Spent the long, lazy, hot weekend taking some photos around the house. Many of the plants that we planted in the spring are finally starting to grow now. Of course I had Mabel out enjoying the weather and we let our new beagle (Bailey) explore the neighborhood and get used to her surroundings. Also spent a lot of time reconditioning our old utility trailer. Cleaned it up, sanded any rust and painted it to match our new truck. You can view the entire photoset by clicking here!

So today was another milestone on our quest to finish our basement remodel. We finished sanding the walls last night (so we thought), and we started getting the walls primed and ready for paint. The computer room, hallway, laundry closet and den are completely primed and ready for paint. However, we discovered that the kitchenette area still has a few rough edges and will need a skim coat of mud in some areas. We’re hoping to get this completed tomorrow and have the walls and ceiling primed before Fathers Day is over!!!

The past few days have been spent mudding the walls in the basement in an attempt to get it completely finished in the next coming weeks. We still have the bathroom to finish (tile and drywall), but that’ll have to wait until we a new stackable washer and dryer. But for now, we need to finish the kitchenette area, the hallway, staircase, computer room and den. All of the seams are completed, 2 coats of mud have been applied, the last will be applied in the morning and sanding will begin on Tuesday. Slowly but surely, it’s coming together and we’re excited about getting it done. We still need to decide on flooring.

Last winter, we quickly learned that our Solstice wasn’t the best car to drive in the sleet and snow. Great for summer time driving, bad for winter. As much as we enjoyed it, it just wasn’t practical for us any longer and since we sold our Jeep, we really needed something that we can pull our trailer with and considering the amount of trips we make to Lowes, a new pickup seemed to fit the bill. We looked at the Toyota’s and the Ford’s, but it was the Chevy dealership who was willing to give us what we needed out of the Solstice. We also got many more features on the Colorado than we would’ve been able to get on the Toyota or Ford at a comparable price. So far, we’re loving it.

This project started in mid September 2008. A complete remodel of our basement, new walls, new plumbing, new electrical, etc. Since we’re doing this ourselves, we allocated 2 years to complete the project. So we’re hoping to be completely finished by the end of September, 2010. Based on estimates, we figure that we’re saving about $28,000.00 doing 99% of the work ourselves. You can follow this link to view the entrie photoset, starting from day one!