Also, note that weird piece of fabric in the middle upper right hand corner--just another sign of how trashy this place must have been!
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Steroid Worm
You can't see it very well in this picture, but this worm MUST have a growth hormone problem--He was freaking huge!! I mean like 1 cm wide and 7 inches long!!! We have two tree stumps in the back yard, one we finally dug up since it was rotten and the other we couldn't get up yet. There is a bunch of sedum planted around them so I transplanted the sedum plants to around the deck and found this guy.
Also, note that weird piece of fabric in the middle upper right hand corner--just another sign of how trashy this place must have been!
Also, note that weird piece of fabric in the middle upper right hand corner--just another sign of how trashy this place must have been!
Basement Laundry Room Progress
Oh where to begin? This was kind of a whirlwind project for us. When we moved in, we always said we could finish the basement since it had all the 80s paneling in it, looked dry and it wasn't very scary to go into. I didn't think it was something we were actually going to do--and do this soon.
It all started one night when Cody was trying to cheer me up and give me a project, so we demo'ed this awkward closet in the laundry room. And by we demoing, I mean Cody demoing and I watched and took the nails out of boards. I thought we were going to stop there--it already made a big improvement in the space. Then I think Cody got real into it. And that is how we got to starting this project.We forgot to do the before picture, and I will warn you---These pictures don't show anything very well. 1. I have a bad camera and 2. the room is only about 12x11 so it's not great for showing more than one wall at a time. It could be frustrating.
Here is the closet we demo'ed--we put all of our paint in it before. It's on the wall with the staircase, so it made for a very dark space under the stairs and I never actually used that under stair area for storage. I will now though--so excited!!
Here is the space after the closet is out--we found lots of stuff under there, including a can of tomatoes from the government! I couldn't tell how old it was--probably from the previous owners so anywhere from 1986 until 2011. I have a feeling this place was quite the site when the flipper guy bought it last February. I especially get this feeling when I find fake flower leaves in the yard and I actually dug up a straw. I mean really, who finds a freaking straw in their yard? An a ball of aluminum foil.
Here is a shot of the room as you come in through the door--the back wall is where all the electrical and plumbing is so it's going to stay this layout. I'll be up front--this is not going to be a fancy room, just going to look a lot better and it is basically our dry walling practice for our kitchen project. Although I just asked Cody if we are going to break open the dry wall to put in the electrical boxes that we want to run through our future half-wall he just said "maybe"...hmm...Oh well, Cody must like this project. Oh, the kitchen is right above this room so that's why I asked. On another note, we are leaving the ceiling unfinished for now; at most we will put in a drop ceiling since we have a lot of junction boxes and plumbing and gas lines in this room.We don't know what we are going to do with the dryer vent--it was one of those things you think of later in the process. Again, practice makes perfect! Also, I'm a kitty litter pail hoarder. The clumping litter only comes in these stupid plastic bins and I hate throwing/recycling them. They seem so useful. For example, we may use them to mix up the drywall mud stuff! So so so many options--I have like 5 of them already (one of which is noted in the squirrel post!)
I plan to put a small wall cabinet above the washer and dryer. We have to build a box for the dryer and stuff to sit on as well since the floor drains to the drain in the middle of the room, meaning the feet on the machines aren't expandable enough to accommodate for the floor slope. We wanted to build a cement box at first, but since our cement floor is painted, we figured it wouldn't hold up very well and the wet cement would poor out the bottom of our mold. Now we are going to just build something--we don't really know what yet.
Here is the room with the paneling taken down and the wall on the right of the doorway is gone. I wanted to make the laundry room smaller and the first room bigger, but the support beam just seams like a good place to put a wall, so we are leaving the layout as is. Unfortunately, people put all the utilities right smack dead in the middle of the basement so this makes for 3 small rooms with a weird hallway. Oh well!
After we cleaned all that mess up, we thought we were finished, but nope, demo-ing is addictive!! Here's the before:
During (that board in the top is where we have to add a half-way in the kitchen)
During again (It's so weird to see what little you stand on in the floor above!)
And after!! The other side needs to be torn down as well since we need to dry wall it so the entry from the back door looks okay. We also need to put new stair treads and risers on to really dress it up. This stair well is the first thing you see every time you come in the back door.
So far, it hasn't been too bad. This weekend was the first real weekend of DIY-ing. On Friday, we took the washer, dryer, and sink out and completely gutted the space--minus the wall in between the first room and laundry because there are some sketchy wires that Cody is "avoiding".
