I like to write posts with a complete theme.  If not a project from start to finish, then at least a whole phase.  For example, the bathroom upstairs happened in a lot of stages so it was easy to post all the demo together, or the tile.

This basement is all over the place and my lack of posting is due to the fact that I have no clear idea of what to document.  We've got four different spaces going on, the family room, laundry room, bathroom, and the stairs, hallway and closet.  Instead of working and finishing each space one at a time it's easier to do them all at the same time.  It's frustrating to both Mike and I because at the end of the day there's nothing complete and it doesn't seem like anything was accomplished.  But, in fact a lot is getting done, it's just all the little pieces one at a time.

I figured I'd get over my posting norm and just show you what's going on.

We installed the flooring a couple weeks ago.  I planned to do a whole write up, but then it was covered in drop cloths and tools so it wasn't really a good "after" shot.  I'm going to show you anyways.


I even pulled the cloth away to show you a detail of the flooring we went with, sawdust and all.


Updated: We cleaned everything up over the weekend, so I was able to get a full floor shot without the drop clothes.



We brought home three different samples from our local lumber liquidators and lived with them for about a week before I bit the bullet and picked this one (far left in the picture below), called St. James Meade's Ranch Weathered Wood.


The other ones I liked as well, but each had something I didn't like about it.  The middle one, (St. James Chimney Rock Charcoal), was very dark which I liked, but it was also very smooth and shiny.  The sample was covered in fingerprints and I could only imagine what it would look like a week after installing it.


The last one was really neat, (Kensington Manor Cape Doctor), but I thought it was too trendy and would stand out too much.  It was made to look and feel like handscraped solid wood which I loved, but it was a little too light.    


The Mead's Ranch is matte with shiny grain.  In person it's pretty neat, and it's already been put to the dirt test with all the dust we're making.


 The last test was against the tile.  All work, but I liked the medium gray the best.


All were on sale for $1.99/sqft and were 12mm laminate with a pre-glued underlayment.  They were all floating floor systems with tongue and groove planks.  I laid everything out, (since Mike started without me and chose an alternating joint pattern that I didn't like.  I made him pull up about 5 rows.  He was not happy with me.), and made sure the wood patterns were random and didn't duplicate.  Once the measurements were done for a couple rows, we knew what had to be cut a couple rows ahead of time.  I laid it out, told him the measurements, and he cut and snapped into place.  It was pretty easy, and very rewarding when it was all finished.

The reason the cloths were put down right after installing the flooring was to add all the trim.  Which just happens to be the last stage of the project.  The problem is the trim involves so much, including the windows, baseboard, built-in cabinets, and stairs, and it's one of the most tedious projects.  It also doesn't help that I can't really be of very much assistance.  Mike likes to work at his own pace, and take his own measurements, so I have to just wait until it's all done to get down there with my paint brush.

He started in the little hallway and worked into the bathroom and then back around the nook into the main room.
 



He works pretty quickly, (when the table saw doesn't break down - ugh!), and we chose to bring all the materials downstairs along with the chop saw to make it even easier.  The table saw stays in the garage, so Mike gets a pretty good workout when he needs long pieces ripped down - up the basement stairs then down the deck stairs then out to the garage.  Then back in reverse.  You can see why we felt it was worth it to bring most of it downstairs and worry about the clean-up later.

We matched the trim throughout the house by ripping down some plywood then adding a cap.  I try to get in and prime and paint at this step before the shoe is added, so that I don't have to worry about getting a perfect line against the finished flooring.


We finished some walls in the bathroom, and this is what the trim looks like when it's complete.


Like I said it's really tedious, but definitely worth it in our opinions.  The rooms that were renovated before we moved in, (upstairs bathroom, kitchen, and basement), all looked disjointed and our goal was to match the rest of the house, and one way of doing that is to continue all the same trim.

A couple weeks ago I gave Mike until the end of the month to finish everything.  With one more weekend left I think we'll cut it close, but we may just finish this bad boy!  Not that there's any liquidated damages, (money the construction companies have to pay the owner if the project isn't finished by a certain day), but he has to finish eventually, because I've got a wedding to-do list a mile long!

