With a house this size and tons of work to do, we quickly realized that we needed to reach out to friends and family..and fast.  So what’s the easiest way to enlist FREE  help you ask? Why a great movie and dinner before the work starts! Oh, and beer! Lots of beer!

Our friends Phil and Sarah and also Jason (who drove all the way from Indianapolis woo hoo!!!) answered the call to arms and we turned Saturday into a day of destruction.  And by destruction I mean that we completely demolished several large burritos at Cebolla’s (mucho buenoooo) and even managed to take down a wall or two! Before all that though, we did make a 3 hour pit stop at the Rave to watch the Hunger Games, which I highly recommend…though the book is way better. It always is.  After that, it was time for a quick bite to eat at Cebolla’s to satisfy our favorite out-of-towner’s Mexican cravings and then we were on our way to the house for the grand tour.

Sarah had little Maliah in tow who is just the most adorable baby you ever did see and Phil brought his #1 helper, his son Tyler.  Jason must have misread the memo because he only brought canine reinforcements but little Bentley stayed out of the way and sunned on the porch all afternoon.

I was a little nervous about showing my friends the house.  Whenever I give someone the tour for the first time I find myself saying “This is the bedroom. I know it needs this and this and this and can you believe that they put that over there?! But just wait til we buy this and that. Then it will be fabulous!” I feel like I have to schmooze over the ugly, dirty parts of the house and make everyone see “The Vision ” (cue organ music now). It turns out there was no need for worrying. Everyone responded with enthusiasm.  They all loved the house just like we did.

Introductions over (house meet friends, friends meet house), it was time to get to work.  Phil, Tyler, Raul and my dad all headed up to the master bedroom with several sheets of drywall to begin hanging the new ceiling while my mom, Jason, and I began to paint the living room and entry way.  I had been debating for months on what I would paint this house.  Luckily, I found this great color pallette site on Pinterest and it helped me realize what kind of color vibe I was going for. Check out some of the color combinations that I played around with.

We ended up going with a neutral tan color for the living room which really helped bring out the awesome purple and green marble fire place.  The entry way and staircase were done in a light jade green which went we with the dark woodwork and made a great combination with the living room and fireplace.  With Jason and I rolling and my mom using a brush to cut in we had the job done in a couple of hours.

After we were finished, we headed upstairs to inspect the handiwork of the boys.  They had finished the ceiling rather quickly. Let it be known here that a drywall lift makes hanging a ceiling muuucchh easier.  Next came the part that Tyler had been begging for all day- breaking down the wall under the staircase and opening up a closet to make space for a built in dresser and TV nook.  Check out the story in pictures.

and VOILA!

Taking down the wall really opened up the space.  We closed off the staircase with a couple of pieces of drywall and also created an archway with some 2×4’s.  The chimney on the left hand side was mudded and painted over so I have ordered some brick veneer stone blocks to create the “exposed” chimney that I want…you all can keep a secret, riiiigghhtt? 😉

Here’s where we’re at with the project now.

Next step- sanding all that horrible, awful, no good mud!

Until next time…