Casa Williams: House Pictures

When we got the renovation quote back from the contractor (who the floor guy goes through too), it was way more than we expected to spend (isn't it always?!) - a huge renovation reality check that's for sure. We had to cut stuff out, change things up, and figure out how to do a renovation that was more affordable but that would still work for our family for the time being.

Of course after we added in all the unforeseen costs and "extras", by the end, we were still spending what we didn't want to. OUCH!

BUT, initially, one of the BIG things we cut out of the bill was the demo cost, meaning doing the demo ourselves (Dad, Andy, and Bill). We definitely lucked out that my Dad and brother Andy had done a lot of this stuff before, so it wasn't haphazardly done, the blind leading the blind type thing (again, super lucky, I know!!!). But the deal was that they would help us for 2 days/ONE weekend (Friday afternoon - Saturday).

***We didn't want to overuse the family's help because Dad and Andy always have plenty to do at their own houses haha!

So Friday night after work and then all day Saturday the 3 guys would do as much as they could before for the construction team started on Monday (no work on the Sabbath -Mom's rule!).

And in 1.5 days they were able to get it all done:

Oh yea, in case you were wondering about our level of crazy, this guy was only a few days old at the time -

Ok, where were we...

1.
Removing the kitchen.
Everything had to go!

The kitchen BEFORE -

The kitchen DESTROYED below-

Yikes sorry about the lighting!

After the kitchen was torn out and hauled out and all the linoleum floor ripped out and thrown out into the dumpster (that's a lot of OUTS, yep, everything OUT OUT OUT); the first wall to go down was the wall between the kitchen and dining room.

Dining room was on the other side of the far wall. Oh man that floor!

Dining room is just in through that doorway on the opposing wall (you had to shimmy beside the fridge to fit through) -

Gone -

In between the two rooms here -

Full shot from the breakfast room through the dining room -

Floor gone!

Standing in the dining room looking back into the kitchen -

Then next was to remove the wall to the left of the entryway, dividing the wood room.

Entryway with slate tile behind this wall -

to the left you can see the slate tile in the hallway and behind that is the carpeted dining room with red painted up to the chair rail.

Entry wall down, totally open to the wood room -

Then the guys had to jack hammer the slate floor and 3 inches of concrete in the entry hallway.

Entry way slate up and wall to the left down.

Shot shown walking in from front door and down to dining room -

***We wanted the whole main floor to have the same wood flooring, hence the ripping out of the linoleum kitchen floor and the slate tile in the entry.

Last of the demo was removing the load bearing wall - the wall between the kitchen and wood room -

just on the the other side of the pantry doors to the right -

In kitchen looking into wood room -

Other side of the load bearing wall was the wood room. -

Remember this?

Standing at the front door. Entry wall down and tile and concrete out.

Wood room looking into kitchen -

The 17 foot steel beam will go in the ceiling where this load bearing wall is.

Now from the kitchen the front door can be seen -

Now standing in the dining room, you can see the fireplace through the load bearing wall -

Don't write this chandelier off yet, it makes a reappearance.

A shot of the "whole" house from the back hallway from the garage - kitchen and dining on left, wood room, old entry and front door on right.

Oh yea - cute visitors popped by to check the progress and that Grandpa, Uncle Andy, and Bill weren't slacking off -

Cousin Zeke and Junebug, who didn't know what the heck was going on.

First of three dumpsters getting filled.

Phew, that's a Friday night and Saturday day of a demo!
Unfortunately this team isn't out for hire, but I'm sure glad I could afford them! ;)
Thank you Dad and Andy!

Now onto the renovation!

And this guy could have cared less about all that was going on -