Living in 700 sq. feet

This is what it looks like - living in 700 sq ft.

One bathroom, one bedroom, 1 set of bunk-beds, 1 bed in the living room, 1 desk, 1 very hacked together breakfast nook.

But we're doing it. And we're doing it well.

And we'd do it all over again.

It went up.

I was expecting jubilation and fanfare and merriment.

Instead I got, "It went up."

Indeed, the floor went up. It went up 6 inches plus some.

We have level floors!!!

Do you understand we don't have a 6 inch slope in the living room anymore and the only thing that cracked was a small bit of the plaster in the two downstairs bedrooms! Do you know how many discussions we have had with people in the last 2 years about whether to do this or not? Do you know that we significantly changed the scope of this phase of construction? Did you know that up until 2 weeks ago we weren't planning on leveling the floors? Did you know that last week 3 guys spent all their work hours separating our house into 3 different sections so only the section that was sloping would move today? Do you you know we weren't sure if this would work? This is huge news.

But for the 6 men who patiently and knowingly raised it this morning, it was just another day at the office.

The space under the house looks like some medieval catacomb or abandoned mine. These structures are massive. Sort of like a giant's game of Jenga.

And it is these structures which are now holding our raised floor in place and will continue to do so until the new walls are sound. The house will then slowly and gently be let down again.

Outside, the very dainty posts and jacks in comparison did all the work. 

All of that, just to get this...

DIY Curb Appeal

Am starting to think the orange cones and temporary power pole could actually be the latest trend in home design. Call it something like industrial chic.

Joking aside, we need to address the curb appeal of this house. It has none. No, it's worse than none - it has negative curb appeal if that is even possible. The plywood arches, the 2-tone brown, the glassed in porch, the 20 feet tall columns that are holding up the stairs. It's all so bad and it's so bad that it is blinding us to the potential.

One day I can see it and then the next day I can't. It's the transitions to the back yard and to the main entrance that seem to weigh the most heavily - so of course we should design to meet those needs. But working with what you have can often be so much harder than starting from scratch, so instead of paying our architect to come up with new iterations that we may or may not like, we took to paper and pencil. Well, my husband took to paper and pencil.

And the boys played.

And I took it all in, trying to digest it all.

This is how we designed everything in Phase 1 - I should just trust this will unfold the same way.