The windows above our kitchen are in! Vinnie had these beautiful matching stained glass windows laying around and dreamt this whole project up when we asked him to do our kitchen. (This whole project being opening up the ceiling, cutting the 24 foot long beams going across the house here and sistering them together to expose them so we have the vaulted ceiling with extra light) He framed them in and got them up yesterday and started on the bead board. Today he finished all the bead board - it looks cool now and is going to look even more awesome once we get it all painted and some cabinets & sheet rock in our kitchen. Oh, and a sink and appliances might help as well.
View as it will look from standing in the center of the soon-to-be kitchen
I know it's hard to get the idea of, but this is the view from standing in the living room looking towards the kitchen/back of the house
In other, also exciting news, our floor guys came today and ripped a bunch of boards out and installed our new/old flooring over where the stairs were. I was shocked they got it all done in one day and will have to post an after-picture tomorrow.
Scott's parents and my dad (my mom wasn't able to make it this time) flew in last week and TONS of progress was made on our house. I am on my summer break from school and Scott had 5 days off in a row so we were thankful it worked for the parents to come at that time. We also have an amazingly creative and talented man in our neighborhood who has agreed to work for us (something he never does as he usually only does his own projects - I think he just felt sorry for us though honestly). He helped us come up with the floor plan for the house in March/April, and is awesome at recycling what we already have and making do with supplies, but still doing it "right" so that it will last and finally be up to code.
So, without further ado, here is a video of where we're at two days ago...already there are changes from this as I think we are FINALLY done destructing and tearing apart and onto the best part: construction.
What Scott's dad (our electrical engineer) looked like after cutting all the holes for the can lights in the living room. His mouth is slightly cleaner only from the mask he was wearing.
My dad (our master plumber) working on some plumbing. He got the whole drain system for the house completed - a task that would have cost us thousands of dollars and was super overwhelming to Scott. The underneath of our house looks 10x's better now due to his nice lay out of the pipes and the fact that we can finally walk around without running into one.
We managed to clean up in the evenings for dinner and were able to go out with some of our good friends, the Morgans, on Friday evening.
Also, we finally decided to take out the stairs that used to be in the middle of the living room. That was Scott's big project last week while all the family was here. It was tricky because he had to cut out and replace a big beam they had moved from where a door used to be, so that there would be adequate support for the exterior wall. I think it looks very nice now though and will make the whole room flow better. Our flooring guy is coming as soon as he gets a free day in the next week to lay new (very old) flooring we found on Craig's list that was taken out of a different house. It was difficult to find and a very happy discovery when we found a good deal on just the amount we needed, as that flooring is old heart pine and an inch thick and three inches wide. That area will then match the rest of the room and he will plug holes we no longer need where pipes and wires came into rooms that are no longer rooms, but open floor space.
Scott is done with his first year of residency!!!! Yesterday marked his last day as an Intern and today he starts his second of four years. He'll be working a few less hours and be able to Moonlight now (work as a doctor in other ER's or Urgent Care Clinics when they are short staffed, to get paid real money). I can hardly believe we've lived here for over a year now and come so far! It has flown by and I am so proud of him and the rest of the resident's he works with for doing so well. The next two weeks he has "orientation" again where they work with the new, incoming Interns to teach them things, and also learn how to take on the leadership position they will have as second years - making more independent decisions in the care of patients. He'll be working only a few hours each day and it's going to be really nice to have him around.
In other exciting news, I was accepted to graduate school last Wednesday! I applied to two programs and have yet to hear back from one of them, but Frontier School of Midwifery accepted me for the Master's program to become a Certified Nurse Midwife! I'm so excited and leaning towards their program anyways I believe, but still waiting to hear from University of Cincinnati before I whole-heartedly accept. Hopefully I will know in the next week or so.
