Windows + Doorways • Kath Eats

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I’m back with another renovation update!! This time we’re focusing on framing, windows, doors, and trim. See all of the renovation posts here. Follow along in real time on Instagram here.

The framing of our house is almost done!

All of the walls have been framed, and the crew just finished up a lot of the exterior trim work last week. While the differences aren’t as dramatic as when half the house was missing, it has been SO EXCITING to see the spaces come to shape!

Downstairs

I’ve been dreaming of the day when I could stand in the dining room and look at the far wall of the new kitchen!

You can see where the wooden floor ends and the plywood begins where the old kitchen wall was.

How it looked before:

So much depth!

Here is the reverse view from the kitchen looking to the dining room:

You can see a lot of the interior walls are now framed.

The view from the kitchen sink:

Gutted

I’ve said a million times in person and a few times in blog posts: I had no idea what we were doing this much work. The house is basically gutted except for the living room and boys rooms. The entire upstairs is gutted and the entire kitchen.

Thomas has answered me a million times that it’s just easier to demo something like a ceiling and rebuild new than to try to repair and work with existing. That’s why he decided to demo the plaster kitchen ceiling. In doing so, he found $300 worth of copper that he sold for cash! So it was worth it.

Insulation Is Thomas’s Middle Name

He is a huge fan of “sealing in the envelope” of a house and making it as energy efficient and green as possible. Our main floor walls have NO insulation behind the old original plaster!! Our house is pretty drafty in the winter, and he’s sealing off every wall he can with modern insulation.

You can see here in the mudroom he’s framed a new wall over the other one. He wanted to do this in the living room and kids’ rooms too, but since those rooms are small to begin with he decided against it (at least that I know of, haha!)

Pantry + Mudroom

Speaking of the mudroom, the mudroom alcove is coming along! This was originally going to be a room with a door – almost like a big walk-in closet – but we felt it closed everything off too much so we decided to make it more of a nook.

Before:

The new mudroom is where the old coat rack was – it just goes back into that cavity beyond in the garage!

Here’s how it started with the garage door open:

The three windows were framed first:

This wall will have white plank siding over it eventually so it won’t look like a garage door anymore.

Pantry + Mudroom Walls

The pantry is on the right and the mudroom on the left here. The pantry has 2 of the windows in it and the mudroom one.

View from living room / front door into new mudroom:

Utility Closet

The last “room” to be built was this little utility closet!

Before:

It will have storage for brooms / vacuums and shelving for things like reusable bags, trash bags, hand vac, and more. Two double doors will close it off.

Upstairs

Our Closets

Upstairs our closets have taken shape! Originally I was going to have the one on the left – the one with the fireplace and odd shape – but we decided I’d have the one on the right instead since it’s more spacious.

My closet (in wide angle mode)

The door to the attic / storage room will be in mind, but I’m hoping we can get one with glass so I can get some natural light from the attic window.

MOLD!

We also found MOLD in the stairwell where there was a big insulation issue!! Gross!!!

That wall has now been demoed. And the insulation issues will all be fixed!

The View!!!

I took this pic on a sunny day last week. They usually have plastic over the windows (until the new ones arrive in May and can be installed) and it was so gorgeous with the sunlight pouring in!

A reminder that this was the before view….!

Our Shower

Oh yeah, and our shower has been mapped out! The green part will be a nice 3-shelf niche for our products.

Inspiration photo:

Exterior

The Front Porch

The front porch is getting some minor repairs to its ceiling and trim.

When they removed the old ceiling they found one of the beams had totally rotted because the flashing was done incorrectly! It really is crazy 1) how much goes on behind the outer layers of a house and 2) how dangerous moisture is!

They also took this window out!

Fun fact: it was installed upside down 🙂

Basement Work

One of the major things we are doing is a new drain to the kitchen sink, which had backed up 5-10 times of the 8 years I have lived here. The week I moved in spray foam clogged the drain and I’ve had problems ever since! We are getting a totally new drain through the back side of the house, and so they demoed a portion of the basement to make space.

The zip plastic reminds me of ET!