The Reckoning (Demo Day 2)

Hoh Daddy!

We got the call Rumpke was on their way to deliver the dumpster, so we put our guitars up and walked over to the house. The driver dropped it off in our driveway and we went inside to get ready for more demo!

John and I immediately went to the garage and started clearing out all the green carpet and padding. Then we got all the paneling and tile ceiling that was propped up in the entryway. Our dumpster started filling up quickly.

Friday's main project was knocking the wall down between the kitchen and dining room. John started by carefully removing the paneling from the wall. We need to save at least 4 boards of it to close up the bedroom closet on the other side of the room.

Right now, it has a door on each end of the closet -- one from the bedroom and one from this room, which you can see below:

Dining Room before demolition. We will close the wall up where the white closet door is. 

John got the paneling down without too many casualties to reveal about 5 layers of wallpaper, plaster, and wooden slats. There was also a circular ceramic thing in the brick (can't remember what that's called) stuffed with newspaper from the Lexington Herald-Leader, 1940 and 1946, mostly from the funnies section of the paper.

There are still some carpet staples on one part of the floor -- oh, yes, I totally put that off -- so I got those out of the floor, at least in the demo corner. Now there's just a small section that I have to finish (thankfully!!).

Not everyone would agree (especially over Derby weekend), but it's lucky for us that Kentucky has gotten another cold snap. Otherwise, it would be gross, sticky, and hot -- inside and out. We opened some windows, put a fan in the dining room window to help suck out some of the dust, and started getting the wallpaper and plaster down first.

Layers of wallpaper

Slowly but surely.

We removed all the wooden slats from the wall, tried to clean up all the dust and debris often -- it was a test of endurance. We were a bunch of pack mules!

You can see from the picture how dusty it was. Lotsa dust.

The back of the pantry and the brick chimney.

The scene from the other side (kitchen) below. It was really something.

Look what else I found in the dining room: more beadboard ceiling. Yeah! The only thing is, it looks a little rough, though. I can't tell if those boards have chimney soot all over them or if they are moldy or what. Further excavation has to happen. It is going to be tedious because there are quite a few layers of insulation, paper, etc. under the ceiling tiles. We'll see if they can be salvaged! Fingers crossed.

Found more beadboard :)

 Seeing daylight!

 A view from the kitchen side.

Aaaaaand...here is the after photo. That wall is gone. Yes, we're definitely keeping the fireplace. It will need a good scrub. I keep worrying that we'll never get this place clean ever again...

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ALL DONE!! For now.......