Boston Knights: October 2008

....as Hampton would say with the clap of his hands anytime he is done eating or doesn't want to be strapped in a chair anymore....

We're finally done with phase one of the renovations. The painters finished about a week ago and the inspectors signed off on everything just yesterday. We're excited to have our house back...sleeping on a mattress in our family room was getting old.

Phase 1 consisted of putting in a nice size "kid(s)" bathroom in an existing smaller bedroom and refinish the existing two bedrooms and hallway by replacing walls and ceilings and all of the woodwork throughout the third (top) floor of our house. Though this project would bring our house from a 5BR 2BA to a 4BR 3BA, we figured a large bathroom was nicer to have than a 5th, very small bedroom. After the three phases are complete, we'll end up with a 4BR 2.5BA, but have about 400 more squarefeet of living space and a much better layout. We never really used the third floor for anything other than when we had guests, so now that it's refinished we were able to really spread things out and make better use of our space.

This is our new master bedroom (formerly Hampton's room) on the second floor. We had the painters repaint this room. Part of phase two will consist of refinishing the large bathroom adjacent to this room (through the wall to the left) and creating a master bathroom as well as creating an extra closet using the existing hallway entrance into that bathroom.

Our old master bedroom, also on the second floor, is now Hampton's playroom. I set this room up last weekend when Marin and Hampton were on the Cape and it was funny to see Hampton's face when they walked into the house upon returning from the cape and he didn't see his toys spread throughout the family room and dining room....he looked confused. But, when we showed him his new playroom full of all of his toys, he had a BIG smile on his face.

We refinished the stairs all the way down to the first floor and repainted the hallway, woodwork, risers, bannisters, etc all the way down to the first floor as well.

Now we're on the third floor, where you will see the refinished original pine floors that we "found" (we'll uncover them on the first and second floor eventually as well) and the new crown moldings, woodwork, walls and ceilings.

We added recesed lights in the hallway too.

Hampton's new room on the third floor. Still haven't found the time to rehang pictures, etc so the rooms currently look a little naked.

This is the new guest room on the third floor. Once "number two arrives" (no, we're not expecting) Hampton will move into this room. Btw, this ceiling fan is pretty neat. It'a made by Reiker and it cools and heats. The top part of the fan has a heater and the blades reverse and it circulates heat all with the use of a remote control.

We used this 6" crown molding throughout the third floor, eventually it will be throughout the house.

Across the hallway from the new guest room is our new bathroom. This was once a 11'x7.5' office/bedroom with a large closet. This is the sink area and through that french door is the toilet and tub area. We figured that this way we could have as many as three kids in the bathroom at the same time...hopefully elimnating any arguments. The french door is an original door with obscured glass. We had it in our basement so we asked Todd to refurbished it and use it for this doorway