Final Basement Update

So, here it is...our, essentially, finished basement (although it's hard for me to ever consider any room in our house "finished" since there are always more ideas that I hope to implement someday). The following photos, however, will officially conclude the basement updates on this blog, though I hope to document some of the little projects we work on down there as we get to them.

View of the main family/TV room from the bottom of the stairs. I'm not
sure if I've ever mentioned how crazy huge that screen is (or how I was
NOT expecting anything that big when we set out on this project), but
how awesome it is to watch movies on!

Opposite view of the same room. It's quite cozy — now that we hung
some things on the walls — for such a large room.

Including this fun little gem — Ryan's autographed
guitar. Autographed by whom, you ask?

Why, Sir Paul McCartney, of course!

Another collage wall, of sorts, this one sports some of Ryan's favorite
albums, framed and symmetrically displayed.

And since this is Ryan's "man cave," (though I kind of
despise that term) he got to do some additional
decorating, including this shelf of Hawkeye
memorabilia.

Here's a view of the kitchenette area opposite the family room. That
massive sea of red (i.e., the rug, chairs, and [hidden under a tablecloth]
table) are kind of just temporary place holders for now. It's all stuff
we had from our previous home that doesn't necessarily go with the
new look of this house, but we decided to make use of it for the time
being until we come up with something better. (More on that to come...)

Another view of the kitchenette. And, of course, a refrigerator is supposed
to fit in that nook to the left of the cabinets, but alas, that's for another
time (when our wallets allow it).

Bathroom, and finally a fairly accurate view of the wall
color, as opposed to the really yellowish tint that
usually shows up in photos of this room.

Ah, there it is. That yucky yellowish tint.

Can you spot me in this picture? (See the little elbow in the mirror?
That's me standing in the shower to get this shot.)

View of both main rooms from just outside the bathroom.

The extra bedroom, which hasn't changed at all really. We have no spare
bedroom furniture at the moment, so until we do, this room will
probably stay just like this. Owen enjoys riding his tricycle around the
big empty space, in the meantime.

Opposite view of the bedroom.

The toy room (in all it's messy, played-in glory!) We hope to get some fun
art on the walls in here soon, along with some shelving or other means of
storage/organization.

View from inside the toy room, looking out.

Another view of the toy room, showing the french doors outside. The
office door is just to the right.

The office, still quite unfinished. Eventually, there will be some shelving
for storage and things will get spruced up a bit.

Now, regarding those chairs and table seen above, that is an example of one of the projects I hope to complete soon and share on this blog. I already bought the spray paint to refinish all the metal legs. And I picked up this fabric to reupholster the chairs. It's mostly gray, but with a bit of red, to tie in the rug that will probably stay for a while.

This table top MUST get painted, if it's going to stay. This was one of the very first DIY projects I ever did some 8 or 9 years ago and I am no longer proud to display it. I'm not entirely sure yet what I will do with it, but rest assured it will be much more subdued that this crazy red mess!

Anyway, more on that later. For now, that's about it for our basement remodel. We've put a fork in it because...it's done!

By popular request...

Sooooo, our basement remodeling project has technically been complete for a little over a week now, but I haven't mentioned that fact here intentionally, as I was really hoping to wait until the entire space was furnished and decorated to absolute completion before announcing the big reveal.

Unfortunately, however, several factors are preventing that picture of "completion" that I have in my mind from actually happening anytime soon. One is, of course, money. We may have inadvertently spent all our available funds on getting the construction complete and now don't have much left over for furnishings. Oops!

Also, our energy and enthusiasm for the whole project kind of petered out over the past couple weeks. We ended up spending every spare minute down there for a few solid weeks trying to get our part of things (i.e., painting, tiling, and more painting) squared away in time for the professionals to do their thing and, in the process, we kind of got sick of being down there amidst the chaos. And even now that things are mostly complete and much, MUCH cleaner than they've been in months (seriously, drywall dust is crazy pestiferous [look that one up!]), we still haven't been able to muster up much motivation for spending even more energy on things like touch-up painting. We'll get it back soon. That drive to just finish the darn thing already will hit any day now...I'm sure of it!

