Weeks 4, 5, &6 Moving along!

These past few weeks saw quite a  bit of progress! Week 4 saw a lot of improvements in the basement, (as seen in the last post) some more work on installing the hardwood floors, and some demo. As we were installing the hardwoods we decided on 2 things.
1. We wanted to open up the kitchen doorway as much as possible to make the area feel bigger and to let more natural light into the kitchen. and...
2. We needed to move the front door.
In it's current location the dining area feels more like an entry. You can't open the door and have a dining table. Previous owner added a pocket door and used the third bedroom as a dining room... but for most families, that just doesn't work... so the door needs to move.
Of course I decided that AFTER, we had already laid the floor around the closet wall, which meant extra work was required to pull up the boards and patch the area where the closet walls sat.

(Remember, you can click on the photos to make the bigger!)
It's a dusty job knocking out walls... We couldn't open the doorway much, but 8 inches made all the difference.

The closet before... and the front door... yes, the new door we just installed and now can't use because it swings the wrong direction...
We also plan on adding a second window where the door sits to let in more light.

You can see the area in the floor and the walls that need repairs... it will mean more work but it will be worth it to have a designated dining space and a better functioning layout. In order to move the door to this location we need to add a front porch. YAY!

We also made another trip to the dump to get rid of all the drywall and plaster, and removed the second kitchen soffit.

And with another evening's work we finally finished installing the new hardwood floors in the living room. Time for the floor sanders!!

We like to go with a local business called Cardinal Floor Sanding, they always do an amazing job! We were kicked out of the house for a whole week while we waited for them to sand, stain, and poly... but you will see, it is so worth it!!

Look back at the before photos in my first post... remember how the bank painted all over the hardwoods in the master bedroom? The first sand removed all of it....

and the results?

WOW!!!! Look at how BEAUTIFUL these floors are!!! We went with Minwax's Special Walnut and a Matte finish. These floors are stunning.

The floors we installed came out a hair lighter, just because new wood will darken over time.

Still, they are beautiful. Pictures do not do them justice. Neither does the evening lighting... Trust me when I say they are gorgeous.

While we were out of the house for week 6 , we worked a bit on our current house and some projects that needed fixed up. We did manage to work a Sunday with Rob our landscaper and added topsoil into the flower beds, edge them, and get them tilled. I laid out the plants... Just need to line them with landscaping fabric and plant. I also worked at scraping paint and cleaning up the siding to prep for painting the exterior.

The last big project we have been working on recently is the garage. We replaced the entry door, trimmed out the edges and began work on siding the garage with the fiber cement lap siding. Bye bye warped bead board!! We didn't get too far this weekend, but it is coming along!

The plans for this next week will include further work on the siding, working on drywall repairs, and *fingers crossed* the kitchen cabinets should be arriving this week! Eeek! It's exciting to see things slowly coming together!
-Cass