The farmhouse remodel has been one adventure after another, but no part had been more anticipated than this one: remodeling of the first floor of the original house.
This space will contain the heart of the home: the family room and the kitchen!
I had been waiting 2 years to start this part of the project and during that time had changed the floor plan several times trying to get it perfect. Above is the final draft but as we move through this project, if a space doesn’t feel right for what we’d planned, we will tweak it as we go. It’s one of the perks of doing this ourselves. Just ask Steve how much he loves that perk and the electricians, oh and the tile guys.
Seriously though, I’ve got them right where I want them, working hard to get things done before I could possibly make more changes!
The first floor project had to be broken into three phases so we could live in one portion as we worked on another. The first phase: gut the west side of the house and create a new laundry room and master bedroom. The second phase: gut the north side of the house and create a new kitchen, walk-in-pantry and island/dining space. The third phase: gut the south side of the house and create a new family room and finally add the front door!
First Floor Project: Phase One
With the wall between the addition and the existing house removed, we were ready to begin.
If you remember from a previous post, I had already removed the french doors separating the original family room and dining room. I had also demo’d the fireplace mantle & face brick and removed all the bead board siding on the interior walls.
We cleared out the rooms…
and then Steve installed plastic sheathing as a barrier between the construction side of the house and the area we are living in (all 600 square feet of it!).
We tackled this gutting project together, with me prying loose the bead board from the exterior walls and ceiling and Steve pulling it off and tossing it out the window. (Remember his right rotator cuff was only 5-6 months post surgical correction, I was still doing the majority of the overhead work.)
It went pretty quick but it was a dirty job. We took both rooms down to the studs. This is the original family room…
and this is the original dining room.
We had quite a pile to burn, none of the bead board was reusable.
I hauled it to the burn pile and lit it up.
Steve and I worked on separate projects for a couple weekends.
Steve tore out the oak hardwood floor from the original family room, removed the sub-floor and replaced some rotted floor joists and leveled the floor.
He replaced the sub-floor and framed up the entry to one of the bathrooms.
I went back to work on the fireplace. The mortar was cracked in many parts making it unstable and unsafe to use, so it had to come down.
The fireplace was double sided with two separate flues. The charred wall of brick you see below is what separated the two flues. Years of intense heat had really compromised it and it came down easily.
The wall of brick behind the charred ones is for the second side of the fireplace.
Slowly I made progress…
Finally the flues were down. I stopped at this point because we weren’t ready to open up the other side of the fireplace.
Steve framed up a new wall that created a hallway through the west side of the house, eventually connecting the addition to the new kitchen.
This new wall will be load bearing so Steve had to reinforce the floor joists and add support piers under the house. It was a cramped space to work trying to hang two 2X12’s each 12 feet long.
Then he dug three footings for the piers, mixed and poured the concrete all under the house with about 2.5 feet of head room.
After curing for a couple weeks he put the support piers in place.
We were then able to shift the load from the existing wall (in the foreground of the picture below) to the new wall (in the background of the picture below) that Steve put up and properly supported.
Once I pulled the last support piece out from under the old wall we stood completely still and watched the ceiling (to see if there was any movement in the floor joists from the second floor.) Nothing shifted, we did it! Really Steve did most of it! Great job B!
That new wall he put in will be the back of our bedroom closet, but that will be for a future post!
Stay tuned, next time I’ll share some pics of the addition as it takes shape.
As always keep it simple and do it with sass!
Kim
This is. FANTASTIC keep it coming.It is so well written.Love Dad
Thanks Dad! Imagine on your next visit you won’t have to climb through the living room window to pack up your car.
Love,
Kim
Moving right along!!
Can’t wait to see further updates!
Stay tuned we are in the finishing stages!
Kim
Ya’ll are amazing! That is a lot of work for 2 city folks! You are going to be so proud of the house when ya’ll are done and it will be worth all that hard work.