Next Up, the Walls

Once we got the floor in, we were so excited to start preparing the walls for insulation, electrical work, metal supports for future shelving, and eventually dry wall. Of course, "preparing the walls" is a very easy thing to type and a very complicated and tedious thing to actually do. 

First, though, we got to do an extremely satisfying thing. After we put up one or two new studs on the wall and felt like it was adequately supported, we got to remove the last of the slanted ceiling beams. Phew! So glad to have those gone!

 

 

Troy spent quite a bit of time cleaning up the walls, removing old molding and nails and screws and all sorts of things in there. It was so nice to get it cleaned up.

We had to carve away a lot of insulation from when Troy made the attic into our bedroom. We didn't realize how much we were going to have to remove, otherwise we would have stopped carving away little bits and just removed it all. It was kind of satisfying though - and messy. We have this wonderful tool that's simply called the multi tool. It's a little tiny vibrating saw and we use it for all sorts of things. The insulation has ended up looking like puzzle pieces.

One thing that needed some extra attention was the triangular space above the doorway. Troy had to build a wall to frame in the open space there. I feel kind of bad - we are to a place in the construction that requires Troy's brain and very little of my mindless servitude. He's had to do a lot of this part on his own, though I help where I can.

One big decision we made was to change out the window. I've never minded the little window that's there, but Troy pointed out the fact that anyone taller than me (and that's most adults) are of a height that they have to stoop down to look out the window. We decided to set a larger window in its place, and I'm so glad we did. It was less of a deal than I expected it to be. Man was it weird to watch Troy just cut a big hole into our wall! Getting that window in was exciting.

 

 

 

The main focus lately has been putting up studs that are 1) large enough 2) placed in the correct position to allow space for insulation (unlike the old ones, which were placed flat so there was only an inch between the outer wall and the drywall) and 3) in the right places to provide a place to screw the drywall in to. The trickiest part was the corner - everywhere there is just weird layers of mismatched wood in various layers and configurations. I'm so grateful that Troy just takes on one task at a time, and he is clearly inspired with solutions all along the way. Who knew that a little 7x10 room would be so complicated. Well...Troy did. He definitely knew.

 

So...progress continues!