long overdue update

It's been months since this blog has been updated, but that's mostly because I wanted to wait until the downstairs was nearly finished before we showed it off to the world. Now, other than a little bit of minor detail work that's left to be done, our original vision has come to life!

In case you haven't seen the original video we took (on the day we signed the ownership papers), here it is:



Here's the new video!



I can't even convey the difference. Even if you scroll down and see old pictures from when we first got the house... these pictures don't accurately represent how disgusting this house truly was. I mean, not only was it vacant for like 4 months before we bought it... but there was not a square foot of carpet in the entire house that wasn't stained by pets. The walls had dirt on them, and cracks, and needed to be sanded. The entire house smelled horrible, and the floorplan downstairs was closed and non-functional.

So obviously the most major change we made was taking out the wall between the kitchen and the living room. When we first looked at this house, we knew that being able to do that project would make a huge difference in how the house felt and even functioned... and it's true. What used to be a small, dark, living room that was cut off from the kitchen is now continuous with the rest of downstairs... and the difference is amazing. It's so much more open (obviously) and the living room just feels a lot larger. Plus it's so nice being able to be in the kitchen and see into the living room!

More pictures were posted in earlier blog posts, but to refresh your memory...

BEFORE

AFTER

and BEFORE

and AFTER

So yeah. We have a bartop with stools/island in the middle of the room. Gabe installed the bartop (once Lowes finally gave us the right piece), and actually had to custom-make these barstools. The bar is taller than most bars, so we needed extra tall barstools. Extra tall barstools are expensive... like hundreds of dollars. So all along he was talking about buying some regular, simple stools and making them taller himself. One day we were randomly walking through Big Lots and saw these for only $30 each:

But they were way too short for our tall bar. So he attached about 5" wooden extensions on the bottom of each leg (on each of the 4 stools we ended up getting), added more footrests lower down for more stability, and painted them black:

The other major project that we totally didn't count on... was the staircase. This staircase was basically a joke when we moved in because it was totally crooked. This first picture doesn't nearly do justice to the crooked-ness.

So Gabe began doing this:

He ended up basically rebuilding the entire side of the stairs... and he's never done any work with stairs before, so it was an adventure. But it turned out beautiful!

The progression:

He stained all the wood, and I painted the white risers and trim. Then he stained the handrail, painted the dowels, and installed them:

And NOW:

And then, of course, there were other little projects.

décor: we picked out a loveseat, chair, rug, coffee table, curtains, art, etc...

My favorite are these pendant lights above the bar.

The girly, pink-and-green guest room... I'm proud of my thrifty over-the-bed art, which is scrapbook paper in cheap white frames. 

Master bedroom a few months ago:

Over the past few months, Gabe's also done a lot of little projects here and there. This is a little table he built to go in the small space between our two chairs:

Shelf for our microwave and toaster oven, to maximize countertop space:

Moulding around a mirror:

The Newell post at the bottom of the stairs that, in reality, is a lot more complicated/layered than it looks:

Of course, there were numerous other little things that I haven't documented - digging a drainage ditch outside to help our yard, caulking settlement cracks along the walls in our kitchen and bathrooms that gradually appeared this fall (that were caused by taking out the wall?! we don't know...), sealing around bathtubs, putting trim around the fireplace, and so many more I can't remember.

Overall, it's been an amazing journey. My only advice... if you're planning on buying a house in some stage of foreclosure, make sure that you know what you're getting yourself into! I love the HGTV shows that show flipping a house neatly compacted into a half hour of air time. ;) Clearly, it's not that easy at all. It's an amazing amount of work... though I've tracked it somewhat thoroughly in this blog, there are so many details I've left out. It took us 8 months to get to this stage, in between both of us taking classes, doing CNA clinicals, working, applying to schools, exams, holidays, etc... and that's even with all of Gabe's skills! He's an amazing handyman/carpenter - I knew he was good before, but this house really proved it. Without his abilities and knowledge, this wouldn't have even been possible... or it would've been prohibitively expensive. He's spent countless hours rebuilding, repairing, and creating things, and basically built a staircase from scratch, something he'd never done before.

It was a LOT of work, but we saw potential in this little house, even with the nasty pet-stained carpets, kinked staircase, dirty walls, and dark, small living room. It was such a good deal (especially when you consider the $8000 first-time home buyer's tax credit we'll be getting soon), is close to where we'll probably be at school for the next two years, and is a cute little first house for our married life. Plus all the upgrades will definitely set our house apart from others in the neighborhood when we try to sell it in the future... I bet we're the only one with an open floorplan. 

Some final pictures, from last weekend:

still not finished...

I've been putting off updating this until we have everything done, but if I continue doing that, there won't be an update for awhile! So, since the last update/over the past month:

--We painted the entire downstairs  - walls with primer and two coats of paint, ceiling with primer, and the baseboards and trim with another coat of white...
--Gabe installed 1/4" plywood over the living room floor, to make it the same height as the existing kitchen floor (or subfloor)
--Wood laminate flooring got installed throughout the downstairs (hired someone/workers to do this)
--Gabe put down the quarter round all around the downstairs baseboards - big job...

Other than that - well, there's been two issues.

1) The bar top we ordered from Lowes' was supposed to be a rectangular shape, curved on the two ends (2 out of the 4 corners), to match the other bar top that was already in the kitchen. Gabe even traced the exact curve of our other bar top on a piece of paper and brought it to the guy, to show him exactly the radius size to have the laminate cut.

