Foundation Finishing

There were still some things we were wrapping up, but it was weather dependent... one of those was the stone facing in on the new foundation.

Original house foundation

Our contractor ordered the stone that we all agreed would match the original house foundation the best.  I thought it would come in sections, but when delivered we found it was all individual stones!

First they had to prep the smooth cement of the new foundation, so that the stone blocks would adhere...

One thing I didn't realize was that you apply it from the top down, rather than from the bottom up.  I guess to keep from dripping cement on the pieces as you lay them.

Here we are with the left side stone in place

 At the end of the second day, we had the largest section done.  Here it is, with the grout not yet in place...

They continued to work their way around the back of the house, then came back a fourth day and did the grouting...

Happily, this is now completed!

You can see that the grass is filling in.  We have future plans for a patio, but we have to put more thought into that, so we just put down grass seed for now.

Next up is painting the exterior.  We've selected the colors & the company to do the work... they have us lined up for August (weather dependent, of course!)

Cleaning up! (The Laundry Room)

I can't believe the last blog post on the laundry room was when it got painted.  For quite a while, we had it functioning, but not looking so pretty.

I had lots of decorating plans for in here though!

Here's where we are now!

Well, that's with everything put away.  It's usually more like this... (I will admit I did remove several laundry baskets filled with dirty clothes out to the hallway for the pics!)

Having the laundry room on the same floor as the bedrooms/bathrooms has been a game changer!  No more baskets of laundry waiting to be folded, or piles of folded clothes waiting to go upstairs, on the first floor. It truly saves time & effort.

I like that there's enough room for me to leave the iron board up.  I use it to sort clothes when I'm folding.  I'm also wearing more items from my closet because the decision isn't based on what doesn't need to be ironed!  It's not such a hassle to quickly press off a blouse that needs it, rather than pass right by it.

The shelves above the washer & drier were from the local home improvement store.

The old wringer was strategically placed on the washer to hide the hose connections in the back.

I still am annoyed with the plumber for placing them so high up.  Speaking of the plumber... he never did get the laundry room sink installed.  That's still sitting on the floor.

Can you tell the plumber was the one part of the project that I completely disliked?

After fighting to get him to fix the upstairs heat from November until June ('cause who needs heat all winter!?!) we're just glad to be rid of him. In addition to poor workmanship, he gave me the creeps.

Anyway, enough of that- back to the happiness of the finished laundry room!

This little guy is a clothes line...

On the wall above the ironing board, I hung up some cross stitching and sewing items.

On the wall behind the door, the blue cabinet fits nicely.   It holds all of the laundry detergent, drier sheets, etc.

I put some hooks on the wall to store extra hangers.
I still need to figure out something for the wall above the blue cabinet.

When the door is open, you don't even see that stuff.  

View from the hallway

Some detail shots: