Living Room - Before and Progress

 Ahhh, the living room. It sits in the center of out home, between everything. The peaked ceiling creates a perfect, cozy spot. The tall brick fireplace is welcoming and comforting and is in the perfect spot to be the heart of the home.

 Here are a couple of MLS pictures of the space:

From the Front Door

 

Looking back at the Front Door

 

From the door to the Kitchen

 

Progress Pictures:

 

 

So much in one room! That huge opening to the left of the fireplace, looking in to the sunroom, had a large sliding glass patio door (what is seen leaning against the wall on the left). We had to take those out and we reframed that wall for some pretty French doors.

 

 The floors in the living room are legit BRICKS. I loved it and would have kept it, had there not been the patch of carpet in the dining room that cuts across (you can see where the carpet runs next to the the entrance and across the back of the living room in the top progress picture). Tearing out the carpet, we found concrete foundation. Demoing that brick was NOT going to happen. So, keeping our pup in mind, we chose dog-friendly 12mm laminate rustic, hand scraped looking floors to run throughout the main living areas. That was just one of the very few jobs we hired out. Getting someone else to lay those gave us the time to do the framing, demoing, taping, mudding, sanding, scraping, and painting needed.

 

 



We toyed with the idea of just repainting the wood paneling in the living room, but it was not anywhere else in the house. We had to tear out some when widening a doorway between the living room and the kitchen, and tearing out the built-in beside the fireplace due to some termite damage. With those things, it was either figure out how to match up the wood paneling in those areas or take it all down. So I took it all down! This added more mudding/taping/sanding dry wall work for me, but it really leant to a cohesive look in all of the rooms.

 

 

 

A job that was exclusively mine was scraping the popcorn ceiling (which is one nasty job). We did a light texture on that to match the rest of the ceilings and walls in the house. Then, I primed with some oil-based primer to seal in whatever yuck was in that drywall. Scraping that popcorn was the hardest job in the whole house for me, so far. I had to get a few massages because of the giant knots it gave me in my neck and shoulders.

 

 

My favorite job that was also exclusively mine (because Chris was using tools that I don't trust myself with to frame walls and hang drywall) was white washing our fireplace. The brick was in terrible condition but doing a 50% white paint 50% water mix wash on it definitely brightened the entire room.

 

 

Replacing the fan, replacing the gold eyeball light with an LED can light, updating some of the lights switches and outlets, and putting up crown were also some of the small jobs that were done to make the room complete. I'm excited to show you a finished photo when I show the other completed rooms.

 

 

 

 

The Mister always in action.