From the lack of posts the last week or so, you could either think that we got burned out and stopped all progress on the basement therefore I have nothing to photograph, or knowing Mike and I like you do, (I'm sure even my virtual friends know us that well by now), we've been busting our butts down there every night after work.  So where are the posts, the pictures, the proof of all this butt-busting?  Well, the problem is now we have about a million little things to do, like trim, and hanging doors.  Nothing blog worthy in my opinion. 

Don't get me wrong, last night I finished painting the pocket door between the laundry and family room and Mike and I worked together to hang it and it was amazing and earth-shattering and there were high fives and hugs, but really how exciting is a pocket door?  There's an opening, then it's got a door.  I say this to explain my lack of posts, and to explain my posting in general.  Sometimes our lives move too fast to document everything, so I'll wait until there's something worth sharing, (rumor has it that the bathroom vanity will be installed this weekend - fingers crossed).

This whole project has been a scheduling bitch.  There are so many predecessors to every little task.  For example, I want the toilet installed.  I'm tired of having to stop in the middle of painting and having to give a full body inspection to make sure there aren't wet paint spots on me before running up two flights of stairs to the bathroom, (mark my words, our next house will have a first floor bathroom).  Mike reminded me that he needed to install the bathroom trim before the toilet went it.  I said "Then do it!"  He then calmly said that he needed the vanity to calculate the trim height.  I said, "Damn", since my task was getting the vanity.  I hate when I get frustrated at Mike only to find out that there's about 3 steps that inevitability lead to me not having something done. 

I decided it was high time to hit up the ol' Ikea to get the vanity.  The reason I sat on this task for so long is that the closet Ikea is an hour and 45 minutes away.  Not like a quick trip to a Target or something.  I have to plan, prepare, pack a lunch.  I had picked a couple of things from Ikea for my bathroom inspiration board, including the vanity, so it was time to gather the materials.

Even though the trip was mostly to pick up the big permanent items like the vanity and mirror, I also got some accessories that I thought would work in the bathroom.  I thought I'd share what I got since it's one step closer to the actual basement being done.


           
1. I have been stalking this mirror since I blogged about it in the inspiration board back in October.  Actually, if checking your ex's on facebook is considered stalking, I'd say I was more restraining order stalker, like one of those celebrity fans who creates illusions that they are real life friends, like break into their house and take baths and wear their robes level stalker.  I fell hard.  I can't really say why I wanted this mirror so badly, but for $40 I liked the size, simple metal frame, and did I mention the price?  I didn't think it was going to be so hard to find this but since last year I've watched any store within 150 miles drain it's inventory, (and any store within 150 miles of family members in different states - I told you I went crazy).  I even convinced Mike to take a trip to Cincinnati, (3 hours away), because they said they had some there.  There was definitely a brewery visit bribe thrown in.  We nixed the trip idea and I eventually came to terms with the fact that it wasn't meant to be.  While I was planning my trip this past weekend I casually checked again, (mostly to watch my dreams die once more), and to my shock they had them in stock!  I almost had a heart attack when I couldn't find it while I was running around until a worker looked it up and told me the were in stock at their pick-up location across the street.  I restrained myself long enough to purchase it at the end of my browsing and drive over to pick it up, (I had to get the vanity over there anyways).

2. I had liked this vanity's lines from the beginning and had convinced Mike to allow me to buy it, all without seeing it in person.  I had a lot riding on the cabinets being good quality, (Mike is a little more than a furniture quality snob), and was pleasantly surprised to see all the storage, nice sink, and even soft close drawers.  The jury's still out on whether it was a good purchase as far as installation goes, but that's another blog post.

3. I picked this faucet up even though I'm not really a big chrome fan, but I want to try to mix more finishes and textures down in the basement.  I also figured that with all the wonky Ikea stuff, it would be better to get all the pieces from the same place.  I've heard more than a few horror stories about connecting our standard American connections to Ikea's European sizes.  I liked that it had the same shape as our faucets in the upstairs bath, which we love.

4. and 7. I grabbed this 4-pack of blue and white kitchen towels and a couple of these red and white ones to use as hand towels downstairs.  I figured if they're good enough for dishes then they'll work for Mike's dirty man hands.

5. I only got one bath towel because I plan to keep more in the closed storage and they don't need to be pretty, just durable.  I liked that this one will bring more color, (the photo looks a little off, but it has navy blue stripes), and I won't mind if this ends up hanging on the hook more than it's folded and put away.