So we went to pick it up when we were told it was ready, 2 weeks ago or so, and they brought it out and instead of having a nice smooth curve on either end, it curved to a point - and then there was just a seam, and the straight front met that seam at an angle. So instead of the nice smooth curve, there's a sharp semi-corner in the middle of it. I mean seriously? Who would order something like that? And was it the fault of the Lowes' guy we placed the order with, or the manufacturing company Lowes' sends the orders to? We were told that maybe their laminate cutting machine just couldn't cut a radius that small, but... clearly there's a machine somewhere that can cut it, because it's the same size as our existing bar top!

While we maybe could've lived with it (at a significant discount), then we noticed that the back side of the piece wasn't even covered with the laminate. So the long end of the bar top on the side of the stove/kitchen, instead of covered in gray speckled laminate, was just unfinished wood. It's a bar top! It's visible from all angles! So why...

Anyway, we re-ordered it - the new guy made some changes to the form, and supposedly we can pick it up Monday. So we'll see...

2) We had laminate wood flooring installed everywhere downstairs, including the bathroom... and part of that job was of course to disconnect and lift up the toilet to put in the floor all around it. Well, apparently, when you put a toilet back in, you're supposed to also put in a new wax seal. You know, so the toilet doesn't leak. Our guys put the toilet back in with the old wax seal, finished the floor, and were on their way. A few days later we were wondering why the bathroom downstairs smelled so bad, until Gabe checked it out. And I'm sure you can guess the rest of the story. Yes, toilet/sewage water had leaked from the toilet to get underneath our brand new floor...

Long story short, Gabe ripped up the floor/padding all around the toilet, sopped up the water, put fans on the floor to dry it out, generally cleaned it all up, and they came and replaced just the floor this past week. Gabe's going to do re-install the toilet with his contractor this week, because they'll do it correctly...

But other than those things - everything's almost done! We're really excited at how well it's coming together. And it's finally starting to feel like home - also over the past month, we've bought:

--a loveseat
--a TV
--a washer and dryer
--an elliptical machine
--a rug
--a lot more little stuff...

Within the next couple of weeks, we should get the bar top, Gabe and Aaron will fix the downstairs toilet and install our pendant lights, and Gabe'll finish the staircase. We also ordered new blinds. And then... it's just little detail work? Artwork hanging, further organizing, etc. Maybe doing something with the yard.

But here, you can see for yourselves - without further ado:

New paint color

Gabe putting down the new 1/4" plywood subfloor

with unfinished subfloor

my contribution:

the new floor!!!

the current view from our dining room:

More to come soon!

progress

Well... it's been awhile, and we've been insanely busy with the house as well as lots of other things. The finished product in our heads of what the downstairs WILL look like eventually is still a little ways off, but not too much! We've just been finishing priming yesterday/today...

Major things still to do downstairs:

-PAINT! (obviously a huge step)

-have the bartop countertop come in to Lowes and then install it

-prepare the floors

-INSTALL the laminate flooring (though I think we might pay someone to do that, because honestly, we just want to be able to live peacefully in our house).

We're living here now... moved in last weekend to a 95% finished upstairs... but the downstairs is still a construction zone. Hence the lack of updates. But here are some pictures of the painted and carpeted upstairs, as well as rebuilding the stairway:

master bedroom. forgive the boxes.

office

"green room"/guest room.

A much more exciting update will come soon, with painted walls (and hopefully a bartop?) downstairs!

wall removal

So this past week - Gabe, Aaron, and Drew took out the wall for real, put up huge beams to hold up the second floor, moved the electrical wiring around, and put sheetrock over the beam, among other things... and then this weekend Gabe and I painted. As in, painted the entire upstairs - 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and a hallway - a coat of primer, and 2 coats of paint. And baseboards too. Pictures of that to follow, but for now: the great disappearing wall...

cut-down studs that were the original wall

Gabe and Aaron putting in the first beam!

second beam:

beam in place, with temporary walls still there:

one wall being removed:

AND GONE:

Gabe posing on our future bar!

electrical work:

sheetrock-ing:

Soon to come: pictures of the finished paint job upstairs (and carpet, once the guy installs it this week)!

so far

Here's a quick list of what we've done up until now (though I'm sure I'm leaving out some steps):

-Ripped out all the carpet and padding, vinyl flooring, and wood floor in the entryway

-swept up the insane amount of dirt that had seeped under all this flooring

-went around and de-stapled the entire floor where the carpet/padding was (so, everywhere but the kitchen). Like 1000 staples, probably.

-cleaned, with a toothbrush and sponges, the bathroom floors/caulk around the edges of the floors

-cleaned the inside and outside and top of bathroom vanities, kitchen cabinets. Yes, the top of the cabinets. Let's just say I thought they were supposed to be beige until the rough part of the sponge revealed that they were in fact supposed to be white like the rest of the cabinets.

-built shelves in the garage to hold all our stuff

-got like 10 different paint samples and tested them out... and finally decided.

-vacuumed the cracks between the walls and floor at the baseboards

-began filling in all the dents, holes, and cracks in the walls upstairs, sanding them, and then dusting them off to get them ready to prime.

...so much more...

And the big project - Gabe and his contractor, Aaron, and another guy they work with, Drew, have started taking out the wall! It already looks and feels so much more open... or it will, once the temporary walls holding up our second floor are down...

Because pictures (and videos) say a thousand words, the wall project:

Gabe being visible in our living room from the kitchen. Success!

The temporary walls to hold up the second floor

current view from the dining room into the living room

Gabe and Drew adding the temporary walls:

Other projects/endeavors:

These pictures don't do justice to how unbelievably crooked the bottom wall of this staircase was. Or maybe you can tell?

So...

Other stair issues: they were covered in carpet (and padding, and a million staples) and now they are not!

sanding:

finished product:

The infamous de-stapling, and vacuuming:

aren't my safety goggles hot?

current master bedroom:

2 of many paint samples for downstairs. Going with the one on the bottom!

and finally, the geese neighbors: