living room renovations - part 1

For the past month and a half, we have pretty much been eating, sleeping, and breathing renovations. This is the last (and most expensive stressful messy invasive) of them, involving most of our downstairs. Because I haven't been getting many days of work (the school year almost being over), this translates into me sitting in the office listening to the contractors on the other side of the plastic wall all.day.long (not to mention a severe decrease in cash flow at precisely the worst time.) True to form, I have not been handling it all that well, but I am hopeful that the worst is over. 

Here's a look at where we started, and how the whole process is going:

And because we aren't crazy enough, we are renovating the living room at the same time as the kitchen.

The "pink vagina room" (as my hubby not-so-affectionately called it) is no more!

Dan and Adam, being the amazing guys that they are, volunteered their time over the long weekend (who does that?!?) to help us complete the gutting. Bringing down the lath-and-plaster ceiling, strapping, and a layer of drywall was the worst part! (Don't worry, we compensated them for their time and efforts.)

We removed the original layers of floor (yes, there's our new water heater, pressure tank, sediment filter, and UV light - all installed by my super-handy hubby!)...

...as well as all the joists, most of the staircase, and the spray-foam insulation that was in the way.  In doing so, we completely cut off all access to the second storey.

So for a week, we climbed the ladder on to the roof and entered our bedroom via the window. (Let me tell you: it's not all it's cracked up to be in the movies!)

Finally we got the new floor joists installed.

Once we got the sub-floor installed, we could use the ladder indoors. (And by dropping the floor, we've gained over 4" of ceiling height...pretty significant when the ceiling we started with, was a mere 6'11"--not up to code for our woodstove!)

We sister-ed new joists to the original beams from 1880, creating a sturdy, (and level!) surface to work with for the new ceiling.  And finally, the walls got framed!

For the past two weekends, cousin Derek came from Toronto to work on our heating and cooling system.  (FYI: to our friends in the GTA, Derek's company is called DTB Heating Services....we highly recommend him.) Thanks to Derek, we now have central air, and brand new duct-work throughout the whole house!

Next week, my handy hubby will be ready to start the electrical work in the living room, and after that, it's time for insulation.  (Eventually, I imagine we will get some brand new stairs too.) Over the past 6+ weeks, there were times when I thought I would never be able to make it through another day. Yet looking back, we have truly gotten a tremendous amount of work done! 

And one day soon, we will have something that looks like this:

Stay tuned!

spring 2014 in photos