If you've ever dreamed of remodeling an old farmhouse, you've come to the right place. My husband and I had that same dream, and we followed it. This blog will either feed your dream, or make you run (REALLY quickly) for the hills. This is our story.
Showing posts with label Staircase. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Staircase. Show all posts
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Finished Staircase!
Here it is!! My beautiful finished staircase!! My dad did the painting for us! I didn't trust anyone else with white paint that close to all of those steps I stained!! He also lightly sanded the steps and added a little more stain and then put polyurethane on top! This was one of my favorite projects we've done, as it made SUCH a huge difference to the feel of the house! I LOOOOOVE my open staircase and the big, wide hallway. It's just like I dreamed!!
Thursday, March 24, 2011
New Treads
Ready for more staircase work?? After we got the wall taken down and the stairs all nice and open, we could really see what we were working with. I really wanted to keep the original staircase. I loved the idea of walking on the same steps that the original owners walked on. However, many of the steps were cracked and splitting in half. There were a couple that literally felt like you would fall right through, and we didn't want to have to revisit this project 5 years from now if they started to fall apart. We toyed with lots of different ideas, including just replacing the broken stairs, and then sanding and refinishing the others. But, now that they were all open and clearly visible, I wanted them all to match perfectly! In the end, we just purchased all new treads.
Once again, I think my description of this project makes it sound easier than it actually was. Who knew there was so much involved in building a new staircase?!! It's not like you just call up the lumber store and say, "hey I need some treads for my stairs." You need a lot more!! First the structure of the stairs needs to be addressed. After the guys ripped up the old treads, we figured out why the steps felt like you might fall through the middle! There was only a stringer (the zig zag pieces that the treads rest on) up each side, and nothing supporting the middle! We added another stringer up the middle, and these are some sturdy steps now, people!! We needed a new banister now too, since everything was open. Then of course you have to get the spindles and the post for the bottom of the banister. Do you have any idea how many different styles there are?? I probably spent 30 minutes in the store just flipping through the brochures trying to make up my mind!!
Of course all of those things came unfinished, so the next step was some serious staining!! We set them up in my parent's garage so they could air dry and stay away from rain or dirt or anything blowing on them. If you've never worked with stain, it's some sticky stuff!! We did 2 coats of dark walnut stain to match our floors. We thought they would dry in a couple of days, but it ended up being almost a week, and even then they felt a little sticky still!!
Finally a project I could help with!!
This took a while!! We had 17 treads, the new banister, and the big end post for the base of the banister. Two coats on each! It was a loooong night!
Once things were dry, everything was installed. First the treads. Then, all the holes drilled for the balusters (spindles), then the post and banister added. We did not do this ourself!! We hired a trim carpenter who really knew what he was doing!! A wiggly banister is not something to mess around with when you have a toddler! It takes some knowledge to drill the holes straight, but at the correct angle so that each spindle fits and is equally spaced. We went with 3 spindles per step, and they each increased in height. It makes my head hurt even thinking about figuring all those angles and what not. Nope, a professional can deal with that! He came in, and in a matter of 1 day, we had this:
Hallelujah!!! Can you hear the angels singing?!! IT'S GORGEOUS! I loved it even all unpainted like this!!
There was one more step (haha!) to finishing this project! I'll show you in a couple of days!!
Once again, I think my description of this project makes it sound easier than it actually was. Who knew there was so much involved in building a new staircase?!! It's not like you just call up the lumber store and say, "hey I need some treads for my stairs." You need a lot more!! First the structure of the stairs needs to be addressed. After the guys ripped up the old treads, we figured out why the steps felt like you might fall through the middle! There was only a stringer (the zig zag pieces that the treads rest on) up each side, and nothing supporting the middle! We added another stringer up the middle, and these are some sturdy steps now, people!! We needed a new banister now too, since everything was open. Then of course you have to get the spindles and the post for the bottom of the banister. Do you have any idea how many different styles there are?? I probably spent 30 minutes in the store just flipping through the brochures trying to make up my mind!!
Of course all of those things came unfinished, so the next step was some serious staining!! We set them up in my parent's garage so they could air dry and stay away from rain or dirt or anything blowing on them. If you've never worked with stain, it's some sticky stuff!! We did 2 coats of dark walnut stain to match our floors. We thought they would dry in a couple of days, but it ended up being almost a week, and even then they felt a little sticky still!!
Finally a project I could help with!!
This took a while!! We had 17 treads, the new banister, and the big end post for the base of the banister. Two coats on each! It was a loooong night!
Once things were dry, everything was installed. First the treads. Then, all the holes drilled for the balusters (spindles), then the post and banister added. We did not do this ourself!! We hired a trim carpenter who really knew what he was doing!! A wiggly banister is not something to mess around with when you have a toddler! It takes some knowledge to drill the holes straight, but at the correct angle so that each spindle fits and is equally spaced. We went with 3 spindles per step, and they each increased in height. It makes my head hurt even thinking about figuring all those angles and what not. Nope, a professional can deal with that! He came in, and in a matter of 1 day, we had this:
Hallelujah!!! Can you hear the angels singing?!! IT'S GORGEOUS! I loved it even all unpainted like this!!
There was one more step (haha!) to finishing this project! I'll show you in a couple of days!!
