The Never-Ending Basement Project

It’s the age old story of starting a project anticipating it will take about 3 days to finish.

You start off the first day with gusto…all geared up to get this project done.

For us the first day began with hauling out moldy storage (yes masks and garbage bags were utilized).

This mold arrived courtesy of a misguided attempt by the 12 year old to put away the dolls in a basement closet…which then did not have the ability to air out/dry out.  Hrmph.

Then our project was interrupted by 2 babies…who’s Mom was on call for animal emergencies.

The next two days were spent playing with babies instead of the basement.

The best laid plans…

That was two weeks ago.

In the meantime…

We pulled down the ceiling tiles hoping to discover why the floor to the upstairs room (dining room) has always been cold.  Sure enough…no insulation and just a board or two between the basement and outside walls.  Ugh.

Insert insulation.  Decide to paint floor joists (most inexpensive option).  Borrow paint sprayer.

We have now discovered that using a paint sprayer to paint the floor joists was not all that it cracked up to be…so Tim painted them by hand today.

The offensive closet has now been washed/bleached and wire brushed/scraped down…and now cleaned out so I can prime and paint it.

We’ve only been in this house for 13 years….how did we not notice it was bare/untreated cement?

Does anyone else have a basement closet or two that they’ve overlooked?

Ugh…again.

Tomorrow will bring priming…

And maybe then there’ll be painting…

I imagine this project will still take another week or so.

You see I have paintings to repair (the Henri Matisse paintings Alex and I created 10 years ago).

I promise I’ll show you the finished project once it’s all done!

But for now, it’s time to RELAX…

I did steal a moment or two to visit our local Ely Flower and Seed store today and found some wonderful new perennials for my flower gardens.  Tim originally sent me for some potatoes for the vegetable garden (he should have known better!). 🙂

Of course, then I did have to plant those perennials…

And replace my “Peppermint Patty” plant with one.  The peppermint plant went into a pot on my deck…I had had enough of it taking over the herb garden!  I figure this will be a great spot to not only smell the fragrance, but to also snip a few leaves for mojitos!

And then I needed to water all my plants…

And by the time I was done with that…

It was dinner time: Tim made homemade pizza- YUM!

And here I am, ending my day with you…

And the movie Leap Year…

And Tim reading his Family Handyman…

And Gabi and her friend Maarja…

Sam’s already in bed…she gets to work at 6 am tomorrow!

I think a glass of wine is in order.

Cheers to a good day!

Patty O