This Old House- Part II

We didn't take that many pictures of the "during" process. This entire project is a tribute to my husband's amazing work ethic and his unwavering diligence once he starts a project. I know of people who have remodeled houses for years, sometimes never finishing. A lot of people say they've remodeled their houses when all they've done is switch out the carpet and repaint the walls, maybe replace a sink. We didn't remodel this house. We gutted it and rebuilt it completely. It was amazing how much wood and concrete we hauled out of this house. We completed the entire remodel (trim included) in fifteen months. There is nothing left undone except the unfinished basement, which Nathan is chomping at the bit to finish.

This was the living room after we took out the shag carpet. This wood floor is the only original floor left in the whole house. We managed to save it and refinish it. This is the kitchen at the beginning of the demolition.

And this is the kitchen a few weeks later. Nathan is standing in the same corner pictured above. See the log exterior walls behind him. This house is solid. I am no longer afraid of tornadoes (not that we get them here.)

Good-bye nasty bathroom.

This was the green bedroom.

This is my living room. That is the front door behind Ethan. The corner bedroom (the green one) we sacrificed to make and office and an opening for both sets of stairs. This was taken right before Lynn cut out the floor in the old hallway and put in a new set of stairs. Taking out the old basement stairs added three feet to our kitchen.

Upstairs we were already rebuilding. We removed the hidden rooms to make closets, and this storage cubby, which goes the length of the house. This was where the built-in dresser used to be.

The old kitchen gone, we moved this wall back and added three feet to our master bedroom. It does have a sloped ceiling, but I actually like it that way.

Obviously with this much destruction in the house, we had to move out. We'd originally planned to live on one level and remodel the other, but when we realized we'd have to redo all the plumbing and electrical, it meant doing it all at once. We rented the cheapest apartment we could find. It was a tiny one bedroom, and-- I'm not exaggerating about this-- our current master bedroom is bigger than the entire apartment. We put the bunk beds and our queen bed in the bedroom, and there was only about 12 inches in between them. There wasn't room for Mazie's bed, so the boys had to sleep in one bunk and she slept in the other or sometimes on the floor.