House Projects

In March one night Shane and I started discussing re-financing our house since interest rates were so low.  After discussing it one night we decided to fill out the application and just do it all online.  We were able to lower our payment and then we pulled out some money and decided to finish our basement.  

We weren't really dying to finish our basement but knew if we were going to stay here for a bit having some extra space for the kids to go play would start to become more important.  Also, Shane needed to have an office that was a little bit quieter and right off the front door wasn't working so well on a lot of days.  We hired a contractor that a couple families in our neighborhood had used.  We got his bid and went for it.

We had the HVAC work done in April and then they started framing the first week of May.  We finished up the 3rd week of June with carpet and we are so happy it's done.  We had our share of issues and went to Home Depot and Lowe's way more than I can even count.  We spent more than we were hoping too but we are so glad it's done and glad we did it.  The kids love playing done there.  Shane has a quiet office down there and it's just nice to have everything done in the house.  We moved our treadmill and elliptical into the small bedroom, we put a small kitchenette by the back door and plan to get a couch, tv, refrigerator and stuff down there at some point.  I mostly just wanted soft carpet and I love the carpet we picked out.  Every time I go down there I think oh this carpet is soft.

Here are some before, during and after pictures.

And then in case that wasn't enough in the middle of it we also decided to redo our shower and floor in the master bath.  We had this tiny little shower that had this gross insert and I seriously couldn't stretch out my elbows while shampooing my hair without hitting both edges of the shower.  We basically had to move out of our room for about 2 weeks though, including clothes from our closet so they could tape off our closet.  This was right as school got out and was a bit, ok very, crazy couple of weeks.  Kids home, I'm working in Siena's room on her bed, we all shared the kids small bathroom to shower, etc.

To say I love my new shower is an understatement and I'm sure I love it more than I love the basement.  We knocked out a wall to make it bigger and then brought it out a bit wider as well, put in a bench and tiled the entire thing.  We put a frameless shower door up and then re-tiled the floor with some really pretty marble looking tile.  Every time I shower I think about how much I love my shower.  Worth every penny on that one.

So in the span of about 8 months we added a room upstairs, re did our shower and finished our basement.  We went from a 3 bedroom house to a 6 bedroom house and we are happy our projects are over for a while.