Basement Fireplace Demo

*sigh*

I'm not happy about writing this post.  At this very moment, K's sub-contractor is in our basement destroying the fireplace.  :-(   It's loud and I'm sad.

Here's the thing with the fireplace....  In my opinion, it was cool-looking!  It was original, 1950s pale long brick...  I liked it.  The people who built this house built that fireplace.

But the negatives...
-  It's HUGE.  It juts out into the room way more than is comfortable, especially once you include the thick tiled hearth.
-  It has never worked since we lived here.  It probably hasn't worked as a wood-burning fireplace in 30 or 40 years.   
-  Water has been leaking into it for all that time...  Water gets in through that little chimney stub out front when it rains.  We can hear it pouring into the chimney and fireplace.  K is certain that the whole thing is full of mold.
-  It would cost thousands of dollars to get it back into working condition.  And then what?  Neither of us actually wants a wood-burning fireplace in the basement.  If it was upstairs, maybe.  But that's not how this house is structured.

So, away it goes.... K is reclaiming the space.  And I'm pouting.  Can't help it.  :-(

This is what the fireplace looks like/ looked like when we bought the house.  We took down that smokey mirror right away.  There was an electric insert inside that looks like logs that glow when you click the switch.  No heat, just a little glow.  That stayed in there, probably until just yesterday!

And here's a picture from 4 or 5 years ago.  K mounted the TV over the fireplace mantel.  About 3 years ago she got a larger TV and put it on the wall opposite of the windows.  So then the mantel became a display shelf for lots and lots of Packer memorabilia.


So down it goes.  The space will be better used with it gone, I do know that.  It will create an entire usable wall, make for a better furniture layout, we won't have to worry anymore about the kiddo tripping on it and cracking his head, etc...

They are also pulling down the ceiling tiles.  Most of them are in good shape, but some were not and some were missing, so it made the whole ceiling look kind of junky.  K is not sure what she wants to do with the exposed ceiling, yet, if anything.  Possibly she'll spray the whole thing white, but we'll see.

Basement Window Replacement

K's college friend has been working with her off and on for the past year or so.  It's been nice for her to have someone else to help with the workload. 

Starting a few weeks ago, the two of them have been working on our basement in between projects for clients.  I'm not sure why she chose to start working on the basement now-- it's not really an urgent project, but maybe she just thought it would fit in well between the other paid jobs.

To start, they replaced the double window in the main room of the basement.  This window was maybe original to the house and maybe not.  Once they opened up the wall it actually looked like the original window was smaller, because there was some concrete repair added to the cement block around the window.  Either way, it wasn't a great window-- pretty drafty, rattled a lot when the trains go by. 

The egress pit outside the window also wasn't to code-- probably couldn't really call it an egress at all.  So they dug out the egress pit a TON.  Made it fully to code and lined it with some solid pressure-treated wood, landscape fabric, and stone.  She also had to make a lid for the pit, since our two-year-old would probably fall down the hole the first time we ventured out in the yard this spring....

K had a salvaged window from a home addition project a few years ago, and she'd been storing it in the garage all this time.  It was bigger than the window that was here in the basement, so they had to knock out TWO additional rows of cement block! 

It lets in a ton of light, and it's a better-made window.  It should cut down on the street and train noise coming in.