Drywall!

Having drywall up makes the basement seem like a different place! Jon initially started the drywall task with my wonderful laundry chute closet - which I have gladly been using for the past several weeks. Since this photo he has added a ledge to catch the laundry about 3 feet from the ground as well as a shelf on the wall to hold extra supplies. 

 Jon enlisted the help of his dad and his brother, Dan, to help work on the drywall. It took a lot longer than he thought to install, but he is very glad to now be working on the spackeling. Here is the few from the bottom of the steps looking into the "office" and bathroom. You can almost see the soffit towards the left on the ceiling.

 The family room portion (Ok, so Jon hadn't quite finished hanging in here...it's done now, though!).

The laundry room:

 Jon installed a small heater for me in the laundry room. I'm excited for heat!

 Our recessed lights. For the time being Jon has regular (cheap) light bulbs in there until we finish off the lights. 

The magic maker in action!

I'm getting really excited about having the basement finished. Yesterday I ordered the carpet so now I need to settle on a paint choice before Jon finishes sanding and priming. Lots of decisions!

The Basement

When we moved into our house in 2010, we decided to renovate the basement in 2012. However, due to flooding in the spring of 2011, we had to move up the planning. However, it is now 2012 and we're still renovating. Therefore I suppose we got what we wanted!

We gutted the basement, starting with the hideous carpet.

Then came down the ceiling and paneling.

To remedy the water problem Jon rented a jackhammer and, with some help from his family, dug a ditch around the entire perimeter of the basement.

After spending weeks on digging, Jon put some stones, a black cloth material, some drainage pipes, more rocks, and a plastic sheet over the ditch.

Our new sump pump! Jon dug a sump pump pit, drilled holes into the walls so that water can reach the sump pump, and added halves of PVC pipes to run the water from the wall to the ditch.

Concrete came next. The tubes are for our washer and new bathroom.

Framing has begun!

I helped out a bit. Jon would measure, I would cut, and he would install.

While we slowly framed, Jon did a lot of plumbing in order to be able to utilize the most possible space with the ceiling and to add the bathroom. Below you can see the new PVC for our washer and laundry room sink.

In the past few weeks and months our furnace cracked so Jon had to put framing and plumbing on hold to fix that problem. It took a lot longer than we thought and resulted in replacing the entire heating system. He installed a Buderas along with a new oil tank in our basement. Currently Jon is spackling the drywall. I'll have to run on down and take some pictures for the next post!