Standstill

So now we are at a standstill. We are awaiting the arrival of our cabinets. We purchased cabinets from this company in North Dakota, called Scherr's Cabinet and Doors. We were really happy with their sample, but I am not impressed with how long it is taking to get these cabinets. We pretty much cannot continue until we have those. We are also debating on paint colors and counter material. The cabinets are shipping tomorrow so we will see how it all goes! I believe we are less than 1 month away from our finished kitchen! Tomorrow I will create a post on all of our fixtures and finishings. :)

Floors

When we first moved into this house we needed a major floor refinishing. We also had a LOT of problems with termite damage and urine damage to our floors. We hired Steve Jordan of Jordan Hardwood Floors to come and splice in new floors (this is where they pull out the damaged boards and put new ones in its place) and to refinish our 70 year old floors. He did such a great job, we hired him again for our kitchen hardwood floors.

Again, he had to splice in some new floors to add on to our existing hardwood floors. These new boards in the dining room are where we used to have that ugly indoor patio.



Old patio area:


Kitchen and dining area:


A different angle:

Attic

Remember that scene in Christmas Vacation where Chevy Chase gets stuck up in the attic while his entire family goes out shopping? He freaks out at first but then realizes he can reminisce and watch old home movies of his family while snuggling with old mementos. Well, I can lock Andrew up in the attic now too! Except our attic is super hot. As they were tearing off the roof Andrew realized how much attic space we had and asked DMH to create working attic for us. We had them cut a hole into the ceiling and install a telescopic attic ladder so we could extend it down and climb up to store items we didn't need (such as all of Audrey's clothes that she has already outgrown!).

Access in the ceiling of the hallway:


Hello ladder:


Wow, you are a long ladder!:


Audrey's bedding and clothes:


Look at all the space!

We Love Arches

One of the prerequisites we had for a home was that it had to have arches. We love arches, and they do such a nice job of separating two spaces without using a door. Plus, they are soft, curvy, and pretty. We already had two arches in our house, one separating the entrance from the living room, and another separating the living room from the dining room. Now we wanted one to signal a separation between the dining room and the kitchen, while still keeping it open. On a practical note, we really needed the arch just to keep the ceiling up and supported.

I need to mention that all of the work has been done by Denis M. Hughes of DMH Construction. We are so pleased with Denis' work. He and his helper Eric are on the site every day, working hard, cleaning up after themselves, being completely courteous, and overall fantastic. I would highly recommend them any day. Denis created this arch for us:



Different angle:


With drywall:




Denis in the foreground, Eric in the back:


The new arch and the original arch:


Denis in the dining room:


The kitchen (view from living room):


More to come.

New Floor and Roof

We needed to jackhammer out the old concrete in the patio area and pour in new concrete to make it even with the existing dining room floor. In addition to that, we needed to raise the roof line so that it no longer slopes down (like an outdoor roof would) but be at the same height as the rest of the room.

Old roof line:


Adios roof:


New roof line:


And new floor:


The space:

Kitchen Remodel - Before and Teardown

Remember our kitchen before? Probably not, because we intentionally would skip it on our house tour. Well anyway, we had a tiny little kitchen that was split into kitchen space and laundry space. By split, I mean with a nearly one foot thick wall in between. We had taken the laundry unit out of there and turned it into kitchen storage space, but it was still so cramped. Additionally, we had a dining room that had a wall with open windows in it. Yes, you read correctly. Windows. The original house ended in our dining room, with two windows that looked outside. Sometime ago, an answer decided to turn the back porch into an indoor back porch, and enclosed the little patio space outside of the house and made it an "inside". I think I will have to post pictures for you to get the idea, if I can even find any.

The original kitchen:


This one is taken from the laundry area of the kitchen:


The refrigerator that came with the house and the only one small enough to fit the cubby (you can see the thick wall to the laundry area here):


The dining room that with the windows and door enclosed in with the patio:


A shot of the patio to the dining room from a different angle:


All of that was torn down with the hard work of the HoodLim men:


You can see the space where it was divided up into the original kitchen and laundry area here:


The dining room with the patio area:




You can see the original roof line where it is so obvious that the patio was outdoors. The concrete floor was demolished to make room for a new one:


The plan is to lengthen the dining area, open up the dining room to the kitchen, add an island to the middle, and a desk by the side kitchen door. Basically we want an open kitchen area. More to come!

The Nursery

Our house was originally 2 bedrooms when it was built in 1938. In 1952, the family who was living here at the time added on a third room which is only accessible off of the second bedroom (our current master). That layout only allows for 1 of two options: an office, or a nursery. Ours was an office + laundry room, and is now a nursery + laundry room. Laundry doesn't get finished very often these days with a sleeping baby.

The room was originally wood paneled, right down to the bathroom. It was definitely interesting.



Then, it became our office/throw everything else that doesn't fit into the other rooms room, which I don't even have a picture of.

Now it is our daughter's room. My talented cousin Joyce aka Painter/Baker/Decorator Extraordinaire painted a beautiful tree from scratch for the nursery. Here she is in the middle of the night painting away:



I requested an owl for the tree to make it a little bit more interesting. It is actually kind of difficult to pick a tree that is friendly without being overly cute. A tree can turn sinister very easily. Here is the final outcome of the tree:



Andrew added some shelves:

We've been MIA

I guess that is what a baby will do to you. What's new (besides baby poop and spit up of course)? Nursery photos and a new kitchen! Actually the new kitchen is in progress, but thankfully the nursery is done. :)