Anyway, I have received multiple requests for photos of the progress, so I figured I'd show you what we've got in the meantime. These photos were taken as soon as the carpet layers left, so it doesn't show the progress that has been made since then (like the TV and other A/V stuff is all installed and some furniture has been moved back in), but since I don't have a camera at the moment (see my previous post), this will have to suffice for now.

Looking down the newly carpeted stairs. Aahhh! We've 

since removed the netting from the banister and no 

longer put up the baby gate. BIG steps for this very-

fearful-of-stairs mom. So far, so good!

View as you first pass through the door at the bottom of the stairs. 

Straight ahead is the bedroom, the french doors to the right are the 

playroom, and to the left is the TV/family room (and lots of dust 

in the air...I told you it was pesky!)

French doors to the playroom, closed...

...and open.

Bedroom, view from the doorway.

Bedroom, opposite view.

Inside the bedroom closet is a pass-through to the A/V
shelving that is accessible from the family room (seen
below).

Office, view from the doorway.

Office, opposite view.

Family room/den. Since this photo was taken, we now have a
MASSIVE screen hanging between those two built-ins, lots of
speakers and a sub-woofer (whatever that is), and a projection TV.
I was not fully aware of just how souped up this basement's A/V
system was going to be at the onset of this project, but it sure will be
a cool place to watch a movie...some day!

Opposite view of the family room. There is now a couch against that
half-wall and some chairs and tables, too. Not our dream furniture, but
what we currently own.

Another view of the family room, this one showing that little A/V
shelving cut-out I referred to above (accessible from the bedroom
closet). I thought Ryan would appreciate this shot since he's pretty
proud of this little design element (all his own!)

View of the kitchenette (and a bunch of random junk). This was the 

floor that we tiled on our own.

Another view of the built-ins in the kitchenette. We have already filled
the space on the lower right with a microwave and eventually plan to
put a fridge on the left.

Opposite view of the kitchenette, looking at the half-wall bar area. We
need to get some stools for this eventually.

Here's that bar again. We added the custom-built wood
topper at the very end to give it a more finished look.
And that pillar was not in the original plans, but was
necessary to support the weight of the countertop. It
turned out pretty nicely in the end!

Hallway off the kitchenette, leading to the unfinished
storage area at the end, and a small bathroom to the
left.

Bathroom. Sorry for the terrible photo. I don't know
much about adjusting the camera lighting. It doesn't
actually look this golden in real life.

Custom-tiled shower. We owned these glass tiles
(which are green, brown, and tan) and were
originally going to use them as our kitchen
backsplash (you can see the alternate direction we
took here), but still wanted to make use of them
somehow. I think they look pretty nice paired with
the biscuit-colored subway tile.

Finishing up (very soon!)

Just a quick post with some final pics after our marathon weekend of painting and tiling. Whew! We got it all done. And right now, as I type this, all the trim, doors, and cabinets are being unloaded and will go up over the next few days. YAY!!! The end is near!

(P.S. I will have to add the names of the paint colors later because I can't remember off-hand and the cans are downstairs where the guys are working...)

Bedroom

Bedroom (alternate angle)

Play Room

Bathroom (sorry for the terrible photo...
this was the best I could do.)

Tile in the kitchenette. (I never want to lay tile in this size area again!)
That is some HARD work! Kudos to Ryan for a job well done!

Tile from alternate angle (and no camera flash)

Basement update

Here are some updated photos of the basement project. Currently, we are finishing up the tile floor and painting (the two things we decided to do ourselves to save some money.) I will be SO GLAD when we are finished with that (hopefully by this weekend)!

Finished drywall, pre-paint and tile:
(P.S. We didn't end up using either of the paint swatches you see in these pics [too dark], as you'll see in photos a little further down.)

Mid-paint and tile:

Office (Paint: Behr – Antique Tin)

Kitchenette/Family Room (Paint: Sherwin-Williams – Argos; Porcelain Tile: Ibiza Bone from Lowe's)

The bathroom is also painted (Sherwin-Williams – Gateway Gray), but because there is no lighting set up in there yet, it's hard to get a good picture in there.

Now I'm off to go paint (the bedroom today) while Owen naps (which is how I've spent every naptime for the last week and a half). Then, all that's left is the toy/play room!