white I thought this would look nice if it matches.
It is starting to take shape...just wait till you see what happens next!

Renovation Day 12- Next Phase- at least downstairs

So by Tuesday we had moved on from demolition to renovation- at least on the first level. The outside hole had been repaired and filled in. The wall got double framed in order to get new HVAC ducts up to the new finished attic dormer which will be the toy room.

Ready for drywall.
Rot gone and you can see the hardwood floor underneath the black goo I need to scrape off.

So this is a picture of the orginal dining room. Not sure when the paneling was added...but the wallpaper and ceramic tile were fairly recent (and ugly). The fan light has pictures of barns on it...its up for donation if anyone wants it. Big improvement already if you ask me.

Demolition Day 6- I have a roof ...and a Hole

Don't worry...the hole isn't in the roof.
Well the rain held off and my roof got done and looks amazing. I had a neighbor stop by that night asking if I had bought the place. I said yes and she said "Well I like what you have done with it already!"...followed by "You must like projects!" Ummm....Yes, yes I do.

And while the guys were hammering away outside I dug out more of the problem corner inside and confirmed that we are going to have to tear it all out and re-frame the whole corner. Hopefully we can salvage most of the Aluminum siding we take off the corner and only spend a few hundred dollars on the structure. But right now...you can see daylight...not cool. And I think now that most things are torn out this might be the only big surprise I run into (Knock on wood...unrotten wood that is).The final item I tried to conquer that day was the dining room floor...but it conquered my instead. For some strange reason someone decided that they should install a ceramic tile over the dining room wood floor...??? I have always hoped that it is salvagable...but everyone always told me not to get my hopes up because you could not tell how they had installed the sub-floor.
So Cheryl and I had been hitting at this floor with sledge hammers randomly since we started. It was a slow process and even when I got a 3'x3' space cleared I had a hard time prying it up from underneath. The good news was that the subfloor had been glued and stapled down (instead of screwed which is good news for salvaging the wood floor) and the 3'x3' piece did come up pretty cleaned, just leaving behind a sticky residue. The bad news was...this was going to take me 2 days to do by myself. So? I paid my crew to do it and it was done in an hour. Sweet. Now I just need to scrape off the goo and try to see if it will sand down with the rest.

Demolition Day 2- Destruction

Day 2- Well it was the Saturday before Easter and I didn't want to dig into anyone else's plans for Easter weekend so I was on my own...but actually got alot accomplished!! The rest of the wood cabinet and paneling came down on the dining room side. See the pictures before and after below- it is a HUGE difference in opening up the house from the Kitchen all the way through. Now I will be able to see the kids jumping on the couch while I am making dinner!

BEFORE:

MIDWAY: AFTER: Soooo much brighter without the dark paneling! Next in this room I will be sledge hammering the tile floor. There is actually wood flooring underneath but I am not sure how they installed the sub floor so stay tuned for that!!

The next thing I tackled was the main floor bathroom, it had been somewhat updated with fake tile paneling vs. the original tile so I just pryed and peeled it all away and started demo of the shower. My plumber doesn't come until Thursday so I just tore off what I could.

Demolition DAY 1- Where do I start?

Friday (Good Friday to be exact), I started the demolition. I am trying to do alot of the demo in order to not only save myself some money, but also to get my hands dirty. Swinging a sledge hammer and prying off wood panels with a crow bar can be a great stress reliever! I am also hoping for it to be a calorie burner!
So one of the first things to go was the Carport. It was in very bad shape and needed to be replaced. Both my girlfriend and I wanted to take a sledge hammer to it, but the professionals came in for that job.




I did have a helper on Day 1. She may only be an 18 year old 90 pounder...but that girl can swing a sledge hammer! And I know what you are thinking- "I hope it wasn't all work and no play that day". Oh no worries there- Prom dress shopping came after the demolition! And only the people who hang out with me could use the following sentence to describe their day; "Well this morning I researched a sociology paper, then after lunch I stripped wall paper and tore down a wall with a sledge hammer, then I found the most beautiful prom dress for the best deal ever, went to a very moving Funeral for Jesus and ended the day on a swingset!" It's all true.




We stripped the wallpaper and border off the walls, tore down the wood cabinet between dining room and living room and the carpet out of my future bedroom got torn up as well! It was a good day!
My only question: Why would they staple carpet pad to such beautiful wood??? Madness.