TKO!!!! (of a wall)

When we bought this 3 bedroom home, there was a problem; it had 5 bedrooms.  In order to accommodate multiple families living in the home, the previous owners had built bedrooms in the dining room and garage. Thus, our first order of business upon receiving the keys was to return the home to its original 3 bedroom design.  

WARNING:  Demolition is fun! It can lead to over enjoyment and impractical smashing of needless items. I recommend breaking things whenever possible.  In fact, I sometimes break things I don't mean to, which of course drives my wife crazy. Michelle took great satisfaction in smashing in the dry wall on this occasion, especially since it is opposite of her organized and maintained way of life. (I think she secretly likes to break things, but can't admit it for fear of not being able to tell me that I act like a child). 

In the 1st two pictures below you can see the wall that was put up to separate the dining room from the kitchen, and the door leading into the "bedroom." This was were the fun began . . . tearing down that wall! In the subsequent pics you can see the wall in its various stages of removal.  One thing to note about this project is the ceiling.  You can't really tell from the pictures, but the ceiling the infamous wall was attached to is made of beautiful wood paneling, so we had to remove the wall and support beams very carefully so as not to damage it. Thankfully the wall was secured to the ceiling with wood screws and we were able to remove them without much incident with our electric drill.  The final picture shows the room many months later in all of its new dining room glory.  

We knocked that wall out!! TKO!!

Drywall Down

Michelle Thrilled the Wall is Almost Gone

Tons of Debris 

Removal of the  Door Frame

No More Studs - Goodbye Wall!

No car, no house, no problem

On our way to checking out homes in Northern California, we hit a bit of a set back. While following our real estate agent to a possible house we wanted to purchase, a driver decided we should get a new car. He accomplished this feat by running us off the highway at 65 miles an hour. While we were spinning in the median, we came to a fast stop by the guard rail which catapulted us back onto the highway facing the wrong direction. The driver never stopped, but the good news was that everyone was alright. We were very shaken and decided not to continue looking at houses that day. No broken bones reported, and everyone was ok. We did not end up purchasing the house we were headed to look at that day.

I have a slight (actually pretty big) correction to Steven's earlier post about the day I lost my beloved first car (still sad about it 2 1/2 years later).  He is correct that we were run off the highway while following our realtor to a walk through of a potential home, but what his memory is a little fuzzy about is the fact that after dealing with insurance phone calls, waiting for the tow truck to arrive and generally collecting ourselves, we did indeed go view the house.  In fact, we liked it and went on to put in an offer on it that very afternoon.  Not sure how my hubby could get these details so wrong, but I guess since we ended up not getting that particular house (a big thank goodness!) and found a much, much better one (for us), I'll let it slide.  I should actually thank him for giving me the opportunity to show you all that I'm right (as usual). 

It's a start

This is the first post for "Happy Home and Broken Bones". This blog was created as a way for a husband and wife to express their views about their new home, relationship and baby in an online forum, where interaction with our members will help decide the age old question.... who was right? Our hope is that people will find inspiration to try do it yourself projects around the house from people who never have worked on remodeling a house before. As with this blog, we fly by the seat of our pants and hope for a soft landing, but as you can guess from the title, a few things will break along the way.