Top and Bottom

Today was another long day of work in the basement - 8:30 a.m. through 11:00 p.m.! As before, Ken led the way, taking us through finishing another small wall, putting strapping on the ceiling and putting DriCore subfloor down on the cement floor. We also had four electricians come by to assess the situation and get the information needed to give us quotes on the necessary electrical work. It was interesting to see four people working in the same profession, but with different opinions, personalities, and ideas. Hopefully by early next week we’ll have some price quotes and will be able to hire one of them to start ASAP. After the electrical is done, we have one minor plumbing issue to address, and then we can get our rough inspection. After that, it’s on to doing the finish work and making this basement a fully livable space!

You can see more photos from today.

88 panels of Dricore in our car…

… and now they’re waiting on the basement floor!

DRIcore is a subflooring system. These should keep our basement floor nice and warm and dry. Here’s to innovation!

Basement work, day 1

Today was the first big day of work on our project to turn the basement into a habitable space. The overall plan is to turn half of the basement into a living room, while the other half will be used for storage and laundry. Ken and Dianne came over, and while Dianne watched Catherine, Ken led the way in starting to make the downstairs take shape. The first order of business was to remove a wall that formed a large closet downstairs, so that we could create a larger living room space. Next, we prepared the joists so that we could attach the new walls. Finally, we framed up the new walls that would separate the living room area. We also purchased a set of French doors and temporarily put them in place to see how they’d look. All in all, a big day of work, and we got a lot accomplished!

We’ll probably have one more day to frame one more small wall and take care of a few other outstanding roughing issues. Then there will be some electrical and plumbing work, and then we’ll get our rough inspection from the town. After that inspection, we can put up drywall on the ceiling and walls, finish things off, and then have the finish inspection. Then we can start moving things in! We’ll keep you posted here with news and photos as things progress. For now, you can take a look at the photos from day one!

It’s Official

So our stairs are “official” now. Our builder finished his cleanup work yesterday, and today he was here at our house for the Town of Danvers building inspector. The inspection went fine, so we now have an officially sanctioned staircase to our downstairs! (We’re trying to get used to calling it that instead of the “basement.”)

At this point, we have a few tasks that we’ll complete on our own before the stairs are “really” done. We need to treat the stair treads with polyurethane and paint the new walls and trim. But we can definitely use the stairs. Hooray!

I’d like to recommend our builder, Ben Lower. He is a skilled carpenter, and does all of the work himself. A true craftsman, he takes great pride in the precision and finish of his work. He’s also very willing to work with his clients to come up with a solution that fits their needs. He works primarily in the Cape Ann area, as well as the greater North Shore. Visit the website for his company, BJL Built if you are looking for someone to do any of your home improvement projects.

Mostly there

The stairs were mostly finished up today. There is still some cleanup to do, as well as the inspection by the Town of Danvers. Hopefully by tomorrow the work will be finished! Here are some pics of what the stairs look like now:

Looks pretty nice, I think! A little paint and cleanup, and we’ll be fine and dandy!

Knee wall

On Saturday, our builder finished the knee wall and much of the sheet rock for our stair project. Here’s a view of the knee wall:

On Monday, the builder will be here to install the treads, trim, and anything else that needs to be finished up. After he’s done, we’ll need to paint the wall to match our existing color scheme, but other than that, the stair project will be complete!

Access to the basement - check!

The stair project isn’t finished yet, but it’s at least to the stage where there are actual stairs that we can walk up and down!

More pics starting here. We’re already thrilled with the ability to go down into the basement without having to go outside. Very handy for doing the laundry in this cold weather!

Our builder will be back for a full day of work today, and then he expects to do the final finishing touches on Monday. Woohoo!

The Perfect Storm

1. Today was the starting day for work on the staircase from our living room down into our basement! This is a major hurdle and will enable us to more easily start on our next project - finishing the basement! You can see some before pics and some during pics to see what it looks like. Quarters are quite cramped, but we’re excited that we’ll soon have a way to get down into the basement that doesn’t involve going outside of the house!
2. Today was the first big snowstorm of the season in our area. I’m not sure how many inches fell, but it seems to have been quite a bit. Luckily it was fairly powdery, so I was able to brush it off of my car pretty easily. It took me about an hour to get home, which is a lot considering that it’s normally less than 15 minutes. However, it doesn’t hold a candle to a few years ago when it took almost four hours for me to get home (to downtown Beverly, which is only two miles further than I drive now). Here’s some photos from the evening.
3. As a side note, tonight was the first time I had driven Rebecca’s new Subaru Legacy Wagon in truly bad conditions, and I must say that it was AWESOME! The all-wheel drive and anti-lock brakes were a godsend. It easily backed up our slick, snow-covered driveway, handled all of the twists and turns with no problem at all. Seriously, it’s like the car doesn’t even care that there’s snow. “Hmm, got some driving to do. What’s this white stuff? Oh, nevermind. Just keep drivin’, just keep drivin’…”
4. Corey’s Mini broke down on the way home from work (Peabody to Somerville), and so the three of us packed into the car to drive down and pick him up in Woburn. He’s staying here for the night - hopefully we’ll find a place to squeeze him in!

I hope everyone else affected by the storm is doing okay. Feel free to leave your stories in the comments, or else link to any posts that you’ve written!