House Renovation Phase Three: Building Walls

If you recall from an earlier post, my first five days on the ground
in the U.S. was doing major deconstruction on our new home before we
 left for Indiana and New Jersey. This was the former state of one part of the
kitchen/great room area.  To the left was a U shaped kitchen.  Left of the kitchen
was a small ham radio operation, and to the right of the kitchen was
this cavernous space of an office.  Both had to go to expand the kitchen :)

The first order of business was removing the non-working
 wood stove, tearing down the brick wall and hearth around
it, and removing the cabinets in the office area. The doorway
that you see on the right, next to the bookcase was the doorway
to the newly completed 9' x 11' guest bedroom.

By removing the ham radio/kitchen wall on the left, we needed
to extend the right kitchen wall by two feet, to make room for
the appliances, and the 18" tall pantry cabinet.  This extended
our kitchen wall from 10' to 12'.  We then built a 7' wall
perpendicular to that to create an "accent wall" when you enter
the front door.  If you turn the corner toward the window of the
former office space, we had plans to build a hallway to the guest
bedroom with a laundry closet becoming the hallway wall, and a guest
bathroom at the end of the hall.  While our guest bath is not en suite,
they will only have to walk out the bedroom door, and in to the bathroom
door to their immediate right.  When we have parties or gatherings,
we can tell people to use the bathroom at the end of the hall :)

With the wall framed up, next we hung drywall.
This angle is actually the kitchen extension and part
of the "accent wall" which boxes in the 18" tall pantry.

Len roughed in the wiring for the new wall, and worked on the
joint compound, while I took to sanding and refinishing the
guest bathroom and dining windows.  I also started making the
rounds on the drywall repair to the kitchen ceiling- working on the
patches Len made where the left kitchen/ham radio wall came down.

As we could begin to see the layout of our new
walls for the laundry, hall, and guest bathroom,
we were tossing and turning one night, unable to
sleep as we were in 'remodel overdrive.'  By about
2am, we gave up on sleep, got up, and Len moved an
air conditioning vent from the former 'office' to the
new hallway.  The present placement of the vent
was directly where we needed to construct the
guest bathroom wall at the end of the hall, so it
had to be moved.  Best to be crawling around in the
attic when it is not 120 degrees up there during the day!

The next day, walls went up for the bathroom.
Where the desk is will one day be the toilet.
To the left of the doorway, where you see the
framing will be a shower unit, and the vanity will
be on the same wall that the bathroom door swings
open to, in part, under the window :)

Len took the door from the Jack and Jill doorway that was
removed in the guest bedroom, and reused it for the new
guest bathroom.  He began hanging drywall, and to the left
you see the white plantation style bifold doors that will be
used in the laundry area.  Two of the three cabinets that you
saw in the "office" (the very first picture of this post) will
also be rehung in the 'laundry room' for storage above the
stainless washer and dryer unit we'll get one day. While most of
the reno pictures are of Len, I assure you I was swinging a hammer
and helping to put up framing and drywall, too.  I can do more
than hold a paint brush or a sanding sponge! We're quite the
good working partners- great partners, actually :)

With the 'accent wall' painted a blue-grey, same as the kitchen,
you can see the rough opening for the laundry, and the doorway for
the guest bathroom.  We stalled out on this project for the time
being as it was time to turn our attention to the REAL grunt work,
and that was to gut and rebuild a kitchen in 8-10 days.  We have the
tile for the guest bathroom, Len has the kits and parts needed for the
electric and plumbing for the W/D, and he has plenty to keep him
busy when he occasionally goes up to the house to mow the yard.
He can work on the laundry and guest bath at his leisure.  No hurry!

The plan is that once this guest bathroom is up and working, ALL of the Jack and Jill bathroom mess will get torn down, walls will get torn out, and the tiny bedroom will get expanded out into the great room a bit. There is presently about 5 feet of 'dead space' behind the front door) We plan to expand the bedroom by four feet, and the remaining one foot depth of an L shaped wall space behind the front door will become a library for all of Len's philosophy books and such, and what is left of my 'sailing' collection of books. When all of that bathroom mess gets torn out, we will be left with about a 16' x 18' blank space to create the plans for a master bedroom suite, to include an en suite bathroom and walk in master closet. We can't even think about that at the moment! Besides, those master bedroom floor plans will likely go through at least a dozen revisions before we ever lift a hammer to deconstruct.  We presently are working from our sketch of House Plan #28, so I'm thinking House Plan #43 for the master bedroom/suite sounds about right :)

While I worked on and painted the kitchen ceiling
and walls two coats, Len spent time doing more
wiring; in the kitchen, 220 for the stove, light
fixtures for the kitchen, dining, and over the island,
and he began installing canned lights in the great
room.  This is a 6' dresser/sideboard from Len's
uncle, and it fits perfectly on our new 7' accent wall.
The lobster boat model was made by Len's father,
and one day I hope we will complete a sailboat
model he has been working on.  The two boats,
side by side on our accent wall, sets the tone
for the color scheme and nautical theme for
the rest of the kitchen, dining, and great room :)

I can 'see' it all in my mind's eye, and it is going to be beautiful.  I love it when a plan comes together! All total, these 'wall projects' took about three days to complete.

The only other thing missing from my accent wall is a
beautiful sailboat painting.  I found this at a gallery in Key
West.  It is in a grey frame, and has the shades of blue and
blue-green glass that you will see in my kitchen tile back splash.
It was painted on an old nautical chart that is part the Bahamas
island chain. It would be perfect on the accent wall, but I cannot
afford to part with $15,000 to make that happen- YIKES!!!  So I
will keep looking...maybe one of my former students will
offer to commission it for me :)  Any takers?!

With Phase Three well at hand, it was time to move on to Phase Four- the kitchen renovation.  Phase Three was briefly interrupted by a quick run down to Conch Key so that Len could help Lobster Dick set his 300+ lobster traps after mini season was over.  We had just 8-10 days left to tackle the kitchen, as I was hoping for at least a few days respite on Conch Key before I was due to fly out of Miami. I was bound for Hawaii for a much needed vacation with my daughters, Emily and Ellen on August 17th, so there was no rest within sight!

G'nite,  y'all!