Hooray! I've finally done it, set up a blog for you, my friends and family, to see what I'm doing in my new condo without having to get your hands dirty or drive down here. I've put this off for a couple weeks now, so there is a LOT to catch you all up on!
We can start at the very beginning, I closed on my condo Thursday two weeks ago in the middle of that November Nor'easter. I was secretly worried my new home would flood on the first day I owned it, but it survived! We got started with the renovations the following Saturday, wasting no time. The first project was to take out the ceilings. Dad told me that this was a simple task, just "put a hole in it with a crowbar and start ripping, it will come down in sheets." This is a lie! It does not come down in sheets! It comes down in tiny pieces that get in your eye and after about forty five minutes we had only managed to make about a two foot square hole. It was not looking good. Luckily I have wonderful friends (Becca and Klooster) and a lovely boyfriend (John) and with some luck we started to make progress. We found that hanging on it like monkey bars made it come down a little faster, so we did that. After a few hours we had the living room, kitchen, hall and bathroom ceilings down and were about to start on the bedroom....but we got tired. So we called it a day! Here are some pictures from that first day and thanks again to my awesome friends without whom this would have never gotten done!
The living room before we did anything to it
Becca with stuff in her eye...it was unavoidable, the air was so full of falling drywall bits
John likes the crowbar...a little too much
After about 45 minutes this was all we had to show for our efforts!
but eventually we got the hang of it...
Becca and Klooster...my weirdo friends
This is how we got it all down, we just hung from the ceiling until it fell!
Ella hated the loud noises and thought we were crazy!
My boyfriend is a stud.
At the end of Day one, a little tired!
The next day Dad, John, and I took down the rest of the ceilings and the sound proofing bars that were under the ceiling, we are gonna put up better ones. We loaded everything up into the trailer, but the dump was closed so we had to stop. We also put up orange stickies for where all the new ceiling installations would go. Here are some pictures from last Sunday:
John on Day Two!
"Who put a lid on my water bowl?"
"Hi Mom, I wasn't doing anything!"
Ella and I taking a break in our future bedroom!
It started to look a little scary...
Dad taking down the sound proofing
John's hangover kicked in at some point and he got a little tired
The sticky notes showing where my new lighting will be
During the week my Uncle Monk, who is an electrician, came down and installed the lights and fan boxes and all the other electric stuff for me, but I didn’t get any good pictures of that. Oops!
This weekend (#2) we started again on Saturday. John and I went in and tore out all the carpet and padding underneath. I was hoping this would get rid of the smell, but it’s still a little stinky. We’ll see if this goes away. Then Dad came and we tore out the cabinets in the kitchen and some of the ugly laminate flooring. I was pretty much rejoicing at this point because I HATED those cabinets and that flooring. It was sooo 80s and tacky, cheap, and ugly! I am SO glad it’s gone! After two dump runs we finished up. Here’s some pictures from Saturday:
My new lighting, compliments of Uncle Monk
No ceiling or floor left in the living room
John stepped on a nail about two seconds after this picture...ouch
Ella hanging out in the empty construction zone
The kitchen after the bar and upped cabinets were removed
My Dad in his natural element...working!
And that brings us to today! I am sore ALL OVER from helping Dad carry stuff out and so when he gave me an out, I took it. Yes, I sat around on my fat lazy butt and let my Dad work on my condo all day. I am not a good daughter. So I have nothing to show you what he did today, but he’s been there for about three hours now so I assume it looks different. I’ll show you as soon as I see it!
So there you have it! Everything I’ve done with the condo in the past two weeks! In the future, I hope to update this on a weekly basis so you can see things as they happen, but I make no promises…
