New Bedroom at Last!

Guys. GUYS! Last night, I slept in my new bedroom. That might sound like a simple little something, but when you think back on everything that went into getting that place finished and ready for Denisa and me to finally move in, it’s kind of astonishing (and more than a little depressing, I guess.) Think about it.

First we had to build a staircase to the area above the garage. It was a staircase to nowhere, essentially. The area above my garage was completely dark. No windows. It had a moldy old rug for a floor, though that only covered part of the space. When we first moved ino over 9 years ago, you could see daylight through the roof. (Come to think of it, the journey to this bedroom began even further back, when we repaired some of the foundation of that garage to make it sturdy, and we switched out the soffits that were almost totally rotting off. Or even before then, the first construction project we paid for on the house: putting new shingles on that roof.)

Anyway. The staircase was over 5 years ago, and it was really just an act of faith more than anything else. A hope that we might someday finish things. We got the staircase up, and then we had to reinforce the floor, which was too weak to support real construction. Then it was framing things out for a bedroom and a bathroom and a loft, and after that it was putting in dormers so that we had windows up there.

That was followed by putting in lights and insulating the whole thing, which of course led to us having to rip the insulation down this year and have it all spray foamed. And now we had the walls put up and painted, and the floor put down, and, and, and–

We finally were able to sleep there. We moved the bed up last night.

Is the space finished? Nope. We have a hall and a bedroom done. In mid-October we’ll be having the rest of the walls put up, fill in the hole where the old staircase used to be, and tile a corner for a pellet stove to live. Then we need to buy said pellet stove, finish off the loft, and tackle the bathroom.

But for today, I’m just enjoying the feeling of actually having a new space in my house. It was strange sleeping there last night. You wouldn’t think adding a new room to the house would make that much of a difference, but it really does. More storage, more floor space, more space to spread out. It’s lovely.