Thinking Outside the Box

My cute friend Mel suggested that I share what I've learned through this remodeling process, as well as things I'd do differently. I have a confession to make, I love change. Since I was a kid playing Barbie's, I've liked changing furniture around. I'm not that different now, only the scale of the furniture is much larger and more likely to cause back injuries. There have been many changes throughout this process, beginning with narrowing down the remodel plans, and more recently, rethinking the way I use my new space to function best for our family and the way we entertain.

The plan for my remodel changed from my original, ridiculous idea that was too huge and expensive. Narrowing down the plans forced me to think about how I wanted the spaces in my home to function. Instead of doing an addition off the back of my house, and enlarging the family room, I decided that I'd prefer a space off the front of my home. This decision was based on the fact that, one, I like my cozy family room and the size of the back yard, and two, my front yard was large and my house had no windows to the front. My original desire was to gain a cold storage space and exercise/bedroom below ground and a bigger, usable porch, and front office/library space.

The new addition houses a wall of bookshelves that I love, but I realized that the desk at the front of the house, was too far away from me when I was cooking. The kids ended up doing homework in the dining room next to the kitchen, but there was still the mess of the desk at the front of the house. I had my piano in my old living room and a sitting room next to our new, double-sided fire place. My dining room table was new and originally intended for the original remodel plan, where I'd move the dining room to my old living room. The table worked without the extension leafs, but as soon they were added for big family dinners, it was difficult to maneuver around the dining room.

A few months ago, I decided to think outside of the box and make my existing dining room into the office/study area. Its still a work in progress, but the space works much better for containing messy mail and homework, and keeps the front two rooms better organized. My old living room became the dining room with a sitting area near the fireplace and window seat. I used soft chairs and benches to make the room more comfortable and approachable, not just a dining space. The new addition now has the piano and a cozy seating area. Its great for quietly reading, piano practice or guitar playing. When we've had family party's, with the table extended (shown in the photo), we can play two separate games of "Ticket To Ride" and still visit with one another. Plus, people actually walk into the new space. It may be unconventional, but it works well for our family and the way we live.

New Dining Space in former Living Room


Former Dining Room, still a work in progress, but now functions as an office/study space with our computer desk, study/game table, and a second desk for craft projects, etc.


View from dining space into the new library/sitting room/music room area. The space is used more often with this arrangement.


Another view of the dining area from the entry way, with both extensions in the table. You can see how much more space we have to sit around the table for dining or game playing.

Progress At Last

Our latest remodel project has been to fix the yard that we destroyed in our remodel last year. An obvious downside to building an addition, is that you destroy your yard in the process. We've saved bonuses this past year to redo the yard. Another thing we've learned is that everything is always more expensive than you anticipate. Plus, self-discovery, I have a tendency to want to "do it right." Doing it right entails figuring out the entire project so that we can do it in chunks that work with our budget and will prevent us from paying too much in the long run. Its not always seeing to figure out the best way to proceed when you have a budget, but big plans and can't do everything at once. Here are some of the photos of the back yard and side yard in progress. It is still a complete mess, but its coming together slowly. Hopefully, by Monday, we'll see more progress since the landscapers are coming to grade the yard and redo our sprinklers--yep, we destroyed those too. Here's a few photos to see the project as it nears completion. I really hope this turns out as well as the addition did. I didn't hire a landscape architect, but instead did the design myself. Knock on wood for me . . .

Project #1: Patios, both cement and stone.
We moved our shed to the back corner of our yard, where we had our contractor build a cement pad with a ramp for the lawn mower. We had to remove aspen trees, but opted to keep the big blue spruces.

This stage of the project also included a stamped, colored patio off the back of the house. We had a brick wall built to hide the A/C unit, although the sound is still obnoxious when the A/C is on. We also trimmed the window ledges with matching brick. The same brick was used on the front of the house and I hope to use it on an outdoor fireplace in the next couple of years. The next two photos show the progress of the patio.



Project #2: Trimming the Trees. Living in a desert has many advantages, but big, green trees is not one of them. Thankfully, we live in an area where we have big, older trees. Unfortunately, our trees were misshaped and filled with dead branches. We have 10 large blue spruces and a large ash tree that we had trimmed. Notice the damage all of the big trucks have done to the lawn. We will have to completely rip out all of the grass and start over with new sprinklers and sod.

In the back ground of this next picture, you can see the results of the tree trimming. This photo also shows our completed fence to the left, our rock wall surrounds the basement walk-out, and the few measly plants that my husband and I spent hours planting, due to the huge boulders that lie just under the surface of the dirt. We had struggled with the idea of spending so much for a landscaper, until it took us approximately 3 1/3+ hours to plant those few plants. When we realized we couldn't do it ourselves, it was easier to hand over the check.

This photo also shows our stone/brick patio that we build using left-over stone from the front of our house after the remodel. This may be one of my favorite aspects of our backyard, it definitely adds character and has a connection to our home's past. I love that the stone was reused in this way.

Thus, Project #3: The Fence. We chose to go with a 4 ft. fence along the drive-way of our neighbors, that becomes a 5 ft. fence in our backyards. Our fence has the look of rod iron, but its powder-coated steel. A great, sturdy fence but a fraction of the cost. This picture shows the workers building the fence.


Project #4: Destroying the RV Pad. This is one of those necessary projects that costs more now, but will save us money in the future. Our plan, eventually (hopefully next summer), is to tear out our old drive-way, lower it a foot, so that we can have 8 ft. garage doors. By pulling out the RV pad now, we can get the backyard elevation right, without having to tear out the drive-way. Plus, we can use the soil under the old RV pad to help raise the level of the lawn out back. I'll have to take a picture of the stack of cement out front . . . its impressive!


Project #5: This has not been completed yet, but after our deck was put on last year, we were not sure what level the patios would be since we couldn't afford to put them in yet. So, we ended up with "drop-off" steps. I do love that we added stairs down from the second level deck. I think its a good fire escape option, plus it makes that deck so much more usable. Anyhow, here what the back of house looks like now. The patio tables are hand-me-downs from Janae and friends in Michigan, the chairs were on sale for $25 each at Target. I loved them because they're stackable. I figure that makes for easier winter storage. Maybe I'll buy a few more next month . . . we'll see what the budget allows!


Unexpected Project: When we tore down the old fence to put up the new one, we realized that our neighbors shed was using our old fence for support. There was a shed, rocks, a chain-link fence, all standing on an unsupported two feet of soil. Originally, Pete was going to do this project and the trampoline project, but as usual, they turned out to be more time consuming and difficult than we'd thought. Anyway, I think it turned out pretty nicely for a retaining wall. We plan to plant hostas under the pine trees for a more dense foliage look.


Project #6: Moving the Playground and Burying the Trampoline. Our trampoline was originally facing north, but it was taking up the space that I wanted for the trampoline. We had the playground turned and moved closer to the trees, then buried the tramp next to it. Our attempt to bury the tramp cheaply is still not a done deal. We are hoping our solution will work, after a few tweaks. Our contractor is going to backfill gravel up the sides of the tramp like a bowl, in hopes of keeping the circular frame in place. After a heavy rain, we did have the frame collapse. I think it'll work, we'll find out tomorrow. We need to trim the shrubs next to the tramp, that'll happen next week. Then, after the ground is leveled, we'll have special playground woodchips to surround the play area. I hope it works!



I'll try to post pictures as the project progresses still further. The hope is that our yard will be usable in the next few weeks. I'm hoping to do a lot of planting myself, but with all the rocks in the soil, I'm grateful to have landscapers prepare the beds. Happy Landscaping!