Basement Redo

 Well after lots of ideas, grand plans, small plans, maybe's, exciting things and doubts. We finally did some partial changes to our downstairs. After we had our renters move out of the basement apartment and we painted and got some new carpet, we have been thinking in the back of our mind to do some other things to use our space better.

BEFORE: so before, before, the top corner pic is our old carpet after we painted before we moved on into our new basement that we'd hadn't occupied for 11 years because of renters. So we added a family/theater room and a gym. We never used the kitchen, except to cut hair and used it while we remodeled our kitchen upstairs 2 years ago. And Greg used his office pretty regularly as he works from home every Friday. It's been great, it's been fine. But, we still only had 4 real bedrooms in our house. And I wanted all our boys to be downstairs someday. And we didn't really want any of them to have the room with no window. 

So, we decided to utilize our kitchen area and tear out the wall between it and the office and turn that into a family room. Then add a wall in the current family/theater room and make that a bedroom. So Jax and Creed will move from their shared bedroom to the other side of the house and will get the 2 bigger bedrooms that we created.

 Some Easter basket finding and movie watching, sword fighting, wand/Harry Potter playing and kids toy storage and other playing down there is what happens in that space. -Sometimes. Everyone still preferred to be upstairs.

 Anyways, Greg decided one day to start taking out kitchen cupboards and we had arranged with a guy in our neighborhood to build a wall for us. So we started the demo.

Demolition: Greg did most of it! Removing sheet rock, and the entire kitchen! We moved it to the patio. And a few weeks later was the dumpster clean up the city does, so then we hauled it to the dumpster out front. Easy and free. 

 Building: Adrian came and started building our wall for us in the old family room. The only pics I have are from the security camera's. And instead of removing the entire office/kitchen wall, where we'd have to pour new footings, get big beams, engineer all this house and cost was high, time was a lot, we decided to bag it and just did a pony wall. I saw it in a few spaces and figured it's an inexpensive way to change our rooms without all the hassle work and money.

Greg even had to go to Europe for while during all this. I stained the wood, got the floor ready for carpet (removing tile residue), cleaned, painted everything, sanded, arranged for carpet to be layed (we already purchased the carpet from several years before when we re-carpeted the basement - got extra) and Greg and I worked hard and pushed to get it done already!

 My paint was lighter than I wanted, ugh. But I wasn't stopping and taking it back and starting over. Samples are stupid and didn't work this time. And I didn't know you HAVE to prime new sheet rock with special primer. So I painted and it peeled. Yes, what a joke! Lesson learned. I screamed a little.

AFTER/Finished: We started April twenty something and finished June 1st. Then we moved our furniture back in, tried to get all settled. I'm still hanging stuff, but it's done and the boys love their bedrooms. And we moved the xbox downstairs... which means - they boys are always down there! This means a quieter summer upstairs. And with boys down playing, some can be upstairs playing or watching. It is great. I am a happy camper!

We brought Greg's old Foosball table from when he was growing up in from our shed and I cleaned it all up and the boys loved it and played on it for like a week straight. Then, hardly have touched it since. Ha!

Creed likes his new room and arranged his whole space. And Jax has the biggest room in the house. Needless to say, he loves it!

We also moved the little boys from upstairs to the downstairs shared bedroom. I love having them all downstairs! Well, really I wanted to keep the 2 little ones upstairs by us for a few more years maybe. But Greg said while we're moving it all, lets just move it all at once so we won't have to move the office again and all that jazz. He was right, so they are getting used to that. 

It's weird having the older 2 so far away, at the other end of the house where I can't hear a thing. Lots of change and time to get used to it all. But it is all good, and we will use our spaces well.