Here we go again...

Once again we have a dumpster in the driveway and a port-o-potty behind the shed. That can only mean more renovation work is about to commence. Yep, we are entering phase 2 of our overall renovation plan. This time we are working on the master bedroom/bath and converting the old game room to a multi-use media room.

We utilized our favorite architect, Ryan Conway, and RHD will again be our contractor.

The media room was originally a game room but in actuality has been almost everything but a game room. Our first use of this room was as a home daycare room while Monica finished her teaching degree. Over the years it has been a family/TV room, an office, a bedroom, a temporary kitchen and, most recently, a storage room.

Our first inclination was to turn in into a dedicated home theater with two rows of theater seating with the back row on a platform.  However,  during a recent party, we realized that theater seating just would not really work for when we have parties. So we will just have a traditional family room setup with a sofa, love seat and chair while still being able to use it as a home theater.  We will move our current white leather furniture from the family room and purchase new furniture for the family which makes Monica very happy.


We purchased a new 3D HD projector along with a wall mounted, fixed frame, 120 inch screen. 

The wainscoting will come out and the wall on the left will have the screen.  The screen takes up roughly half of the wall and we will paint that wall with a dark blue flat paint.  There will be five of the 7.2 speakers on this wall.  Andy purchased two tower front surround speakers and center speaker.  We will also have two surround speakers up at the ceiling as the height speakers.

On this wall will be some wall cabinets with glass doors to hold all of the components including the projector (hopefully).  Alternatively the projector could be ceiling mounted.  There will be a pocket style door installed on this side of the wall and will slide over to cover the door when we want to darken the room for movie watching.

This closet will be re-worked to become a niche for the kegerator Andy bought.  To the right of that the wall will be firred out a little over two feet to have a niche to install some cabinets.  Again we will use IKEA cabinets as they have worked out well for us in the kitchen.  We like some dark black-brown cabinets with perhaps a bright red countertop with a white backsplash.  Oh yea, we will also have an under-counter ice maker as well.

We are really excited about the media room.

Finally, we are going to finish our master bath and update the master bedroom.  The master suite has always been the absolutely last priority when looking at projects.  If you recall, Andy started working on the Master bath and closet before we started the big addition project replacing the vanities, sinks, sink faucets, mirrors and light fixtures...and it still is not finished.  Andy also started building some custom closet components which are now being replaced with an Elfa system from The Container Store.

So, what are we doing then?  Well, we are pretty much gutting the half of the bathroom that has the toilet, tub and shower.  We are purchasing a nice tub for Monica that has hot air bubbles and a heated backrest.  Andy will get  a totally new shower with four body sprays and a frameless glass enclosure.  We will also add a glass block window just above the tub.  The additional light from the glass block window and the glass shower enclosure will really open up and modernize the space.

This entire wall will be gutted and rebuilt resulting in a more open feeling space.

There will be a nice new tub and a glass block window here.

RHD will be out on Thursday to begin.  Hopefully, both rooms will be completed in about 4-5 weeks.  Once RHD has the master bath complete, Andy will finish up the master bedroom.  We will repaint, install new flooring and RHD will add some can lights

In the meantime, all four adults will share the guest bathroom and we have turned Karen's bedroom into a daycare for our animals... don't worry, Karen just recently moved out to her own apartment.  In addition, our dining room is now a storage area for items that we had to move out of the construction zones.

The dining room now holds a lot of stuff including the popcorn machine, the kegerator and all of the new master bedroom furniture.

 Keep tuned to follow our progress.