Officially Finished Basement

Today Bryan and my dad installed our ceiling tile downstairs. The basement is now truly finished!!! It's hard to show before and after because the lights on a ceiling make everything a different color than in real life, but I'll try to show you. Suffice it to say that the old ceiling was more than a tiny bit yellow, and not put up very well.

Before

After

I think I had the most frustration with this renovation yesterday. We were called by the local shipping company on Wednesday and told our order (kitchen cabinets) had arrived in eureka for us to pick them up. So we got Bryan's mom to come watch our kids on Friday, and got my dad to bring his trailer and I went down on Friday with my dad on the 2 hour trip. Only when we got there did we find out that our order was only one cabinets front. ONE! What?! When Bryan called the shipping company back to find out what was going on the lady acted all casual saying that was "just the other order". We were never told our stuff was coming in two shipments. And had we known we would not have made the trip, or inconvenienced our parents, until we were sure everything was in Eureka. But when you are told "your shipment was delivered" you assume that means everything don't you?? Yeesh! The actual cabinets, minus one door front, shod arrive on Tuesday. But my dad has to go back to work. So we probably won't even get the kitchen cabinets until next weekend :( but at least they are coming. And we did get the basement completely done, so the weekend wasn't totally wasted. And I am so grateful for understanding parents and in-laws. 

Downstairs Trim, Baseboards, and Upstairs Stain!!!

I am so excited! Other than a new ceiling our basement it done! DONE!!! My dad was here for the past 2 days putting up trim, baseboards, closet doors (and trimming trees that broke in the snow). He is amazing! I am so lucky to have him. He is so handy and really knows how to take something to the level of professional. Thank you dad!!!

I'm going to try to do pictures of before, during and after if I have them available for each area of the basement. 

Here is our landing area in the basement

Stairs

Family room

Hallway

Spare room

Jackson's room

Bryan also got the stain put on the living room and dining room. I love the color! And he and my dad got the pantry door in. It's exciting to see the upstairs starting to be worked on. 

What's planned to be up next? Upstairs doors and closet doors, downstairs ceiling, and tile. We should have our kitchen cabinets in 2 weeks.

Sanding and Trim

Yesterday bryan spent the day sanding our living/dining area. It looks great, but I am so excited to get it stained and regain that living space. A tiny path through the kitchen and into the basement is not conducive to traffic flow, or eating meals. 

Before (we ripped up carpet to get to the hardwood. The dinning room is still carpeted in the photo, the living room photo shows the colour of the hardwood under the carpet)

Sanded

My parents came out yesterday and my dad started putting trim and baseboards on downstairs. I can't wait to see when it's all done! It's going to look amazing!!

Paint, paint and more paint

You would not believe how much painting has been going on here! And I have to admit that less than half, maybe less than a quarter of what has been painted would be done at this point, if Bryan's mom hadn't come to the rescue last week and this week. She is a trooper! She also saved me as I got crazy sick for a few days and she was here to let me sleep and rest (and painted while doing that). Again. It doesn't look like a lot when you just walk in our house but we've been busy!!! All of upstairs was painted (girls room, our room, kitchen, family room and dinning room). The bay window was a pain to paint, but needed to be done so the paint is dry when we sand the floor (hopefully tomorrow).

It's impossible to see, but the framing around our bay window is the same white as the mirror above. Which I also painted :)

Now look at these baseboards and door trims...

 

Multiply that amount by about ten and that is how much is in our garage waiting to be cut and nailed. But thanks in large part to shirley, they are all painted.

Those doors in the picture above are the closet doors for the bedrooms in the basement which I painted. I also painted all the doors for upstairs which will hopefully go in soon. (There are 3).

So if you were in our house 2 weeks ago, you would walk in and see the painting done upstairs, but we have been busy with so much more painting! My right arm is sore and much stronger than it used to be. Also, on a side note, there is so much more to painting than you think. Taping and taking off (then replacing) outlet covers, drop cloths... It all takes so much time! And then you have to wait for everything to dry and do a million touch ups. Again, I am so grateful for Shirley's help! 

We also found out today that our kitchen cabinets get shipped next week! So hopefully we can pick them up by the end of the month (a couple of weeks sooner than anticipated but very welcomed). I cannot wait for my new kitchen! This is the style of doors. But they are picket fence white, and we haven't picked out hardware yet. 

We also placed a deposit for our gas fireplace which will go in our living room. But no photo of that. 

Things are coming together, but as you can tell from the "painting" pictures, we are living in an organized disaster right now. I look forward to just organized within the next couple of months.