The Downstairs Bedroom, or “An Adventure in Patience!”

October 12, 2003

We were going to do the downstairs bathroom next, however we have skipped it and started working on the downstairs bedroom. Since we have moved in over year ago, the floor has had a “bounce” to it. So, we’re pulling up the floor and starting from the ground up. The previous owner had carpeted over pressboard that was laid on top of plastic that was over the original wood flooring. There was mold between the plastic and the pressboard, so it all had to be removed.

October 17, 2003

Robert got home from work early today and pulled more of the downstairs bedroom apart. He pulled the sheetrock from the wall, and under that was (mostly) old tongue-and-groove boarding that had been wallpapered over many times in the past. At some point in the past, there must have been some damage of some sort, as a large section had been replaced with apparently whatever they could find at the time. Pulling off some of the boards to check out what the insulation was like, we discovered there was no insulation in the walls at all! That would explain why it was so cold in that room last winter. We just thought it was because the ghosts stay in that room!

October 26, 2003

Robert got in another few hours deconstructing the room today. He completed pulling all the wall boards off down to the studs, and then removed the floorboards down to the joists. Some of the joists were bad. Some weren’t even supported between the run, and some had even broken off the foundation! Well, the project price just went up! We temporarily propped up (with the help of a hydraulic jack) some of the runs under the middle of the house with cinder blocks and 2x6s. We’ll have to go back and check the entire under-flooring of the remainder of the house so we don’t have any surprises later.

March 28, 2004

Five months later, we have finally started reconstruction of the room! It was a long winter… but that’s no excuse. We just bit off a little more than we could chew at that time. This past week I was able to remove the remaining floor joists, install a new header joist and band joists, and install most of the floor joists and some of the bridging. Hopefully I’ll be able to finish the remaining bridging during the week after work so I can start working on the floor insulation this coming weekend.

May 4, 2004

The floor is completed, well everything but the top layer, which won’t go down until the walls are completed. And guess what the next part of this little adventure is… the walls!

August 14, 2004

Finished replacing and adding to the wall studs. Also removed the old broken window on the north side of the room and replaced it with a larger Pella window.

August 29, 2004

Electrical has been run, as well as coax and cat-5e. Insulation (R-19) is going in now.

September 18, 2004

Sheetrock! Sheetrock is finally going up!

October 3, 2004

The dry wall is up. The joints have been taped. Mud has been thrown. And everything has been textured.

October 8, 2004

Well, after a year (damn!) the room is coming together. The floor is done (sans the top layer, which we go pick up tomorrow to lay this weekend!); the walls have been torn down and replaced; insulation has been installed; sheetrock hung, coated and textured; and finally, after one year, painting is in progress!

October 10, 2004

The laminate floor is finally going down.

October 12, 2004

The laminate floor is done! All that is left is the closet, doors and trim.