Upstairs Remodel Phase 1

So I guess I think of the upstairs remodel in four phases:  (1) getting all our junk out of there/demo/insulating, (2) drywall, mudding, sanding, (3) priming/painting, (4) installing the floor and trim.  Then after these four phases, we will be free to decorate!  Usually the decorating is my job to plan and Kyle just helps me move things, but since I've agreed to allow the entire upstairs to be superhero-themed, he's given me much more input on what he wants in the room.  It's so sweet to see him so excited about doing some decorating.  I figure it's the least I can do since I was the one who's decorated the whole downstairs and veto pretty much anything he wants to set out.  Also, I promised him that we would decorate the baby's room in superheroes if it was a boy and he was super excited.  Now that we know we've got a girl coming, he's working very hard to get excited about the Audrey Hepburn-esque theme we're doing instead, but I can see he's not feeling it.  I mentioned today that we could move the mini-fridge upstairs out of the basement and put his hero magnets on it, and he's got all kinds of plans on what to put in it (diet Mountain Dew).  I also have planned to buy him more wallhangings for the upstairs for his first Father's Day, so I get the wife-of-the-day award.  And don't worry...he knows about the hangings.  I had to get his opinion on them before I ordered.

So, anyway, although I like decorating more than demolition, I like demolition more than any other part of the remodeling process, especially if it involves ridding ourselves of something ugly.  Of course, this project did!  Sadly (or gladly?) I wasn't able to help too much with the demo because (a) it's getting really hard for me to carry anything over about twenty-five pounds because I get pretty dang winded and (b) there was all kind of dusty black crud falling from behind the paneling that didn't look too safe to breath, so as soon as we knew that was back there, Kyle banned me from demo. 

Phase 1 of the remodel was officially complete Sunday and Phase 2 began on Monday with our Amish crew out to do the work.  I'm VERY glad that we don't have to drywall, mud, or sand!  It's very dirty, dusty work and I'm not very good at measuring anything.  Plus, Kyle got sick this week, so his illness timed itself pretty conveniently.  While he's down here recovering, Phase 2 is being completed.

I don't have Phase 2 pictures (I want to wait until it's done), but here's pictures from Phase 1:

Up the stairs (yes, it does just end with a wall...no landing!).

What you saw as you looked over the side of the steps.

Walking toward the white panel from the previous picture and looking right...

Then left...

Going into the small doorway/closet/very small room from previous picture.

The people who lived here previously did some horrible bubble insulation in random parts of the upstairs.  This was one side of the closet/small room.

Oh, and...here's the other side.

As you come out of the closet/small room, you saw this.

And this is leading back toward the stairs/semi-finished area/bathroom.

Tiger loved the pre-remodeled upstairs!  He was able to climb into the walls and sleep in the insulation.  What a brat!  He's going through some withdrawal now, I think.

Back door.

Bathroom.

Pretty ugly, right?  This is exactly how it looked when I moved in four years ago.  We didn't have the money or the time to fix the upstairs up right away when we remodeled the downstairs, and our intentions to do it last summer were sucked dry by having to re-plumb the bathroom.  

Wanna see what it looked like without the hideous paneling?

Did they GLUE that paneling onto the drywall?  Why, yes.  Yes, they did.  Grrrrrrrrrr....!  And as you can also see from the picture, some of the drywall was put on....BACKWARDS!

So as you can see, you sort of feel like you're in a toaster, but it was better insulated overall than we thought, which was a pretty good thing!

Without that weird paneling wall built around the chimney, this upstairs feels so much bigger and much more open!  I'm glad we decided to nix it!

Well, there you have it!  Phase 1 completed.  The removal of the paneling made SUCH a difference!  I told Kyle that if I had to, I'd almost prefer it unpaneled and exposed to the paneling.  Almost...didn't say it was safer...just feel like it's slightly prettier!

I'll continue to update with pictures just as soon as the other phases are accomplished!  Viva summer remodeling!

Crib = Ordered!

