Drew of all trades

Let me brag on my husband for a quick second, I really don't do that enough.  First off, he's cute.  It comes in handy when he's being a pill (which of course is the nice way of putting it.)  And yeah, I should probably have put other things first, like his smarts or his devotion to his family but what can I say, I like his butt.  And he has an awesome smile.

I mean, of course there's other stuff too.  Everything he does is for his family.  Seriously, everything.  He thinks of us before he thinks of himself, sometimes to his detriment.  He will run himself down to the bone for us and while that's not good for anyone, he truly is devoted to us.  

I trust him implicitly and I don't need to tell you how major that is.  Trust is earned, not given and he has demonstrated over the years that he is the most upstanding man of his word out there.

There's fun stuff too.  If you give him a bunch of stuff and tell him to fit it into a particular space, he can do it.  You can give him 100 things and a teeny box and he'll magically make it all fit.  Seriously, it's one of the things I love about him because it's so cool.  Every so often, he'll go through the cupboards and rearrange things and organize them so everything fits and looks nice and somehow we have more space than before.  That's the engineer in him.

He is great at parties too.  He knows how to work a room without making it look like he's working the room.  I love that he's outgoing and loves to entertain.  He's an amazing chef and I love how much he loves food.  He gets giddy over a fresh loaf of bread - like for real giddy and it's really cute.

Naturally, he's got his areas of improvement - that temper is a monster (which is the nice way of putting it), but overall I'm reminded just about every day that I made the right choice in my husband.  If you have to do life, he's the one I'd choose to do it with.

One of Drew's other major talents is that he's quite handy.  This is super fantastic because I'm DIY-design-obsessed and I want to try every idea on the Internet.  So, last fall when we finished redoing the kitchen, the next and final big project was the laundry room.

This is what we had when we first moved in.

Nasty popcorn type ceiling, off-center light, prison gray walls.

As if doing laundry isn't depressing enough.

Step one was to move the light to the center of the room.

Then we lived with the hole in the ceiling for a while.

Then we got a new washer and dryer and decided to stack them to try and get more space.

We worked with this for a while but it was still depressing.

Last fall, Drew and his friend got started on the renovation for the laundry room with the goal to finish it by the time Andrea was born.  That didn't happen but it doesn't matter because the end product is fantastic.

The original ceiling was popcorn-y and terrible.  The texture just ate up the light and for a room with very little natural light to begin with, that was not the business.  The wall behind the washer and dryer was the same texture and it was just gross.  One option is to skim coat it, which means run spackling over the popcorn and sand until smooth.  That option is a gigantic pain in the ass.  That's when I stepped in and showed them the beadboard ceiling at The House of Smiths.  Except, beadboard is also a pain in the ass - from what I understand.  I didn't do the cutting and measuring.  Drew didn't want to do the cutting and measuring and really just wanted to paint the popcorn, to which I kindly and gently replied, "I Am In Here Nearly Every Day Of My Life And I Want Beadboard."  

First panel of beadboard.

I will die on this mountain.

You get your yellow bedroom, I get my beadboard.

Drew and his friend, who is also an engineer, spent many nights last November measuring and cutting and buying new sheets of beadboard because they messed up, and measuring and cutting some more.

A lot of beer and cursing was involved in placing all the beadboard because the 

laundry room was an afterthought addition and the ceiling and walls were wavy and uneven.

The engineers were meticulous in their measurements

but there's no accounting for a wavy ceiling.

 I started getting nervous because if the beadboard didn't work out,

I'd never hear the end of it.

Then I got really nervous because once it was up,

it didn't look all that great.

There was no turning back now.  With the beadboard up, we turned to the sink.  I really liked having a sink in the laundry room, I just didn't like the generic utility sink and I didn't want to replace it with a plain silver sink like what's in every laundry room.  We searched and searched for something that would jump out at us and one night we found it on Craigslist.  It was an antique baby tub that would serve perfectly as a unique sink for the laundry room.  I drove out to get it and my handy hubby plumbed and placed it.  Incidentally, did you know that with the proper plumbing know-how, you can make just about anything into a sink?  

We bought butcher block countertops from Ikea and the boys got to measuring and cutting once again.  We unstacked the washer and dryer to have a place to put the laundry basket and other supplies.  I really wanted everything to have a home and the laundry basket had been 'living' on the edge of the utility sink.  Again, not the business.

Out of the box, the butcher block was too wide, but they ripped it down and

 put the raw edge at the back.

They also moved the water lines for better access.

Or something.

Honestly, I'm not sure.

Obviously, this isn't a tutorial on how to redo your laundry room.

The other thing they had to address was the circuit box; namely, I didn't want to see it.

So they bought a cabinet, cut out a hole in the back and put the whole thing 

over the circuit box.  They're so smart.

