Inside work has begun on the second bedroom

If you've been wondering what the addition looks like from the inside, you're finally going to find out. Until a week ago, the inside of the house looked fairly normal. There were some new electrical outlets, a few new windows, and a couple of windows that had been removed, but nothing exciting or picture-worthy.

Last week we broke through the old gable wall in the second bedroom (that's the one in the front of the house, which was set up as a guest room/office). Now when you walk into the bedroom from the hallways, you can go from the existing part right into the addition.


If you head towards the addition part, you can even look to the right into what will be the new part of the master bedroom.

We're hoping to have the second bedroom finished by Christmas, and will move on to finishing the master bedroom after that. I'm also hoping to reclaim my dining room for at least a few days to host Christmas dinner (most of the stuff that was in the second bedroom has been temporarily stuffed into the dining room).

Catching up, part II

The front wall of the house was the second to be completed finished (after the gable wall). With all of the soffit, facia, and siding installed, the house looks basically finished from the front (except for the window stickers, various construction items and lack of landscaping/shutters).
We had been accessing the addition from the outside by leaving the last small window (as wells as the sill and crip) uninstalled. In order to get to a point where we were ready to close up that access and break through the old gable wall, the insulation for the addition had to be installed. The rough electrical for the two bedrooms was also completed and cuts were made for the new heat/air conditioning vents in the two bedrooms. The rough wiring for phone jacks is even completed.

Deciding on the placement for the outlets and vent meant a lot of time spent bent over the plans, staring at them and trying to envision possible furniture arrangements (with many breaks while I ran to measure a piece of furniture). It was reminiscent of when I made the decision on what windows I wanted and where.

Once the rough electrical and insulation inspections were passed, the last window (the small one to the right of the scaffold in the picture below) was installed and the back wall was finished.

Landscaping and shutters will probably not happen until the Spring. Landscaping for obvious weather reasons, and the shutters because we're still debating color. I had originally suggested the idea of blue (a darker blue, but not as dark as navy), but Chuck wasn't sure how that would look. So I suggested black, and he was amicable to that. Unfortunately, his mind reading powers weren't working that day, and he didn't realize that I intended to match the color of the front door to the shutters. As it turns out, he doesn't like the idea of a black front door. So we're back to blue. Which means I have to find the shade of blue that I have in my head that's available for shutters and a door that I like. That could take a while.

Time for a catch up post (or several)

How many entries can I start with a statement about how I haven't blogged in a while and I promise to be better about updating in the future? I wish I could say this is the last, but we'll see.

Anyway, a lot has been done over the past two and a half months, but for now let's start with some of the things we got done in September:

On Labor Day weekend we disconnected the electrical service, relocated everything to the new gable wall, and hooked it back up again. No one got electrocuted, none of the food in the fridge/freezer spoiled, and I was even able to make it to a friend's birthday celebration that evening (albeit a little late). The phone service was relocated a few days later. Because no post is complete without pictures, here's a shot of Dad on the scaffold working with the electrical lines:

A few weeks later, the house got a new roof. We realize that we would never be able to match our 15 year old shingles (which have discolored over time), and that we (meaning I) would never be happy with an eight foot stripe of not-quite-matching shingles on the roof. And really, no one wanted to hear me complain about it for years to come.

So we ended up hiring a roofer to re-do the entire roof. It was money well spent, and they completed the job in one day. If you're looking for a roofer in this area, let me know and I'll happily give you the contact information.

Of course, a new roof meant that we got to pick out any color shingles we wanted. Or, I debated over the color choices while my husband said he was fine with whatever I wanted and my father reminded me that I needed to make a decision and let the roofer know sooner rather than later.

Since I'd never been crazy about the gray shingle / yellow brick combination (I know some people love gray and yellow together, but I'm not one of them), we ended up going with Shakewood. Here's a picture of the roof on the day it was finished:

In the picture above, you can also see that we finished the Tyvek on the front of the house, and finished installing the new windows in the front. You can get a much better idea of the layout of the new windows now that the last old window is gone. The triple window on the far left is almost nine feet wide and fairly heavy, but installation went very smoothly. Same thing for the new double window that's to the left of the front door.

More to come in the next catch-up post.