It has been a hard-working week! Despite not feeling well the first few days of the week, which slowed me down a bit, Shelly and her sister Sarah kicked into high gear and cranked out the last of the demolition. All tallied, we finished the following this week:
[x] All hardwood floors removed
[x] All baseboards removed
[x] All door trim removed
[x] All chair molding and wainscoting removed
[x] Infill wall fully demolished in living space, fireplace venting removed
[x] Bedroom prep for paint and carpet
[x] Siding removed from back, exterior wall
To really visualize the progress, I took a few after photos trying to match up the camera angles so you can see the difference. This first one shows the expanded open living space we're so excited about. It is a bit hard to see, but the new room has an extra 14 feet!
The kitchen has also been fully torn down and ready for a huge overhaul:
We had one half sunny day on Friday afternoon, and took advantage of it to do some demolition of the front yard. :) We had two giant trees that were within a foot of the house! Why builders plant trees so close to the foundation and roofline is a mystery to me. Not only can they cause issues with the foundation over time, but the leaves clog gutters and shorten roof life - one of the major problems this house has given the lack of maintenance the past few years.
Everything in this yard is about 3 years overgrown, so I ripped out the chain saw and went to town, taking out 3 trees and at least 12 bushes!
Sara managed to capture a video of us felling a large tree in the center of the yard. It was only a foot from the room, so Shelly pulled the rope to keep it leaning toward the lawn while I cut the last few inches of trunk.
Check out the pile of yard waste we created in one afternoon: about 25 cubic yards worth and taller than Sarah!
The end result is a major change in curb appeal! You can now actually see the house from the street!
As you can see, we still need to remove the tree trunk and roots, but that will be another day...
Perhaps most exciting to me, construction has already begun. We added one thing back to the house this week: a new set of French doors for the back patio. In these photos you can see the new French doors at the end of the room, and a clear delineation between the old living space (green walls) and old den (orange walls). The newly combined living space is going to be awesome for entertaining.
The external siding where these doors were installed had some major water damage and some of the wood underneath had to be replaced, the house weather wrapped, and then the doors properly installed and sealed. We couldn't have done this by ourselves, but thankfully we have an amazing mentor who is helping make sure we do all of this work safely and correctly for obvious reasons. I'll introduce him in a future post, stay tuned!
We've got a ton more construction work queued up for next week and we can't wait to share!