Basement Progress Weeks 0-5

Our basement finishing is still going! They have officially been working 5 weeks with 1 week of break on week 3 for plumbing/electrical and AC work.

David and Bill worked long and hard at first digging up (through concrete) and re routing pipe lines for the spare bathroom and moms bathroom.

It was messy and loud (they used a jack hammer) but they worked hard. This was all before the crew could start.

It looks like they started digging an underground tunnel.

Max helping to load the concrete mixer from Home Depot.

The first week of the job was demo and starting to insulate and frame. This was our first truckload of supplies coming down the street.

Dry wall, framing lumber and insulation.

Next up we had delivery of our new AC unit. It was great entertainment for Max to watch the guys unload all the supplies.

Gigi and I had fun picking out some paint colors and bathroom tile testing it out in different lighting scenarios. She is showing you our greige wall color we chose.

I wanted to get some before pictures to remember what it used to look like. Our steps are now turned to give more room for mom's bathroom. I'm so glad David is talented and can envision all this (and draw it all out). It created a little more work plumbing wise and for the steps but it will be so worth it for her bigger bathroom and bedroom.

Our big helper!

Original studded bathroom.

Steps

Original hallway/under stairs area.

Max working hard apparently with a bike tire pump (who knows where he finds this stuff).

Back craft room/extra bedroom.

Looking into the playroom/living room/kitchen area. The major change in this room is knocking out the side wall area/big beam to make it a more open space.

Looking in from the back kitchen area to the new playroom/living room.

You can see the concrete all filled in here and the steps are being taken out to start turning them.

Demo cleaning

These next photos are progress photos after the demo and before the framing/insulation.

The biggest change in this space will be when the AC/hot water heater stuff from the far right is moved to the closet area on the left side of this picture. This will free up a whole side wall area for the kitchen refrigerator/oven area. Again it was a little more expensive to do it this way, but David knew we needed the extra space.

David enlisted the help of brother in law Mark and brother Darrin for the electrical and plumbing work.

Its clear judging from these photos who did all the work (ahem Mark). JK! They all worked very hard for 2 weekends plus David worked every night finalizing all the lighting. It is a lot of work trying to figure out where every single light, switch and outlet needs to go, Thanks Darrin!!

Hi Ian! We even had a family party for labor day at our house just to get them to come back over to help :)!

The framing in progress.

Here you can clearly see the steps that have been turned and mom's entrance to her room on the left hand side.

AC work

Insulation.

Steps turned.

Then there was more of the same thing going on for a while so I went back down once some of the drywall was done. You can see the puttying also. Man, is it dirty down there from all the sanding.

These steps aren't done, but just wanted to note the progress.

Looking into the kitchen area. New closet area with AC and hot water heater has been moved.

This was where the old units were. Look how much open space it freed up for the sink area/refrigerator and oven! You can also see some doors.

Utility Closet.

This is mom's room and her cool ceiling. The door leads to her walk in closet.

Her washer/dryer will go to the right into tucked into a corner.

The biggest change is in her bathroom. Look at all the gorgeous tile! I'm proud of us for choosing all this. It really came together! I LOVE it. She's going to have the best shower around! She has a bench in there also. I love the colors! It's not grouted yet.

The biggest change in the back bedroom/craft room is the addition of a window! It brings so much light in and I'm so glad we did it.

It's hard to get a picture but you can see it up there. Our contractor says he will be done by this friday, but I'm thinking at least through the weekend. He's making some good progress though so we will see. He's already painted most ceilings and some walls. All that's left is flooring, grout, painting, trim work and finishing steps. David will still have a few things to finish after his test at the end of October (putting in the kitchen cabinets and doing the steps with hardwoods).  I'm getting excited. The end of October we are having lots of family come to town so we will be utilizing our new 7 bedroom space hopefully! Each couple/kid can have their own room, they will be spoiled!