Did you miss me?

I've been a bit preoccupied this month and just about everything in my little corner of the room has been put on hold. You see, my art studio is in my living room...well it was, until it was stuffed into every crevice of space available in this little house. For the past month I have had my lifestyle upside down, with a major renovation to our house. We live in a 123 year old small house. The living room floor was always a concern to me, because there was a huge patch in the middle of the floor that was uneven and could catch a person's shoe as they walked past it. It was about a half inch lower than the surrounding area, with nails sticking up. I'd hammer them down, and then they would pop up again later. This went on for years, until my son decided to fix the hole. At one time, there was a coal furnace that heated the house. The heat just came up through a floor vent in the middle of the floor. When they removed the coal furnace, they also took out the floor register and replaced it with a wood patch, which was not level with the floor.

<<This photo was taken after my son repaired the old patch in the floor.

I thought it was just a matter of fixing the patched area, but, what did I know? For the past month, my son and daughter-in- law have singlehandedly raised the floor beams, added support beams, replaced beams, fixed dry rot directly under the front door threshold, sealed off rotten wood, patched a couple holes in the floor, added underlayment, sealed the underlayment, caulked around the edges of the registers, sealed off the sides of the room, so they can apply a liquid floor leveler, etc.

So what does a person do, when everything in the living room has to be moved to get to the floor. Well, you get rid of it, or stuff it in every nook and cranny you can find. So for a month, everything that was in the living room is stuffed in every conceivable place. Most of the chairs are stored in the garage, so I only have three places I can sit now.

After removing the threshold board, we saw this rotten wood. The gray floor is the outside porch part of the floor. The brown part is inside the house.

See the rotten dry rot where the front door is? My son vacuumed out the rotten wood and brushed Minwax High Performance Wood Hardener on the beams to stop any rot and harden the wood.

My son wanted to see how far the rotten beams extended.

Front door floor is patched and nice and solid now. Whew! Glad that is fixed! it was scary to go out and check the mailbox!

This is what it looks like now with the underlayment, added board on top of the underlayment where the floor was 7/8 inch lower. My son was trying to fill in as much area as he could with extra board to level it, before using the liquid leveler, which is very expensive. The middle of the room is between 5/8 to 7/8 inches lower than the rest of the floor, so he is trying to level it out, so the planks will fit and stay locked in place.

This is a whole bag of leveling cement. This is the first of ten bags which will be mixed and spread over the underlayment to level the floor. Who would have thought it could be so complicated?? My son is an artist at construction. I think I will just stick with pencils and paint. I would have NO CLUE on any of this. I barely know how to use a regular screwdriver. Being creative is much more than making pretty pictures!

More self leveling concrete.

This is my poor kitchen, stuffed with some of my art supplies. if I accidentally eat paint, you will know why. Counter space is rather challenging at the moment. I have a great excuse to eat out, except now I don't want to. I want real food. Pizza gets old after a while.

More stuffing, and not for a turkey.

My poor office space has been invaded. Now where is that paint brush I was looking for? Help!!!!

To be continued...