6. We've used both bath rugs and these that are more like heavy towels outside of the shower.  I like these mats for the ease of laundering and figured being in the man bathroom would see more dirt than usual.

8. I've killed a lot of plants in my time so I figured fake was the way to go.  It's also in the basement so it wouldn't have a chance anyways.  I like the natural look of plants, but love the indestructibility of plastic.

9. Mike usually looks for the finish of a toilet paper holder and picks the cheapest.  I'm way more discriminate and therefore take forever to find one, but when I saw this one I liked the industrial feel, the simple lines, and the fact that it didn't include any sort of spring ready to shoot across the room while you're trying to put a new roll on.  I got the official apporoval when I showed Mike and he loved it!

10. I'm not sure if we'll use these or not, but I thought it would be nice to have a couple simple hooks to hang the hand towels from.  Mike has since said he wants a hand towel that stays on the ring so we'll see what we do.

We'll I know it's not a big basement update, but having the vanity means that we are closer to getting everything done.  We should at least have some bathroom updates soon.  I've got a date with some trim and my paint brush tonight.
  

After moving the keezers out to the garage, we moved the washer and dryer into the ever growing pile in the family room to prep the laundry room for paint.


We never had before pictures of the this room, because before we moved in we painted everything.  We had to, the walls and floors were dark red.  Like dried blood.  Who would want to look at that while doing laundry is beyond me!

As I was painted I told Mike I must be blocking out bad memories of painting because I don't remember painting this room.  He reminded me that I didn't and that because he was working on the house a lot while I was at work when we bought the house 3 years ago, he painted the laundry room.  I do all the painting and assumed I had done it, that's when I promised myself to start using no VOC paint and stop sniffing paint fumes because I was losing my mind.  This also explained why there were no before pictures.

The room is pretty basic, cement block walls on two sides, concrete floors, a window, and the water heater, furnace, and sump pump.


You can see that bloody red color in the spots where the paint chipped.  Funny story is that Mike actually got a really bad bloody nose while I was taking this picture, and was dripping blood everywhere.  I told him that I've seen enough Dexters to question whether he did it on purpose to set up a fake murder scene and set me up to take the fall for his disappearance while he flies off to Mexico or something.

I told my mom the story and said "I want this on record", and she responded that I could have just been setting the scene for me to murder Mike and telling her the "bloody nose" story to explain why Mike's blood was all over when she was scheduled to visit the next day.  I guess we have weird trust issues in my family, or watch too many serial killer shows! 

Looking to the left.

And, to the right.

We were happy with the color of the walls and had almost 2 full gallons in storage, so we just needed to touch up the cmu blocks and paint the new drywall Mike had added to the other walls.

The floor was the big issue, and definitely needed a new coat.  We had spots that were chipped away and new concrete from the new drainage pipe installation.  We didn't have any paint left over so I just got a gallon of Porch and Floor Enamel in Pewter Cast, just because I liked the paint chip and it was a darker gray.  We figured a darker color would hide dirt better than the lighter gray-blue we painted before.

The wall painting and touch-ups went fairly quickly, but with cold temperatures and a high gloss finish, I spent more time waiting for the paint to dry to do a second coat then I spent actual painting.  Once the walls were done, I was able to do the floors and tried to paint it on pretty thick so that I wouldn't need a second coat, painting yourself out of a room already requires enough strategy, I didn't want to have to wait again and do it a second time.

After an hour or so, it was dry enough to walk on, (which was good because we had turned off the heater to elevate the condensate line in order to paint under it, and the temperature outside was in the single digits).

My mom came into town for some wedding excitement over the weekend, so it was a good excuse not to work on the basement and leave the floor to cure for a couple days before we put anything back in. While I was out with my mom on her last day, Mike got too excited to wait and put the washer and dryer back in.  I'm not complaining since I was more than happy to have my laundry back up and running.




Our laundry room is far from beautiful, but in a house this old, I'm just happy to have so much storage, and a space separate from the living space to hide my laundry.  Since we did re-evaluate the usage of this room as we were cleaning it, Mike and I did come up with a couple projects that will make my little laundry space even more efficient, and I can't wait for them to be finished so that I can share them with you all.

Also, if you're a reader of Young House Love, you know that today they posted the