January 2007

The floors and electrical outlets are finished! The appliances are being delivered and we are beginning to put in some furniture!

HERE: Looking into the kitchen BELOW: Inside the kitchen -- refrigerator (not in its final location)







The dining nook again, now with a new sconce on the wall to provide light during dinner :)

Our living room with our first piece of furniture. A cozy chair from Upscale Resale. Notice on the bottom right hand window, there is no longer a Chicken Out menu filling in for a missing window. We replaced all three sliding windows and repainted the sills.
Looking at the front door from the living room. CLEARLY we have not replaced the front door yet..... notice the graffiti. (I thought it would get replaced sooner that it did :)



The Bathroom: We converted the bathtub into a shower space. Stone tiles were installed from floor to ceiling. The vanity, toilet, and lighting.



HERE: The bedroom with lighting (and new window that LOCKS!)
BELOW: The bedroom closet

December 2006

Skip ahead -- and then we had painted walls (thanks to help from Natalie Tedder) and our stone floors installed.


Looking into our kitchen from the living room (acutally the floors in the process of being installed at this point):


HERE: The living room - Sycamore Green by Restoration Hardware
BELOW: Standing in the living room looking at the bathroom door, the hall closet, and on the right the entry way into the kitchen.








The kitchen: Butter Cream by Restoration Hardware.



The bedroom: Atmosphere Blue by Restoration Hardware.


In the bedroom, looking into the bedroom closet:


In the bedroom, looking out into the hallway. You can see part of the bathroom entryway and a bit of the living room on the right. Electrical outlets not finished off yet.

November 2006

And then we had walls.... and more debris again. The place suddenly shrunk when our new (mold-free!) drywall was installed.


In the living room. A new pile of debris - left over drywall:

The hall closet (will be Luke's). You can see the edges and corners have not been finished off yet and the seams have not been smoothed.


HERE: Looking into the kitchen
BELOW: More debris in the living room



HERE: Looking into the bedroom
BELOW: Our dining nook again




Looking into the bathroom. No sink, just a toilet.... not for long.

October 2006

We FINALLY removed all of the debris. We re-insulated the walls with brand new (mold free!) insluation. We painted the cement floor, walls, and bottom of the beams with Killz Ultra to seal the wood from moisture and kill any remaining mold.


Looking into the kitchen from the living room. Notice the new breaker box on the right -- all of the electricity was replaced and updated and recessed lighting was added on the ceiling. With 559 square feet, not even your lighting can take up space. No room for floor lights or hanging fixtures.


Lucas in the kitchen!


A nook in the living room space -- the future home of our "dining room". You can see the new insulation and the recessed lighting.


The bathroom still hasn't been touched much yet at this point other than the walls and ceiling: RIGHT - Looking into the bathroom through the hall closet.


Looking into the bedroom. No recessed lighting, plans for a ceiling fan with a light and wall sconces.


Recessed lighting without the ceiling!

Inside the bedroom:


Standing in the bedroom doorway:

Looking into the condo from the front porch:

August 2006

Day one of demo was pulling up the rotten flooring and the carpet in the bedroom. (No photos)

Day two was knocking out all of the drywall. We were originally going to simply patch the holes, but based on the condition of the floors and the known flood damage, we feared mold on the other side of the drywall.... we were right. It all had to come down. Ceiling, walls... nothing left but cement floor and wood beams. The good news was that the wood beams were in good shape. The biggest challenge after the demo, was disposing of it all. That took several weeks and MANY trips to both the Fairfax County Dump and other various places which will remain nameless.


HERE: The damaged drywall, out on the front patio.
BELOW: The damaged drywall, still hanging.
You can see the mold.


The refrigerator got temporarily relocated to the living room:





















LEFT: The wall in the kitchen where the sink, stove, and dishwasher formerly resided. RIGHT: The back wall of the kitchen. Notice the rotten floor on the right, very difficult to pull up when it crumbled into the shovel.





A view from the front door -- looking into the living room, straight through to the bedroom. Taylor's working hard pulling the drywall off of the cinder block wall.





















Turned around, looking back outside through a front window. Look at all of the debris on the porch.....





The fuse box -
Lucas working hard pulling off the wall in the kithen:



Of course, I was working hard too:









and PILES of debris....




Looking straight through into the bathroom:

July 2006 - BEFORE

Closing Date: July 5, 2006... what have we gotten ourselves into?

These are the first pictures we took. This was the weekend after we closed. Uncle Bill, Marilyn, Amy, Steve, and Olivia were in town and got a first look. I think they thought we were crazy. :) We knew going into this that we had a long road ahead of us. The further in we got, the more we realized needed to be done.

Several things the photos did not / cannot capture: 1) the smell of mold and cat urine 2) the hole through the front door 3) The missing window on the front, patched by a Chicken Out menu. 4) The shattered front window repaired by tape. 5) Rusted window frames 6) Holes in walls and interior doors. 7) The only light was ONE ceiling fixture that was falling down.

This is looking into the kitchen. In front of the kitchen is rotten parkay flooring. You can see a bit of the orange extension cord coming out of the kitchen. All of the electrical outlets in the kitchen were cold, so the refrigerator was plugged into an outlet in the living room. On the right you can see a half-functioning old fashioned fuse box.


As you turn left into the kitchen, this is the view! The dishwasher does a great Old Faithful impression. Yes, we believe that's what caused some of the flood damage.


Doorless Hall Closet:



View into the bedroom:

The bathroom -- the room we originally thought needed the least amount of work. Relatively speaking, it wasn't that bad.