Our Home Renovation

Last night we had some major rainfall - a neighbor’s gauge showed almost 6 inches this morning. News reports are saying anywhere from 4-7+ inches, depending on the area and they’re saying there were a few areas that were “off the charts” (does that mean their gauges overflowed??). Two blocks from our house, people were rescued in boats and many houses are under water. Thankfully our house is up high on a hill, so we didn’t have to worry about flooding like everyone else, but we did get around an inch of water throughout the basement which was a first. Last summer, my big project was building a media room in the basement. Walking in there this morning having water squish through my toes definitely felt strange. Our power just came back on, so it’s time to get the fans and shopvacs going. As annoying as it is to have to dry out the basement, we’re extremely lucky/blessed to not be under water, or even have more than an inch in the basement.

I checked the Sheridan House this morning and it was fine - there was a bit more seepage than normal, but if that’s all that there is when 5+ inches comes down in a short period of time, I have no complaints.

We have some good photos which I’ll add to this post later. We also made some awesome progress on the Sheridan House yesterday which I’ll write more about later too.

Inspired by Toby over at 649 6th, I will be posting to this blog 30 times in the next 30 days. It’s been so long since I’ve faithfully updated, yet we’re doing SO much house stuff right now. It’s crunch time at the Sheridan house, as we’re hoping to be finished in about 5 weeks (before labor day). So, starting tomorrow, we’ll start the 30-count and see where it takes us. In the mean time, I uploaded a bunch of photos of the basement at the Sheridan House, including the new PEX plumbing system (It’s awesome - I want to do more of it!).

Lately the big project has been the guest room in the basement. The room that will become the nursery is currently a guest room, so we needed a new guest room.

Here’s the layout that we came up with:

Why is there a wet bar in a guest room, you ask? Well, originally this room was going to be a media room, and hopefully one day will be used as such. We’d love to put in a murphy bed so that 90% of the time it can be a media room and the rest of the time it can be a guest room. We’ll see if that ever comes to fruition.

In the mean time, we’ll have a huge guest room that has a nice wet bar in it, which will actually be convenient, because until we add a bathroom to the basement, we only have one bathroom.

All of the framing is complete, the electrical is roughed in and hopefully I’ll get the insulation finished tonight. Then comes drywall, electrical finishing, trim and carpet. Think we can get it done in the next 2 weeks before the inlaws arrive? Let’s hope so!

By the way, the consensus on the piano is to dismantle it and re-use the wood for other projects. Specifically, the vanity and cabinet in the bathroom. Now I just gotta figure out how to get rid of the 500lb+ soundboard! Free hunk of scrap metal, anyone?

When we moved in, there was a piano in the basement…a really old piano. After talking to some neighbors, we discovered that the piano belonged to the original owners who built the house in 1928. When they moved out in 1993, the piano, which had been moved to the basement for storage (not a good idea) was apparently too heavy to move, so they left it. And there it sits today.

So, here’s where you come in. We need to decide what to do with it. We have three options that I can think of. Leave a quick comment and let us know what you think. Here are the options (we’re open to others if you have any)…

1. Leave the piano in the basement and make up a cool story to go with it - aka The Legend of the Piano
2. Recycle the piano, i.e. reuse the wood for other projects, somehow dispose of the innards
3. Just get rid of it and avoid the hassle altogether

Just to clarify, we were hoping to get it fixed, but it’s beyond repair, as it has 2 cracks in the soundboard. So, what do you think?