They also installed three LED ceiling lights on a dimmer switch because

it's right off the kitchen and the kitchen dims so the laundry room needs to dim too.

I need mood lighting when I'm washing diapers.

Much neater!

Then they cut covers for above and below the cabinet.

They're only three sided and they're not attached to the wall

so they're easy to remove should we need to get to the wires later.

Now that eyesore of a circuit box is all nice and hidden.

Then there was the issue of storage.  Our kitchen isn't that big and we don't have a lot of counter or cabinet space.  The bigger appliances that didn't get daily use were just sitting on the counter getting in the way so the guys took some more butcher block and made shelves on the wall behind the sink.  We moved all the stuff in there and I thought it was going to be a pain to get the blender and bring it into the kitchen whenever I want a smoothie, but it's no big deal.  And it *is* nice to have the counter space back.  Plus, they even put outlets in the wall so in theory I could have the crockpot going in the laundry room.  This is amazing because Sofia regularly climbs up on the counter and I don't have to worry about her touching the hot crockpot and with it on a shelf in the laundry room, it's completely out of reach.  Putting outlets out there was seriously a genius move.

Right around this time, the boys ran out of steam and I *think* I'd already had the baby - I can't remember what I did yesterday so remembering what happened last fall is out of the question.  We called Bill the Painter to come in and patch all the seams and caulk the gaps and paint the room.  We ended up using the same color as the kitchen (Ocean Pearl by Behr) so it would be more cohesive.  Since the dog goes outside through the laundry room, the door is always open and we wanted it to look like an extension of the kitchen.  Bill did a kick-ass job and you can't see any of the seams, not one.

Scary

Ah-mah-zing!

Gorgeous!

My antique sink with my modern faucet.  Love it!

Look at that beautiful ceiling!  Not a seam to be found!

This is how it looks today.

And I'm proud to say that in this moment in time,

that heap of clean laundry is folded and put away, thank you very much.

Also, those are peel and stick carpet tiles from Lowe's.

I gave up on trying to have a runner in here,

and the carpet tiles work really well.

We also got an organization system from Pottery Barn

where I keep track of Drew's travel and other stuff.

I have calendars on my phone and computer but you can't 

have too many reminder spots.

PS, I got some Nate Berkus push pins from Target because regular push pins just wouldn't cut it in my fancy new laundry room.

These are the stupidest pushpins in existence!

Once you push them in, there's nothing to grab onto so you can 

get them back out!

I have to wedge my fingernail underneath the pin and pry it out and it

sucks!

Boo, Nate Berkus.  Boo.

Not my hand, btw.

It's whatever.  

Back to my pretty laundry room.

Bill the Painter painted the doors French Gray by Glidden 

because the old color was sad and ugly.

I had that quart sitting around for ages and had him put it up because I was dying to use it.

It's bluer than I thought it would be but it's a nice contrast with the walls

so I'll keep it.

Also, I can't get over how well he patched all the seams and painted everything

so perfectly.  You know what they say:  "Caulk and paint will make it what it ain't!"

Another shot of my pretty sink.

Also, we sealed the butcher block with mineral oil.

I learned that little tip from ol' Mr. Google.

I kept meaning to get another trash can that would fit under the counter and move the 

dog food bin out to the garage, but I never got around to it.

And now that we're moving, it doesn't make sense to get another trash can

since we don't know what the setup will be in the new house.

Also, grown men shouldn't stand on butcher block countertops when doing ceiling work.

Lesson learned, hindsight 20/20, all that.

We'll probably build a center support to help with the bowing

at some point before we move.

And this is the longest photo caption ever.

Also, if we were staying I'd build a custom

drying rack for the wall to the right of the cabinet

and put a giant stain guide on the wall to the right of the shelves.

I keep meaning to take that poster down from the top of the cabinet too.

Drew put it up there for 'decoration.'

Bless his heart.

However, since we're leaving it doesn't make a lot of sense to put more time and effort and money into it since that'll just be money we won't have at the new house.  Besides, it's quite pretty how it is and it's an enormous improvement over how it used to be so I'll take it.

Drew and his friend did an amazing job and I'm so proud of their hard work.  I love my new laundry room and I no longer get depressed about life when I go in there.  It was the last big project to get the house to where it feels like us and I really like it.

Naturally, this all happened just in time to turn it over to someone else.  Isn't that how it always is?  I mean, it's probably not that way for other people, but it seems to be a theme with us.  

Of course, since we're moving so soon after arriving here, it *may* not have been the best idea to do any of it.  

Oh well, lesson learned, hindsight 20/20, all that.  You know how it goes.

In the meantime, I'm going to enjoy my laundry room for however long I have it and maybe the new owners will pick up where we left off.  At the very least, hopefully they will appreciate Drew's hard work!  I know I do.

Thanks Babe!