Thursday, December 27, 2007

Week 4 - Christmas

This week was very slow with the Christmas holiday. We celebrated Christmas at our house on Sat. the 22nd, because I thought I had to work Christmas eve and Christmas day. I found out last minute that I had it all off!!!! Sheila and I went over for a few hours Christmas afternoon and hung Durock and brainstormed on how to tackle the kitchen.

Sunday, December 23, 2007

Merry Christmas from the Natvig's




We've been doing a lot of behind the scenes work. Buying things on Ebay and different stores. In week 3 and beginning of week 4, we spent about 6 hours finish gutting the upstairs. The master bathroom and main bathroom are ready to begin. Clay and Evan helped me get the tub out on Sat. They also carried in the durock for the bath and shower tiling project. All we have left upstairs to clear out is the soffit in the kitchen! We plan to get in gear in the next week through New Years day. We've been getting more bids for the furnace replacement, I think I found my second career. The first bid to install the new furnaces was $1600 (includes some PVC piping, a little Venting and a days worth of work), what's wrong with that picture? The 2nd bid was for $2900!!!!!!!! and we got one more bid sight unseen for $1600. I'll keep you updated on what we end up doing there.

Once again, Merry Christmas!

Sunday, December 16, 2007

Start of week 3, final gutting





It's been a slow week, but we finally got our rears in gear Saturday night and Sunday. The upstairs is almost all done a few small things and the last of the cabinets and the ovens in the kitchen. Downstairs we took out the water heater and got a couple of bids on installing the furnaces. The 1st bid was $1600, hopefully the 2nd bid will be much lower. The closet downstairs which are shown in the pictures for this post are all gone now. We're getting closer to starting the reconstruction. We spent Saturday morning purchasing a Microwave oven and a stove/oven.

Sunday, December 9, 2007

Beginning of week 2




The kids are involved now. They like to tear out walls and floors and get paid for it.
We should be done with the gutting out of walls, and the removing of plumbing, and electrical by the end of the week.
Sheila has started looking for tile, toilets, tub, and vanities for the bathrooms so when we are ready to do them we will have everything. We will be using e-bay and Craigslist as much as possible.

Thursday, December 6, 2007

End of week 1!!!!









The boys and I headed over to get some work done tonight. Evan worked on the wall that was surrounding the laundry area, and Clay worked in the master bedroom closet, both removing sheet rock. I worked on the Kitchen soffit, removing light and the soffit.

Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Monday - Day 4

Finished gutting Living room, still trying to decide on how to finish the fireplace. We have some issues with the setting of the actual unit, and we're hoping to get it set forward. Did some preliminary work on the electrical lines to the Kitchen and taking out the line to the old laundry in the front entry. I started taking out the soffits in the kitchen and was shocked to see how much work I might have to do moving the electrical, then I realized that the cabinets don't go all the way to the ceiling and that most of the electrical can stay were it is. We'll have to deal with the cellulose insulation when we get to the sheetrocking of where the soffits were. I'll have some pictures tomorrow when I go back today with the kids, unless we get snowed out.

Sunday, December 2, 2007

Despite the snow storm - day 2






We still love each other. No major disagreements. It actually was fun getting rid of all the old 1984 theme. We took out the kitchen cabinets and gutted fireplace. We did a lot of brain storming on keeping the wood fireplace or changing it to gas or electric. We decided to keep it wood since it is on a woody lot with a lot of downed trees and would be less work. We are going to rock veneer it and make it bigger on the sides with a raised hearth and add a mantle with a flat screen TV. Sunday we will rest because our backs need it. Monday we will be back at it.

Saturday, December 1, 2007

Closed Thursday - Tear out Friday

Everything went well for our closing, although if anyone saw the Channel 9 news Wednesday night, it looked a little iffy. They had reported that many of the foreclosures were not going smoothly. We were concerned because we were beyond our closing date . The first day we tore out the wood flooring and raised living room. Put the washer and dryer downstairs and got the water turned on.