The Big Girl Room Part 1

Before Christmas, we knew we were going to remodel a part of our home. We determined that Mari needed a larger room and with the baby coming, it was best to leave the nursery as the nursery and move Mari to a big girl room. After much thought and discussion, instead of converting the den into a large bedroom, we opted to make that our office/craft room/all purpose room. The old office/spare bedroom would now become her big girl room. We let our families know of our plans and you know what! They were so very generous in their giving and gave us a whole slew of Home Depot gift cards! Seriously, we were overwhelmed by their generosity and what was going to be a really tight remodel now gave us some breathing room, enough that we weren't going to have to stress about buying a new big girl bed for the Sugarbean!

The second weekend in January, Don told me that he was going to redo Mari's new closet. He was very ambitious and that weekend, he'd moved EVERYTHING out of the office and the closet. There were boxes in the closet that we put in there five years ago. Needless to say, I was overwhelmed by the amount of stuff that we had accumulated, especially because it was staring us in the face in the den. Our den is so full, it is rendered useless. (Lucky for me, I have cousins who are OCD organizers and purgers, they should do it professionally! They are going to come and help me get rid of the unnecessary, organize the crafts, and find a place for the rest of it. I'm so excited!) Anyway, yes, all the stuff was out of the room.

The following weekend, MLK weekend, the construction on the closet began. We were excited because we were going to have another day to work on it! While he did the room, I was going to focus on Mari's dress and everything else for her party. Our cousin and good friend came by to help Don. The plan was to redo the closet and instead of the regular swinging door, we'd install a pocket door. When he pulled the walls down in the closet, he saw just how poorly the house had been insulated. NO WONDER THAT ROOM WAS DRAFTY! They managed to gut the closet completely, and because of the insulation issue, we determined it was best to re-insulate the exterior walls. He also found a Sunkist can from the 80s when the house was built! I hate that we didn't grab a photo of it. Interesting what the insides of your wall can reveal!

Sidenote: I never liked the office. You guys are totally going to think I'm totally hokey, but I always had a bad vibe in there. It was unsettling to me and as a result, I was completely opposed to it ever being used as a long term bedroom because of it. Don knew how I felt. This is why we debated for so long about converting the den v. using the bedroom. I finally relented and decided that I was going to ask my mom to bless the room and get rid of any bad vibes that lingered. There was a teenage boy who lived in that room for a short while when Don used the house as a rent house. The exterior walls had been poorly patched from when he had punched holes taking out his frustration. When he had taken everything out of the closet, he exposed some interesting symbols/drawings and a giant "HATE" scrawled across the back wall. He'd exposed the anger. When the walls came down and it was all thrown away, the unsettling feelings I had were gone. Imagine that. 

Anyway, here's the photo of the closet with all of the walls taken down and no insulation:

When our cousin had stopped by, they were able to use some of his power tools to take off the beams to the closet. Lucky for us, they weren't load bearing beams. This would be perfect for the pocket doors! Here is the closet exposed. It is a decent sized space for a gal! He wanted to continue, but since the Sugarbean had gotten sick, the rest of the weekend was spent trading off to take care of her. 

Luckily, they were able to make a quick run to Home Depot to purchase the frames for the pocket doors. During the week, Don was able to buy the insulation too and he slowly installed that through the week.  You can see that the pocket doors were installed and so is the insulation. I think it looks great!

Bright and early Saturday morning, our cousin showed up with his truck and he and Don went off to buy the sheet rock. Here's a photo of the closet and the insulation. I forgot to mention that Don is a glutton for punishment because not only did he tear down the exterior walls, he tore down all of the walls and redid the insulation for the entire room and closet!

Below, you can see the exposed walls and our friendly teenage neighbor (he's TOTALLY Don's helper, always helping him with the house projects. The fence, the redo of the patio, and occasionally babysits Mari too!). You can see one of the walls going up!

Here is Don walking in the sheet rock with our friend Nick. I have to stop and take a moment to be SO VERY thankful for friends who are willing to give up their Saturday to help us!

Here is our cousin Mike installing the sheet rock! Looking great, huh?

An hour later, and all of the walls for the room are up! On the right, you can see the teenage neighbor scraping the ceiling to give it a smooth topping instead of popcorn. We don't like popcorn ceilings and well, we've been doing one room at a time in the house. I think we only have a few more rooms remaining with it.

Here's another view from inside of the closet.After the walls are all put up, it is time for taping, sanding, then PAINTING!!!! So excited! We are also going to add a new ceiling fan and install the shelving inside of the closet. When it is finished, Mari shouldn't require a dresser drawer any longer. All of her clothes will be inside of her closet, with plenty of room for her shoes and for her to grow. Very happy indeed!