New Bathroom, part 1, Demolition

Instead of posting all of the new bathroom pictures when it's all done, I thought I'd go piece by piece.

First of all, it won't be done for months and months.

Second of all, I want to remember this summer as it happened.

And redoing this bathroom, down to the studs it certainly what is happening this summer.

I started in a post I talked about back here. We had a pipe leak into our playroom and had the plumber out to take a look.

Since we'd have to open up a few walls we decided to jump in and do a whole new bathroom. This 1954 house that I adore has so much charm and character. (I think) (every person who we've had come and work on this old house has told us something sweet about the way it's made and the character) But along with the charm that comes with an old house are the redos that need to be done. The girls bathroom was the only/last room of our house that was still original. We liked it. It had it's own sweet way about it. But it was time.

So, here's the first few steps to our bathroom redo.



While I took lots of 'before' pictures Scott spent days, it seemed, getting everything all organized. We had a dumpster delivered to our driveway. Researched what would fit once we took everything out, and made a big decision on the bathtub.



And then it was time for the demolition. I moved everything out of the bathroom, and moved the girls into our bathroom for the summer.

Scott sealed himself into the girls bathroom with a mask for his face, a fan to pull all of the dust out of the bathroom window, and a sledgehammer. For days. Did you catch that? DAYS! Sealed in with plastic, then the door shut.

We didn't put the air conditioner on knowing that the amount of dust would circulate the house and make an even worse mess to clean up.

Once the days were over, the bathroom looked like this.





Down to the studs.

Now I have to explain a bit about this house. We're pretty sure it could withstand a category 5 hurricane (not that we have them) because of the way this house is made. Under the tile was concrete. Under a layer of (did you catch that?) CONCRETE was thick wire. And then under that heavy wire woven through the first layer of concrete was more concrete. That's how they made houses in 1954.





And all of that concrete and tile had to be carried out to the dumpster.





By who? All of us!

At the end of a very long day and very long evening of all 4 of us working I took out my camera so that we wouldn't forget.

This was the door holder. Standing outside opening and closing the door a hundred times all day.



And Anna was up and down the stairs for like 4 straight hours with the vacuum and on her hands and knees picking up concrete that fell out of the piles Scott and I were carrying.



While I carried buckets that were too heavy for me, but I did it anyway, Scott (after being sealed in that room knocking it all down for days) carried out most of it.



My guess on the weight here? Maybe 100 pounds.



Back and forth we went, back and forth for hours. (and just so I can remember this years to come, with no AC on)

After the demo was done, we started cleaning up our house. Even though Anna did an amazing job keeping up with everything and cleaning while we were going, it was an amazing mess. (that left me in tears as the evening wore on) But we got it all cleaned up.

So here we are today, most of the demolition is done. Now he's going to replace the floor (the floor under the tile floor)

And start getting the hole opened up in the kitchen ceiling for the plumber.



Blogging as we go will certainly help me along the way. I'll be able to see the progress and to see how hard we all worked (mostly Scott) My husband can do anything!

Here's to a new bathroom by the fall (crossing our fingers before the first day of school in September)