The Sunroom is done!

I don't know who wins the "Most Patience" award....me or my dad. Oh wait, that award goes to my mom. 

Do you remember the photos I posted back in June 2017 of the weekend storm? They had about 20 trees, around their house, get knocked down with three of them hitting the house, garage, and shed. They hired a contractor to help with the repairs and rebuilding, but dad and I decided to finish the interior work on the rebuilt sunroom ourself. 

I am happy to say it is "done." As you know, nothing is ever really done. We are still creating a unique window treatment and trying to convince mom to let us put in french doors. But to our guests, the room looks done. :)

For those who have not visited my parent's house, let me see if I can find a photo of the old sunroom.

(2002)

Now focus on the room, not the people. You can see the two walls of windows and the glass ceiling. What you can't see are the other two walls. They are "normal" walls that had a wall covering of wood closet siding hung on a diagonal. 

All of the original glass/metal walls and ceiling were removed by the contractor and he rebuilt to look like this...

The other outside wall has two more windows. We gave up the glass ceiling, added the windows in the peak, and gained more insulation. Our plan is to add a deck where you see the unpainted wood.

I don't have a lot of pictures of the days we worked on the interior. There was a lot of hauling 8' and 12' and 14' pieces of car siding. We had them stacked in the sunroom and when the weather was nice, we hauled them outside to sand and varnish. When the weather was not in our favor, we sanded them inside. Mom helped us with that part of the process. 

For my own record keeping/memory book the project also included:

• hiring the insulation to be done
• running wiring for the outlets, lights, and ceiling fan
• repairing the floor due to water damage (we decided to repair rather than tear up and redo)
• installing the air conditioner/heater
• painting the exterior wood and trim
• installing the light fixtures and ceiling fan (with special walnut and oak base plates)

(note the wood wall on the right of the photo, that is an original wall. We kept that wall intact and I just sanded it and re-varnished it so it looks more similar to the color of the new wood.)

My brother jumped in on the fun for some of the big parts of the project: installing the ceiling, building and installing the walnut center beam, and he helped put up the ceiling fan. The days that he came to help gave me a chance to grab the camera and take some photos. :)

My mom wins the patience award because for about 11 months she had all of the furniture and decorations from the sunroom scattered throughout the rest of the house. That included a gas fireplace in her kitchen and an extra table in her dining room. When we were almost done with the sunroom, we moved a lot of the furniture back, but we still needed the saw. So that was another test of patience for my mom, to live with a saw in her sunroom while we finished the trim work. 

The day we could finally put the saw back down in the basement was the day we finished the walnut beam on the side wall. There had been a lot of debate on whether we needed to replace the old closet siding wood (the angled design) or keep it. I just didn't have it in me to haul, sand, and varnish another batch of car siding. The walnut beam was what we decided to do instead. It allowed us to use create a transition piece using some really old wood, we had in storage. We left the rough cut surfaces, so it has a lot of character and matches the center beam. 

Mom was our faithful assistant throughout the project. She was always bustling around sweeping up the sawdust and mess we created in the project. (Sometimes she was sweeping while we were sawing.) The day we hung the beam on the side wall was the funniest. We needed mom's help handing us the various drills and screws, while dad and I were up on the ladders. Mom felt like she needed to keep sweeping the floor while holding the extra tools. She cracked us up with her focus on keeping the dust from being tracked throughout the house.  

Mom and dad have entertained small groups of friends and family in the semi-finished room and since we finished the last big part. I'm looking forward to hosting our extended family Christmas there in the next couple of weeks. I think we will get those last few little, finishing-touch projects done by then too. 

But I know, the reality is there are always more projects to do. The house is never really done.