Step by Step...the long road to a new craft room

We are hard at work here getting my new craft room done finally. It's been a 28 month long journey but in the mean-time we've accomplished a lot! A few detours too. When renovating, we try and take summers off. In Canada they are so short and the kids grow up so quickly, it's really important to us to spend them together. We've also had a few detours, a leaky roof and this entire addition/renovation was not JUST a craft room project. We added a new bedroom (done), a new back entrance (check), a beautiful new kitchen and eating area (check) and a few other things.

I have to stop right here and just say that my hubby is amazing! He did this all himself. The man is a machine and I've never seen anyone work like him. It's really the only way we could have afforded to take on this project. And while I NEVER want to go through it again, I'm so glad and appreciative now that we did. While we're finishing off the craft room, I thought I'd share a few glimpses into the process so you understand what has taken so long...

It all started Labour Day weekend 2007. Out came the tractor and the shovels and the saws and hubby went to work. Three weeks of heavy digging every Saturday and every night until well after dark, here's the start of my basement addition, ready to be blocked. As you can see, my large porch was cut down in size. I had to barricade off my kitchen door lest one of the little boys walked out into thin air. Under the kitchen of this 100+ yo farm house was a crawl space. Hubby had to dig out the entire corridor as well as a cold cellar and storage room under the house by hand.



October 19th and the blocks are starting to be laid on the footings. My craft room lies to the left. This is the view from my old kitchen door.

Finally we are closed in except for one window that has been left out to pour the floor. It's now November 21/07 and we're getting ready to pour the concrete floor. As we have old radiators throughout the house for heating, hubby installed hot water tubes in the concrete. My feet will be nice and toasty all winter long. Now my room is not this large. It's the space to the left. The larger room went to my 3rd child. I was thrilled to let him have it as it meant that child number 5 could move in with child number four and OUT of our room. Bliss!


My "huge" contribution to the project was keeping the construction dust & dirt under control, keeping the kids safe, and providing lots of food. I also spent time designing the kitchen, and figuring out how to best squeeze all my paper crafting supplies into one 8x8 room. Here's what I came up with.


I'm so excited to finally have a room to create in again. Hubby built me one in our last home but I haven't had one in 10 years and 5.5 months. Not that I'm counting. (wink) I've been creating in a small corner of the family room which has been less than ideal. Now it seems to close so being done, I can hardly stand it. A few weeks ago we found the time to paint the room and last Saturday spent the day installing cupboards. A little more electrical and some trim and I can start moving in. Well. Who am I kidding, as we finished getting the cupboards installed Saturday night, I've started moving stuff in already!


I'm off to do more sorting!

Have a beautiful day!

Julia