We've been crib-shopping ever since school let out a few weeks ago (has it been that long already?!).  We'd spent a good deal of time discussing the type of crib we wanted:

1)  Quality

Nothing flimsy that would scratch or break easily.  We'd decided that we'd really like a crib that was well-built and would last through all our kids.  Now, I have no idea how many kids we'll have or how far apart they will be, but let's just SAY we have them threeish years apart and have fourish kids.  For a crib that converts into a toddler bed, that crib could be up for 12 straight years!  Or if we got the rails for it to convert into a full-size bed, it might never come down!  It needs to withstand moving to a new house or around the room, and frankly, a lot of cribs we looked at didn't fit the bill.  

2)  Color

We both felt a white crib seemed pretty feminine, which would be fine now...but what if we have a boy in the future?  And we both hated the espresso-black-looking colors.  There's a driftwood color, but that just makes the crib look fake.  And we also didn't care for the darker wood colors.  We have a bookcase that we've decided to leave behind when we move the office upstairs so that we can keep baby's books and some toys on it (anything to get lots of storage!).  This bookcase is a medium-wood (think oak) color and is REAL wood.  This was our goal to match.  We cleared off a shelf from the bookcase and took the shelf with us everywhere to see what we could match.  Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like it's a very popular color, because NO ONE had any cribs in this color of wood :(

3)  Longevity

To convert or not to convert?  Originally we'd decided not to do a convertible because we plan to just move our kids straight to a twin instead of doing a toddler bed.  But those are super hard to find and a lot of the good quality ones are just as much as a convertible.  So...convertible it is!

4)  Time frame

We're not doing a bassinet/cradle, so we need this crib pronto.  I know we still have more than three and a half months before baby is born, but I've heard horror stories of things getting back-ordered and cribs taking more than 15 weeks to arrive (because like everything else, a lot of the parts are made in China if not assembled somewhere else).  Not only that, but then you have to open the box to make sure you have all your parts.  And if you don't?  You have to send it back or wait for a part to arrive before assembly.  Talk about a pain.  And I don't really want to deal with that, so we really, really wanted to try to get something either locally made to be sure we'd have it in time OR be able to purchase it from the store floor to put it together quickly.  Just to be safe.

This being said...

We went to a few Muncie stores like Wal-Mart, Target, and Meijer and didn't really care for the quality and small selection of their cribs.  Maybe we're just picky...but we took a good look at the displays and how dinged up they got just from sitting in the store.  The woods were all soft and it looked like one good scratch could just about ruin the look of a crib.  So no.

Then, we figured we'd have better luck in Indianapolis at stores like Babies-R-Us, Buy Buy Baby, and Baby Depot (Burlington Coat Factory).  Pretty much the same deal, only tons more expensive!  We even searched some Indianapolis/Muncie furniture stores, but ALL their cribs were over $1,000.  And sorry...ain't nobody got time to afford that.  So no.

Seriously...we'd looked at about 15 stores and several different websites.  Nothing seemed to fit what we wanted and I figured we'd just have to settle.

But then I considered...what about an Amish-made crib?  

My mom has purchased kitchen chairs from a furniture store called Bernhaus Furniture in Berne and we know that they are fairly reasonable in pricing and the furniture is superb.  I had a feeling that this was the place...if only I knew they sold cribs.  Using my sister as a contact (because I feel like now that she works in Berne she knows EVERYONE who lives and works there), we discovered that they did.  My mom and sister and I stopped in and we looked at a few cribs.  I was impressed with their quality and their custom-order process.  I looked through a catalog and found one that suited every single wish on our wish-list, made a copy, and took it home to show Kyle.  He liked it just as much as I did.  Kyle's parents offered to pay for the crib as their baby gift, and it really was as simple as that.
 
I ordered the crib this morning over the phone and bought a toddler rail to go with it.  It did cost more than Target or Meijer or Babies-R-Us, but it did NOT cost $1,000.  I was guaranteed a free delivery and free assembly by August 5th, plenty of time before baby arrives in September.  I feel like we won the crib lottery. 
 
Kismet!