Second Floor - Before and After

Well, today is the day. We're moving upstairs. We've officially "finished" the second floor remodel.

I put "finished" in quotes because, of course, we have a few things left (baseboards in the closets, hanging up the hallway light, paint touch up, installing a stair runner). But that's OK. We can live upstairs and do those things.

More than anything, both of us are looking forward to living somewhere with color after seven years of "landlord white."

"Seven years!" people exclaim when I tell them. Yeah, well. We never really had much of a formal timeline. And in addition the remodeling the second floor, we replaced the windows, front door, front porch, fence, roof and siding, front walkway, landscaping, and HVAC.

And we fixed assorted things that broke all over the place - sinks, toilets, ceilings that came crashing down.

And we enjoyed life. We went on vacation - including two times overseas. We got bikes and rode them all over the place. We celebrated weddings and birthdays with our family. We had friends over and went to see movies and concerts. 

So with all of that, seven years doesn't seem too bad to me. 

Now for the pictures.

Front Room - Before

 Front Room - After

Bedroom - Before

Bedroom - After

Bathroom - Before

Bathroom - After

Hallway/Stairs - Before

 Hallway/Stairs - After

Amazing.

It doesn't get much more amazing than these before/after photos of our floors. But first, I'll extend the suspense by writing a bit about them.

The floors in our house are just planks of old growth pine. There's no subfloor. And while old growth pine is much harder than new pine, it's still a soft-ish wood.

Additionally, all of the floors had been covered with tile, linoleum, carpet, and more. They had been through water damage and leaks. They had a gazillion nails and staples pounded into them (remember this from 18 months ago?).

Our expectations were pretty low. We knew there would be irregularities in the wood. We thought parts might turn out OK. But wow. Just wow. We hired a terrific contractor, who is EPA certified for all of that nasty old dust (maybe there was lead, maybe there was asbestos). Three days later, it was like magic.

So here are the pics. Amazing.

Stairs before:

 

Stairs after:

 

Hallway before:

 

Hallway after:

 

Front room before:

 

Front room after:

Master bedroom before:

Master bedroom after (with bonus Mike!):

Next up: lighting and trim!

Second floor drywall is done!

Done done done!

Check out the finished stairwell:

I like the math magic shown in the last picture. You can tell Mike has a minor in mathematics, right?

So we close out 2011 with all walls up, and with mudding and sanding next on the list. It's a pretty good feeling. This year, we've rebraced the attic stairs, insulated all second floor walls, hung ceilings and walls, added a new garage door and opener, replaced our fence, grown and harvested a lovely little garden, stripped paint, cleaned plaster off of brick, and done our best to maintain social and professional lives.

The pictures below are a good indicator of our progress.

Drywall pile when it was delivered:

Drywall pile today:

See ya, 2011 - bring on the mudding and sanding in 2012!

Drywall-a-palooza: Part 2

Found the camera. It was on the third floor, on Mike's desk. Of course!

Before I show off the finished bedroom walls, I want to share some of the work that has to happen before drywall goes up.

Modern construction follows a set of strict rules and measurements to ensure that the building process is ultra-efficient, from both a time and materials standpoint. For example, modern studs are generally spaced 16 or 24 inches apart, to ensure that sheets of drywall that measure 4 x 8 feet will fit evenly.

In 1890, the whole house was made of plaster and lath, so it didn't matter if the studs were irregularly spaced. But since we're using modern 4 x 9' sheets of drywall, we have extra work. See the extra piece of pine that's screwed to the stud on the right side of this picture?

And the pieces on the third and sixth (from the left) studs? Yep - those are extra pieces we need to add to make sure there's something that will hold the drywall.

  

For our next lesson in old ass house construction, take a look at the next image. That's new insulation hung on an interior wall. Wondering why we'd ever do that?

Here's the deal. Plaster and lath construction is incredibly heavy, durable, and thick. It's very soundproof. That's one of the main reasons that old houses feel "solid" while modern McMansions feel hollow and echo-y. Most home restorers try to keep the plaster around and have it repaired.

That wasn't possible for us given the thirty or so fist-sized holes in each ceiling, and the scary wiring, and the lack of exterior wall insulation. So we're using insulation around the master bedroom to bump up the soundproofing.

Once all of that extra work is done, the actual walls can be added. Look! Our bedroom!

Last topic for the day: paint stripping. I may have mentioned earlier that all of the woodwork in the entire house has been painted. While Mike and my dad hang walls, I've been stripping paint. Here's the bedroom doorway so far. The next picture represents about 5 hours of work with the heat gun and putty knife.

 

And sometimes the painted woodwork is hard to reach. So I get to use the stilts!

Next up, hallway walls and more paint stripping.