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Building a staircase wall

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There’s been a lot of work done on our house in the last few weeks. The current project that my husband and I are finishing up is a living room wall. It’s one that we knocked down a few years ago between the upper and lower stairway. Yes that’s right .. we’ve had a big opening between the basement stairs and the main floor!

So we’re building a wall now, but not a full wall like it was before because we enjoy the light that comes down from the upper floor that we didn’t get when there was a full wall in the past.

I think tomorrow we’re going to do the wiring for the light switch to the basement stairs and an electrical outlet in the wall. We had been using a cable raceway to hide the electrical cords going to the area in the past but now that the wall is going up we won’t have to do that.

It’s going to be so nice once the wall is up and I can finally look at the wall and the staircase as complete. Believe me it’s been years since I’ve sen the area looking finished! Next is the living room dining room ceiling and then a whole lot of painting throughout the house.

Neighbors disturbing my sleep?

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I haven’t been sleeping very well for the last few weeks. I’m not really sure why, but I pretty much feel like I’ve barely slept at all.

Anyway … The other day, I think it was Wednesday, I was finally sleeping. Since I’m on medical leave I decided to stay in bed and turned off my alarm so I could catch up on my sleep. Well that didn’t work out. At about 8 am I was awakened by sounds next door that sounded like my neighbors were moving furniture around. As it turned out it wasn’t my immediate next door neighbors (the adjoined house) it was the neighbor on the other side of us, the ones doing all the renovations that were making noise.

I guess the guy hired a professional plumber and the plumber was at the house starting to work and he was drilling concrete in the basement. It made our whole house rattle and shake! So much for my sleep! I stayed in bed and kept trying to sleep, but it didn’t work out.

I was mad. I sooooooo needed to sleep.

Perhaps Karma came to visit that afternoon … why? Well .. later that day the plumbers truck wouldn’t start and it looked like he had to call a tow truck – I didn’t recognize the company but it even said they’d do rv repairs which is unusual around here. So … anyway … I have no idea if the plumber finished his work or not, as he appeared distracted once his truck broke down. Maybe he’ll be back sometime in the next week or so to disturb my sleep.

My neighbors have to be the slowest at renovating their home

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Our next door neighbors are remodeling their home. The only problem is that they’re doing the work themselves and they only come by once a week or even only once every two weeks to work on the house. At this rate their house will be done in about two years!

Surprisingly at least one of the neighbors was next door working on the house all day today, from early morning until about 9 pm in the evening. They hadn’t come by since last week and they rarely come by during the week – especially not during the day during the week so it was surprising to hear them working on the house today.

It was so cold today too. Whatever they’re doing inside the house must be toxic because they keep opening the windows – all of them! With it being so cold and the windows being open I can only imagine how big their gas bill is going to be!

They must be redoing the bathroom. I was talking to them about their plans and they told me about how they’re going to put in a really nice shower and new cabinets and maybe even a Robern Medicine cabinet. It sounds like it will be nice when it’s done.

Have you ever had neighbors that slowly renovated next door to you?

Time to refinish our basement

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I am so tired of looking at my unfinished basement. I pretty much can’t stand going downstairs – except of course to do the laundry or to store extra supplies. So … I’ve resolved to start refinishing the basement some time in the new year – probably in the spring.

I don’t really want a fancy finished basement, just something practical. You know – since the basement is small half the area would be for the furnace and laundry and perhaps some extra storage and the other half could be finished like a den or rec room with cozy couches, a reclining chair and one or two modern coffee tables.

If we’re really smart about it, the couch will be a pull out so we’ll have some extra sleeping space for guests. We do have two spare bedrooms upstairs but sometimes we have several guests stay over and having an spare bed in the basement wouldn’t be a bad idea. Not at all!

Do you still have an unfinished basement or did you bite the bullet and finish your basement?

Looking forward to a dinner party this weekend

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On Sunday night my husband and I are going over to some friends of ours for dinner.

It’s going to be a small dinner a party to celebrate our friends birthday and to show of some of the renovations they’ve been doing to their new home.

They totally redid their kitchen – new cabinets, new appliances, glass mosaic tile splash guard, new tile flooring. I just know it’s going to be lovely. Probably a dream kitchen.

I don’t even want to know what it cost them. I’m sure it’s way more than my husband and I could afford right now if we were to redo our kitchen.

Have you ever renovated your kitchen? Oh and don’t you love dinner parties?

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