Cody is actually very handy. I am impressed with his skills. We are a little unsure about how to vent the drain from the sink, but we will look into that. So far, Cody has soldered the hot and cold pipes for the laundry shut so we could move them, taken apart some electrical boxes so we can frame around them and he finished the framing last night. Well, framing around the back and window wall. We still have the rest of the room to do, but we wanted to do these two walls first so we could hook our washer back up and do laundry soon. We took about 5 trips to Lowe's and 3 trips to Home Depot on Saturday. On Sunday, we decided to spend the money on an air compressor and nail gun because framing with Cody's trusty ol' blue drill was not going fast at all. We have bought so many cool tools--Cody said what we save in labor we are gaining in tools! I think we are going to have to build a special storage for all ourshit tools. I have soooo many projects lined up for our nail gun though--including crown molding in the living room, new carport roof, bead board in the dining room or bathroom, etc etc etc. We also bought a hole saw today which I immediately thought to myself "ooh I can build birdhouses now!" The possibilities are ENDLESS!!!! haha. Ok, I think I am done with this post right now. Cody has finished most of the framing and he is working on plumbing the sink, I will post more pictures soon. Tonight was supply getting and "reading" night.
P.S.-sorry for the awkward page layout. I started messing with it and then stopped, but I don't feel like messing with it anymore so it's staying for awhile. I have so many projects I can't remember them all!!!
It all started one night when Cody was trying to cheer me up and give me a project, so we demo'ed this awkward closet in the laundry room. And by we demoing, I mean Cody demoing and I watched and took the nails out of boards. I thought we were going to stop there--it already made a big improvement in the space. Then I think Cody got real into it. And that is how we got to starting this project.We forgot to do the before picture, and I will warn you---These pictures don't show anything very well. 1. I have a bad camera and 2. the room is only about 12x11 so it's not great for showing more than one wall at a time. It could be frustrating.
Here is the closet we demo'ed--we put all of our paint in it before. It's on the wall with the staircase, so it made for a very dark space under the stairs and I never actually used that under stair area for storage. I will now though--so excited!!
Here is the space after the closet is out--we found lots of stuff under there, including a can of tomatoes from the government! I couldn't tell how old it was--probably from the previous owners so anywhere from 1986 until 2011. I have a feeling this place was quite the site when the flipper guy bought it last February. I especially get this feeling when I find fake flower leaves in the yard and I actually dug up a straw. I mean really, who finds a freaking straw in their yard? An a ball of aluminum foil.
I plan to put a small wall cabinet above the washer and dryer. We have to build a box for the dryer and stuff to sit on as well since the floor drains to the drain in the middle of the room, meaning the feet on the machines aren't expandable enough to accommodate for the floor slope. We wanted to build a cement box at first, but since our cement floor is painted, we figured it wouldn't hold up very well and the wet cement would poor out the bottom of our mold. Now we are going to just build something--we don't really know what yet.
Here is the room with the paneling taken down and the wall on the right of the doorway is gone. I wanted to make the laundry room smaller and the first room bigger, but the support beam just seams like a good place to put a wall, so we are leaving the layout as is. Unfortunately, people put all the utilities right smack dead in the middle of the basement so this makes for 3 small rooms with a weird hallway. Oh well!
After we cleaned all that mess up, we thought we were finished, but nope, demo-ing is addictive!! Here's the before:
So far, it hasn't been too bad. This weekend was the first real weekend of DIY-ing. On Friday, we took the washer, dryer, and sink out and completely gutted the space--minus the wall in between the first room and laundry because there are some sketchy wires that Cody is "avoiding".
Cody is actually very handy. I am impressed with his skills. We are a little unsure about how to vent the drain from the sink, but we will look into that. So far, Cody has soldered the hot and cold pipes for the laundry shut so we could move them, taken apart some electrical boxes so we can frame around them and he finished the framing last night. Well, framing around the back and window wall. We still have the rest of the room to do, but we wanted to do these two walls first so we could hook our washer back up and do laundry soon. We took about 5 trips to Lowe's and 3 trips to Home Depot on Saturday. On Sunday, we decided to spend the money on an air compressor and nail gun because framing with Cody's trusty ol' blue drill was not going fast at all. We have bought so many cool tools--Cody said what we save in labor we are gaining in tools! I think we are going to have to build a special storage for all our
P.S.-sorry for the awkward page layout. I started messing with it and then stopped, but I don't feel like messing with it anymore so it's staying for awhile. I have so many projects I can't remember them all!!!
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