Craft Room Finished

Avery and Zach's new room above the garage is finally done after two months of construction. The boys love all the new nooks and crannies the space provides. They use one of the storage areas as a secret room and have moved a bunch of toys into it. I am using the space for their art projects (drawing, coloring, cutting, gluing, etc) and I was able to move all the crafts out of the butler's pantry. Not only do we have more space for kitchen stuff; we have also put a serious dent in the downstairs clutter.

Construction of the Craft Room

As built, our house had a large empty space above the garage. The builder used engineered trusses to hold up the roof. They are inexpensive and strong, but come at a cost: space.

One of our neighbors had the brilliant idea that the engineered trusses could be replaced with conventional roof framing, freeing up the space for a walk-in closet or bonus room connected to one of the upstairs bedrooms. It sounded like such a great idea that several of us decided to have the same modifications done, sharing the cost of revised architectural drawings and building permits.

A couple of days ago our contractor Billy started the demolition process. He removed the ceiling in the garage, built new roof framing, cut out the engineered trusses, and finished by constructing a 2nd story floor.



This morning Billy broke through the wall between the bedroom and the future "craft room"; there is now a six foot hole in the wall. To expand the usable bedroom space he also tore down the two original closets that bracketed the room's window. The space already looks and feels so much bigger.



The footprint of the craft room is also large, but because of the roof line we'll only get to use eight or ten feet in the center of the room. The lowest part of the room will be closed off to make storage spaces, and in front of those will be built-in shelves and drawers for storage. At the front end of the room, opposite the door, is a large circular window that was decorative but will now provide a nice bit of light during the day.

A New Patio in our Backyard

After two years in our house, and a year with our back porch, we decided that it was time to add a patio. It took about two weeks for them to get it all done, and they spent a lot of time chipping away at our crummy rock and clay filled soil. We ultimately chose this particular contractor because we loved the design.

This first photo shows the general outline with rock and dirt removed.



Here is the first edition of the completed patio (later, we had them come back and make a few minor edits).