Destroying the House

Almost four years ago, we bought a little townhouse with a tiny little yard.  We felt it was a good move but always imagined we would move in a few years.  This winter we even started the process of selling our house and started looking for a new home.  But, as they always do, things got complicated.  After much soul searching we decided we should stay put.  This was a hard decision as our house has some quirks that are hard to tolerate (besides the size).

Our biggest complaint about our house is we have no back door and no place to put one.  The kids' rooms are at the back of the house and I don't want a door off my child's room.  Partly for safety reasons but mainly because I knew it would make me very grumpy to have to walk through a messy child's room to go outside.  I would constantly be nagging them to clean it up.  I knew it would not go well.  Michael and I struggled with this for the last three and a half years.  We had an architect in, we contemplated tearing down walls and doing a massive remodel and then one day it just came to me.  I turned to Michael and said, "Why don't we just switch rooms with the boys?  Then the back door would be off our room."  We just sat there staring at each other slack jawed.  Did it really take over three years to think of this solution?  Are we both really that dense?  Why yes, we are.  After recovering from our shock we called our contractor friend, Orion, and got some quotes.  Things went pretty quickly from there.

The boys' room before we started.

Cutting out walls.

The temperature was only climbing into the teens during this time.  Orion was outside most of the time.  I felt so bad for him even though he kept assuring me he was comfortable.  The kids kept offering him popcorn and hot chocolate.  He politely declined but let them watch what was happening.  He even let them help demolish the wall (if you need a contractor, I can get you his number).

"Put your backs into it!"

"Timberrrr!"

Libby hammering the wall down, while Orion pulls with a crowbar.  Guess who was doing most of the work?

Ethan had it well in hand though.

Next post will have pictures of the door and kid's rooms.  We finally painted!