Monday, March 21, 2011
Scary Staircase!
Helllllooooo!!! I am still alive if you were wondering! It has been another crazy week of doctor's appointments, grandparent visits, and a girl's weekend. Ben had to go to Dallas for the weekend for work, so me and the girl were on our own for the first time! I haven't spent the night alone since Ben and I got married! We survived, though, and are very happy to have daddy home safe! This week I will be 34 weeks pregnant, which means we are only about 5 weeks away from meeting our little man! It cannot come soon enough! I am now seeing a cardiologist every few weeks for these crazy dizzy spells and light headedness. (that is DEFINITELY not a real word.) I am SO excited it is spring, and I'm starting to have this uncontrollable urge to open all the windows, turn up the radio, and just clean my heart out. However, I don't think that would do much to help my contractions and dizzy spells. I think I am officially entering the "nesting" stage. All of the sudden baby day just seems so close, and there is so much I want to get done before he gets here!! We will see how long I can resist.
I thought I would start showing you the process of opening our staircase. In my opinion, it's one of the best things we did to this house. The original staircase was completely enclosed, and just a little too dark and scary for my liking.
This was quite a project, and one we really didn't know how to tackle. I grew up having a half bath, or as my mom always called it, a "powder room." I really felt like we needed one in this house, because the only 2 bathrooms downstairs are our master and the one in my daughter's room. I wanted a powder room with just a sink and a toilet for guests to use. We knew we would be knocking the staircase wall down, and it turns out there was a lot of wasted space under the steps! It was the perfect place and size for a powder room!
So, since we didn't really know what we were doing, (AGAIN), we just decided that swinging a sledge hammer at some sheetrock would be a good place to start! I will say, once again, I had no part in this. But, the men beat the walls for a while and this is what we got!
At this point, I was just GIDDY with excitement!! It made SUCH a huge difference! The powder room worked out perfectly and was so easy to add! Dad just cut the doorway out and the sheetrock guys finished it up! They also hung new sheetrock on the wall beside the steps since it was just raw wood planks before. A little more hammering down on the door, and...
Pretty crazy right?? It doesn't even look like the same house! I have to say, not only did it help the staircase in drastic ways, it opened our hallway up several feet as well! If you look, you'll see the wall came out a good 2 feet or so from the staircase. At the end of the hallway, there was a gorgeous glass door. So, when you came in the house through the front door, the foyer was it's own little room with that glass door leading down the hallway. Although I hated to lose the door (we saved it and used it somewhere else!), I really wanted a huge, super wide hallway that started right off the foyer. Here are a couple pictures of the hallway and foyer before we went sledge hammer crazy.
(Sorry about the weird angles!)
This is the foyer before. See how you had to walk through the single doorway to see down the hallway??
Here it is looking from the front door after all the walls came down!! Doesn't it make a huge difference??!
So that's the beginning of the staircase remodel!! The next step was making the stairs safe enough to walk on! :)
P.S. I realize the walls are painted in some of these pictures and completely unfinished in others! That just goes to show you how randomly I took pictures! :)
I thought I would start showing you the process of opening our staircase. In my opinion, it's one of the best things we did to this house. The original staircase was completely enclosed, and just a little too dark and scary for my liking.
This was quite a project, and one we really didn't know how to tackle. I grew up having a half bath, or as my mom always called it, a "powder room." I really felt like we needed one in this house, because the only 2 bathrooms downstairs are our master and the one in my daughter's room. I wanted a powder room with just a sink and a toilet for guests to use. We knew we would be knocking the staircase wall down, and it turns out there was a lot of wasted space under the steps! It was the perfect place and size for a powder room!
So, since we didn't really know what we were doing, (AGAIN), we just decided that swinging a sledge hammer at some sheetrock would be a good place to start! I will say, once again, I had no part in this. But, the men beat the walls for a while and this is what we got!
At this point, I was just GIDDY with excitement!! It made SUCH a huge difference! The powder room worked out perfectly and was so easy to add! Dad just cut the doorway out and the sheetrock guys finished it up! They also hung new sheetrock on the wall beside the steps since it was just raw wood planks before. A little more hammering down on the door, and...
Pretty crazy right?? It doesn't even look like the same house! I have to say, not only did it help the staircase in drastic ways, it opened our hallway up several feet as well! If you look, you'll see the wall came out a good 2 feet or so from the staircase. At the end of the hallway, there was a gorgeous glass door. So, when you came in the house through the front door, the foyer was it's own little room with that glass door leading down the hallway. Although I hated to lose the door (we saved it and used it somewhere else!), I really wanted a huge, super wide hallway that started right off the foyer. Here are a couple pictures of the hallway and foyer before we went sledge hammer crazy.
(Sorry about the weird angles!)
This is the foyer before. See how you had to walk through the single doorway to see down the hallway??
This is after the glass door and doorframe came down, but before the staircase wall came down.
Here it is looking from the front door after all the walls came down!! Doesn't it make a huge difference??!
So that's the beginning of the staircase remodel!! The next step was making the stairs safe enough to walk on! :)
P.S. I realize the walls are painted in some of these pictures and completely unfinished in others! That just goes to show you how randomly I took pictures! :)
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