Introducing The Great House Project*

Remember how back in September I mentioned that there were some big changes coming for our family this fall? Well, today, some major pieces of our home renovation starts!!! (Deep breaths, deep breaths.) When it's finished, every single room in our house will look different, except for the dining room. While it's happening it's going to be pure chaos, especially since we're trying to live in the house during the bulk of it... Yikes.

As you can likely imagine, this is a super exciting, but also somewhat stressful time.

Today, I'm going to share a timeline of the process thus far and give you a few sneak peeks. Back in March, I wrote some responses to 25 questions. Specifically, I'm going to share question 23 with you in its entirety.

23. Let's jump forward a year, what would you like to have achieved in the next year?

I would love to have taken some major steps forward on getting our house renovated. We've been dreaming about doing "something" for about four years now and I just feel really stuck as to what the next steps are. If we could be doing something about it, rather than just talking about it, that would make me really happy! It just feels really big and overwhelming.

Right before I wrote the answer to that question, I had been driving Rachel to dance. On the way home I heard an ad for our local home and garden show. They mentioned we should visit if we were thinking of renovating so I told Dave we should check it out.

We headed there that weekend and, as I described it to a few friends, we speed dated every contractor at the show! There were about ten of them. We asked them all similar questions and came away with follow up meetings with two of the contractors.

We had those meetings in the first few weeks of April. After meeting with both contractors, we felt that although either one likely would have been good, we really connected with one of them. He took some of our ideas and gave us really helpful suggestions. So we signed a contract with his company in the beginning of May.

At the same time we had financing meetings with our bank and credit union. We got the financing in place about mid-June. During this time the contractor and designer were measuring our house and coming up with a design for the reno.

Throughout May, June, and July, we met with the designer and picked out flooring, new kitchen cupboards, kitchen back splash and counter tops, and various other pieces we need for the reno. We also continued going back and forth with the contractor over the designs -- mostly through email.

September and October have been a flurry of meetings with the contractor, project lead, main crew heads (one for demolition and one for building), and, of course, packing up our house. So where are we at now?

Well, today, the playroom/back entry is being taken off. And it's very likely that some basement demolition will begin this week.

 

left: The main room in the basement is ready for demolition; right: one last picnic supper in the empty playroom, which is also ready for demolition.

So what exactly are we doing?

Well, in the basement we're putting in a three piece bathroom, a bedroom for Sam, and a family room. The laundry room is staying the same, except there will be a closed wall (as opposed to the stud wall we have now) between the laundry room and the bathroom.

On the main floor, our living room is becoming our guest room, we're adding a powder room, and we're building an addition on the back which will be our new living room. It will have sliding doors out onto a deck. The kitchen is being completely gutted. We're getting a dishwasher, our counter tops are being raised to standard height, and I'm most excited that we're going to have some glass fronted cabinets so I can display my Fiestaware!!! Hahahaha!!!

On the second floor, Sam's room will become Dave's office, our room will become Rachel's bedroom, our bathroom will no longer have a door and will have a much better layout, Rachel's room is becoming my office, and there will be a door from my new office to our new bedroom which is being built on the back.

Phew. It's a lot!

I will share a few more details of how we've gotten ready, and what's happened thus far in a post later this week. For now I'll leave you with these two pictures. One is the powder room floor and one is our kitchen back splash (along with cupboard colours and counter tops). Remember how intrigued I was by the tiles in Portugal? Well, now I've brought a very small piece of it into our house! Hahahaha!

*And yes, for those of you familiar with the later JD Robb books, I totally stole my renovation hashtag from there :)