Ahhhh....the smell of fresh cut lumber!

That's the smell when you open the door at the new house now....and that means that change is in the air!  :)  (that makes me happy!)

My work station for the day!  This is the kind of work I really enjoy doing!

Here's the new master bath/closet view from inside the bedroom..just a few more things to do here.  I can't wait to see my clawfoot tub in that bathroom!  YEAH!  I've been saving it for like 10 years!

New view from the back bedroom.  The new wall is up with the 3 doorways (2 bedroom doors and the NEW full bathroom!  YES!!!)  We still need to frame in the bathroom and closet.

Hallway view from the front bedroom.  The stud in the middle at the end of the hallway closed up the old entry to the only bathroom on the main floor.

 

This is the new entrance to the hallway from the front door.  It went from 32" to 57".

That REALLY helped make it feel more "open" there!

More framing to do tomorrow.  A framing crew would be nice about now!

Let's Build Something!

We got our delivery of framing lumber this morning....and the delivery truck got stuck in the yard, lol!  Kade had to pull him out with our truck.  Gotta love it!  We definitely need to expand the driveway turn around/parking area.  It's just not big enough for trucks!!

I caught the end of it!  Our truck pulled the delivery truck sideways before pulling it back onto the road.

Here's the old bathroom - turning into the master bath and a walk in closet!

There's Kade framing up the master closet door.

We got a little bit done today....rehabbing is so much more difficult than starting from scratch!!  Tomorrow...more framing!

Planning, Planning, Planning...

That's ALL we've done this week.  Cleaned and planned!!  Planned, and then planned some more!!  Today we went over to RP Lumber and got prices on some stuff that we need...and ordered the lumber so that we can start our framing!  YEAH!!  It'll be here sometime in the morning...let's get movin'!

Invention Please!!

I need someone to invent a super dust sucking vacuum for demolition  :)  It needs to get all the tiny drywall and plaster particles!!  All I did today was clean up piles, pull nails and VACUUM!!  It's amazing how long it takes to Vacuum 1750 sq. ft.!!  I think I might have gotten half done and it took me over 3 hours!  Yuck!  I can't tell you how bad I wanted to just get my Dyson out and walk around instead of using the shop vac with the angle tip and crawling all over the place!  It looks a little better I guess...

We did decide to leave the plaster in the hall closet and the front bedroom.  There wasn't anything wrong with it and it'll be a tiny bit of drywall that we won't have to do  :)  Every little bit helps!

Tomorrow...more vacuuming!  Hopefully framing by this weekend...YEAH!!!

NO MORE PLASTER!!!

Well...there is still a little bit more plaster, lol!  Geesh, it's like it never goes away!!  (and I never want to see any again...EVER!!)  Dad, Kade and I worked today on finishing up the plaster removal. (and the zillion nails that held it all to the walls, lol)  We just about got it done.

There's Dad, lol, admiring our work  :)  I was standing in the back bedroom taking the picture...and you can see all the way through to the front bedroom.

We really know how to make a mess don't we? 

The back bedroom...soon to be the Master!

Of course, it was the first Saturday of February...so we had do stop early and go watch/help our friends The Harmans at their music show at Harman Auction in Shipman, IL.  Here are some of my favorite pics - cause you know that's all I was doing all night, lol, just taking pics!

This month was Jerry Butler and the Blu-J's  They were great, as always!

 

Mike & John Harman of The Harmans

John, Jeff and Mark Harman (three of my favorite guys!!)

The Pitney's were also there this month...and they were awesome of course!  That's Johnny over there on the right..he just "had" to interrupt their song, lol.  It was great!

 

Mo Pitney - Watch for this kid...he's got a record deal in the works!  We've been listening to his music for over a year and he is OUTSTANDING!!

Holly Pitney...a beautiful voice as well...when's her record deal??

The Harmans & The Pitney's jammin' at the end of the night.  (minus the girls)

We had a great night!  This was by far one of my favorite shows yet!  We went back to The Harmans after the show and listened to them jam until about 2 a.m.  I could barely keep my eyes open...but the music was great!  So glad we got to be there!!  Tomorrow...back to the grind!

The Beginning of the End

...of destruction that is  :)  At least I hope it is!  Today we started gutting the bedrooms/hallway.  Mike & Johnny came over and helped us and we made a pretty big dent in it!  We didn't get to the ceilings...they are TERRIBLE.  They're like 1/2" drywall and then at least 3/4" of plaster over the top!  They weigh a ton and have the radiant heat wires running through them about every 2-3".  Ugh!

View from the old dining room (that's the bathroom on the right and straight into the bedrooms!

Middle bedroom.  How's that for a view??  :)  Maybe walls are overrated, ha ha!

 

The back bedroom and only main floor bathroom...soon to become a Master bedroom/bath and walk in closet!  That'll be nice!

 

View from the entryway into the hallway (and the middle bedroom now, lol)  We opened up that walkway in to the hallway by almost 2 ft.  That helped open up the entryway a LOT!

Hopefully we'll be able to finish up the plaster removal tomorrow and get this place cleaned up!

Time for a new dumpster

Well, Kade finally called about getting the dumpster taken away....and bringing it back for us to fill again!!!  We definitely underestimated the amount of trash we would have, lol!  So the weight limit on that bad boy was 5 tons...and $48 for every ton over that we have....anyone want to guess how much weight was in that one?  It looks full but not overloaded, right?  Well...we had just under 8 TONS of trash in there!!  All it really is is plaster...very little of anything else!!  Whoa baby!!  But...the new dumpster is back so we can start filling it up again!

 Yeah!! (Who gets excited about dumpsters?? lol!)

We worked on taking the cedar the rest of the way out of the stairway tonight.  It didn't take us very long, but we did find out where the termite damage was!  (We knew the house was treated for termites because there are holes drilled EVERYWHERE!!)  The damage looks pretty bad - and it is, on the boards that actually have damage...but we got lucky overall and it doesn't look like anything structural has any damage.  Whew!  Just a few boards to replace and we will be back in business!

Isn't it crazy that bugs can do that??

 They did get the side of the stairs to the basement, but we should be able to fix that pretty easily.

This is probably the worst of the damage...the header above the "Utility" room door.

Tomorrow we will start the gutting of the rest of the house!!  I think we will be SOOOO much happier with this floor plan!  Let's get it done!!