Our Farmhouse Kitchen Renovation: Part 1

These two pictures above are what the kitchen in our side wing downstairs looked like when we first started working on things. You can see where the cupboards were in picture 1 and the chimney and door to the main house in picture 2. Though, that's a little misleading, the door actually leads to another little hallway/entryway that is STILL technically in the side wing, with an opening into the main house (the room we currently use as a dining room). Below you can see what things looked like after the walls started getting torn down.

Here is the back corner (remember the pink walls and cupboards? Yeah, Not anymore!)

These pictures are a few years old, things have been on hold for awhile for a number of reasons, but recently have picked back up! Here are some updated shots! We gained another 6 feet or so length in the room by tearing down that wall to the right!

Here you can see we've busted through the wall (when I say "we" I mean hubby with my oh, so helpful assistance of staying out of the way) - If you look closely at the left, hanging in front of the window, that's a piece of the ORIGINAL tin ceiling (!!!!!!!!!!!!! You have NO idea how much I love that original tin ceiling!!!!) We pulled that entire section of ceiling down, and TOGETHER (yes, I put in some grunt work on that part) we hauled it outside, and then hubby, SUCCESSFULLY pulled the tin off the ceiling piece we pulled out! He salvaged it, and took it apart, without destroying ANY of it! We will be using a piece of the crown molding part to repair the tin ceiling in the room we CURRENTLY use as our kitchen, that will become our home office (the entire tin ceiling is in one piece in there except for one side the crown molding was damaged) and the rest of the panels will become a sort of "backsplash" behind our counter in the kitchen! YAY for Repurposing original materials!!!!

Here, you can see the entire right side of that wall has disappeared, no more doorway, and my new kitchen is officially about 6 feet longer than we had before! When we FINISH things, the left side of the room will have a counter that goes around the corner and a big work island just about where the chimney is... to the left we are building an addition full of windows and our dining table will go in there!

 Here you can see, the chimney and the wall are completely down... still a long way to go, but getting there!

New England Farmhouse Renovation Part 2: The Upstairs

If you haven't read part 1, Click here now to read it. - Also, I apologize for the crappy quality of some of these photos... the one's that are BLATANTLY out of focus, were taken by the hubby, but they are what we have, so we deal with it, lol

Ah yes, the upstairs. When you walk up the stairs in the side wing, you would find yourself in a cozy little landing with angled walls and a sloped ceilings and no windows. To your left was a small bedroom with a blue floral wallpaper pattern and a small closet. To your right, another bedroom with a chimney and a door that led to a small cramped little bathroom. In the bathroom was another door that led to the hallway of the main house.

The top of the stairs, looking down

 Taken from in the first bedroom, facing the "landing" between the 2 rooms.

This is the front wall, this window faces the road

Standing at the top of the stairs looking to the room on the right, the pink door back there behind the chimney leads to the upstairs hall of the main house.

The pictures above are the closest we have to "before" pictures, unless hubby took some before I moved in that I don't know about.

Now on to some of the progress pics! After we got all the crap pulled out...

Taken standing in front of the door to the upstairs hallway of the main house, facing the staircase. As you can see, we got all of the walls, plaster, etc. pulled out and all we have left is the wiring and some of the old insulation. The chimney you see in the right hand side of this picture is being torn down THIS WEEK so we can get started on the kitchen and framing for the two bedrooms and kids bathroom that will be going in up here!

Facing the other direction, along this front wall (on the right) will be a hallway, on the left will be 2 bedrooms (one on either end) with the stairs and a bathroom between them. The unused section of "hall"  (where I'm standing while taking the picture) will become a "Craft" nook for me!

I hope you've enjoyed this riveting look into our adventures in renovating a century old farm house! Look for another post SOON!

New England Farmhouse Renovation- Part 1: The Kitchen

February 2012

5 years ago this week, my 3 oldest children and I, embarked on one of the biggest adventures of our lives. We packed up all of our belongings, and moved in with my boyfriend (who is now my husband and there are now 4 kids!). The outside of the house looked a bit nicer than this when we first moved in, at least, it was all put together still. There used to be a porch on the front of that side wing on the left.

Right now, we only live in the Main house (the big part on the right). You walk in the front door and you are in the main hall, the main staircase is directly in front of you, to the right is a door to the living room, straight ahead is our current Dining room (can also be accessed through another door in the living room - to create a big circle) and in the very back corner is a tiny little room that we are currently using for our kitchen. The original kitchen to this house was in the side wing, just behind those 2 windows on the lower floor.

When you first walk in that door, farthest to the left (and this picture does NOT show the entire side wing, there's another window upstairs and down to the left that you can't see) you would be at the bottom of the "utility" stairs, to your left would be the Laundry and Mud entry, to the right was the kitchen.

Here's the Mud Entry and Laundry closet:

 "Mud entry" to the left of the main door. The white door leads to the garage, just to the right of that door is a TINY little corridor that was the "laundry" - Shown below:

The Laundry nook....


Here's an idea of what the kitchen USED to KINDA look like, after we started on the renovation adventure.

 When you first walk in the door and look right, into the "kitchen" this is what you saw, that door leads to the Main house

 Look toward the back corner and you can see where the cupboards used to be, that's the old counter top and lots and lots of tools and stuff

If you had continued through the mess and found your way in to the half bath behind the staircase you could look back into the "kitchen" and see this (to the right is the basement stairs, behind is the half bath)


I know this is a LOT to take in, so I'll leave it at this for now, and post more in a few days, maybe with some updated shots!