Progress
The mild winter (btw, they are forecasting ZERO chance of a flood here, which has famers worried about drought. I do not know how people have the guts to farm in this part of the world. It seems to work out so rarely!) has gotten us thinking about the timeline of this project. Spring is well on its way, and the time has come for some action!
First, we figure this is pretty much the last chance we have to work on the upstairs, since our attention is going to be focusing on downstairs for the next year or so. Jake did an amazing job of trimming out the closet, as you can see in this terrible picture. There are still doors to be hung, obviously, but those require sandblasting, so I'm going to say they won't be up before the kitchen is. Then again, Jake loves to work on this stuff in the evenings, so you never know. That, by the way, is the reason that I feel mostly ok about this huge project. Jake is the kind of guy who finishes his jobs. The office/loft area is trimmed out BEAUTIFULLY, and he did that all on his own, so I know this will all be finished some day as well.
We also started packing up the main floor. I know it seems kind of crazy early, but really, the weeks are ticking by. Jake wants to switch the stairs to the basement over spring break. That is only 4 weeks away, and there is plenty of packing and organizing to be done before that can happen.
We have gone through, organized, purged, and packed up the CD's (who uses the actual CD's any more, I ask you? As I was going through mine, and Jake was going through his we both wondered if there was any point to putting them in boxes and storing them in the basement. Chances are very good we will never remove them from said boxes. More likely, one of our children many many years from now will stumble upon them while looking for a place to hide their contraband. Which may be worth storing them all that while, so I guess we'll keep them.). The art has been taken off the walls, and boy is it bleak down there.
Looking mighty bare, eh? Now that we have started getting rid of our pretty things, it looks and feels a lot more like we are living in a renovation zone. This inspired Jake to start ripping plaster off the wall.
That was around the time we realized that we could do whatever we wanted on these walls - they are coming down! So Jake started drawing the opening sizes (approximate, we aren't sure how big the header will have to be for the beam yet), and Jill and I used our artistic talents to make it feel a little more homey.
If you squint a little you can see where Jake already ripped off a chunk of wainscotting.
It's feeling real in a way that it hasn't so far. I think that's good. We are still hosting people at our previous rate of one family meal a week (or so it seems), so hopefully we can get the walls good and decorated via Sharpie's before they come tumbling down. If you know anyone who likes/needs to write on walls, send them our way! The only catch is they have to be over 3 feet tall, so they don't get the wainscotting.
First, we figure this is pretty much the last chance we have to work on the upstairs, since our attention is going to be focusing on downstairs for the next year or so. Jake did an amazing job of trimming out the closet, as you can see in this terrible picture. There are still doors to be hung, obviously, but those require sandblasting, so I'm going to say they won't be up before the kitchen is. Then again, Jake loves to work on this stuff in the evenings, so you never know. That, by the way, is the reason that I feel mostly ok about this huge project. Jake is the kind of guy who finishes his jobs. The office/loft area is trimmed out BEAUTIFULLY, and he did that all on his own, so I know this will all be finished some day as well.
We also started packing up the main floor. I know it seems kind of crazy early, but really, the weeks are ticking by. Jake wants to switch the stairs to the basement over spring break. That is only 4 weeks away, and there is plenty of packing and organizing to be done before that can happen.
We have gone through, organized, purged, and packed up the CD's (who uses the actual CD's any more, I ask you? As I was going through mine, and Jake was going through his we both wondered if there was any point to putting them in boxes and storing them in the basement. Chances are very good we will never remove them from said boxes. More likely, one of our children many many years from now will stumble upon them while looking for a place to hide their contraband. Which may be worth storing them all that while, so I guess we'll keep them.). The art has been taken off the walls, and boy is it bleak down there.
If you squint a little you can see where Jake already ripped off a chunk of wainscotting.
It's feeling real in a way that it hasn't so far. I think that's good. We are still hosting people at our previous rate of one family meal a week (or so it seems), so hopefully we can get the walls good and decorated via Sharpie's before they come tumbling down. If you know anyone who likes/needs to write on walls, send them our way! The only catch is they have to be over 3 feet tall, so they don't get the wainscotting.
Ask Jake about the wall with the handprints inone of our houses!J
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