Renovation: The Wall is gone!

Okay not completely gone but the dry wall is gone. 

You can really start to see just how open the living room is going to be.  Bill has his assignment from our contactor for what must be completed before the crew arrives on Tuesday.  We must have the drywall gone on the walls and pieces of walls that are going to be removed.  The studs must remain because most of the walls we are removing are load bearing and beams must be put in place along with columns.

Before

So far, between our nephew and Bill:

• The wall dividing the living room and hallway has been demolished.  
• The wall between the telephone room and the living room is gone. 
• The carpet is gone in the hallway and telephone is gone
• We found out there is hardwood through out the house and we are pulling out all the carpet and refinishing the whole house! WOOHOO! Can you tell I am excited?

After

Sunday's agenda:

• Pack up the kitchen and in the process determine what must be packed and what is going out to the RV
• Move furniture out of our bedroom and closet room in anticipation of pulling up carpet
• Couponing (a whole other story that I haven't written yet)
• Laundry

Renovation Day 1 - Demolition starts

TODAY is the day! Demolition of the kitchen, living room, dining room, eat-in kitchen area, weird double entry foyer and hallway has begun.

I foresee lots of Wordless Wednesday posts coming out of this renovation!  For today I will outline what we are doing and how it is going!

To understand what we are doing, please take a look at the existing floor plan.  Can you see a major design flaw in the kitchen?  Wait for it................. yep you guessed it, the cook top island.   If you think it looks bad in a flat drawing, it is nothing compared to the reality.  Both Bill and I have lost over 200lbs from our largest weight, and we still can't get by it without turning sideways.  And heaven forbid you have someone who wants to come into the kitchen when the oven door is down!

Here are some of the highlights of our new plan, come back later this week to see the floor plans!

• Kitchen wall where the refrigerator is today will be gone, at least the upper portion
• New door to a new deck on the sink side of the kitchen
• Flooring refinished darker throughout the house
• New cook top, oven/microwave/convention oven combo on the wall
• New cabinets, sink and counter top
• Today's dining room will be the study and Jea's classroom
• Today's Eat-in kitchen area (also known as the den by Bill and his sister) will be the dining room
• Living room wall that makes the hallway is gone

Today, the carpet in the hallway and the molding from all of the front rooms is being removed by Bill and his nephew.