As you know I demoed the brick wall that was part of my fireplace on Friday night with some of my girlfriends. We ended up tearing out the decorative ceiling beams as well and there was a lot to clean up and finish on Saturday. Too bad we had no time to do it. Hubby and I had a banquet to go to at Rutgers, our alma mater. 
So on Sunday hubby helped tackle the remaining brick and mortar on the floor. Can you see in the picture above, there is brick under the garbage can? And under that there was still a ton of mortar. Removing it was slow process involving switching off between a sledge hammer and a chisel. There was no option to leave it there because we would never be able to put in new flooring. Thankfully hubby got most of it out.
I built that nice little wood frame so we’ll have something to attach the drywall to, and insulation! It’s cold over there. There are 2 half bricks missing in the picture below, but don’t worry, I have them, they’re actually sitting on top of fireplace right now. I need to make a clean cut down the middle and then I’ll replace them.
So things look pretty well under control over here, right? I was supposed to spend Monday cleaning up because Tuesday (yesterday) was my son’s 5th birthday and I had about 25 people coming over for a party. {I love my neighborhood, because I can have a full on party at noon on a Tuesday!} So I started to clean on Monday. I vacuumed up brick dust, picked up big chunks, wiped off the furniture, you know. But then all of sudden, I found myself with sledge hammer in hand, again. And next thing you know I was taking out the small wall between the kitchen and family room. Not the half wall, but the 2 foot wall that has 4 light switches in it. Oops. It went from this to this pretty quickly.
This is a look from the family room into the kitchen. I wanted to shorten this wall behind the bookshelves (which will be going to the basement as part of the makeover).
I moved the one bookshelf, then started making small holes in the wall to check to see if there was anything in there besides the obvious electrical wires. Of course I knew there were 4 light switches on this small wall, but I also know that hubby can relocate them. He’s done it before.
Then I took the sledge hammer to the other side. This was the picture I posted on Instagram Monday.
The plan was to spend the night drywalling next to the fireplace, but I could tell that our efforts were going to be diverted. As soon as I took down the drywall I could tell there was something not right with the studs. They were all eaten up by termites. 
I’m no professional, but it didn’t look like active termites, but the damage was definitely done. There were also signs that mice had joined the party. Two feet was now turning into a big can of worms. It didn’t matter so much that the studs (vertical 2 x 4s) were eaten up because I was taking those out anyway. The problem was that the worst piece of wood was the sole plate (or bottom plate), which was completely deteriorated. And there was a hole in the subfloor below it. Not good. And more mouse droppings. Yuck. There had obviously been some water damage, which attracted the termites. 
I cleaned things up and fed the kids lunch. Then I called hubby and told him that I took the wall down. 🙂 Doesn’t it look so much more open? I love it already.
When hubby got home he got to work freeing the electrical wires so I could take out the remaining studs.
Despite my nice drywall cut, we decided to take the rest of the drywall out to the corner. We wanted to see how bad the termite damage was, plus it made it easier to relocate the wires. Here I am thrilled to be tearing out what’s left of the deteriorated sole plate. It was mostly just splinters of wood.
Now to focus on moving the electrical. Apparently you can’t just swing all those wires over, they have to be removed from the con box one at a time, moved, then reconnected. 
My friends expect a certain level of crazy when they come to my house, but this would be too much.
Have no fear, hubby got the wires rerouted to the newly relocated switch box. And I put up 3 chairs to keep the kids at the birthday party from going into the room. Yeah, really.
It worked just fine and the party was a success. There was plenty of space for them to play in the basement and Lego room (aka living room).
So this is what the family room wall looks like now. We’ll obviously be working on this again tonight. After Girl Scouts, T-ball, choir practice, track tryouts and lacrosse practice. And I wonder why nothing ever gets done around here. 🙂
Here’s what’s been happening with the family room:
- Ladies Demo + Wine Night
- Family Room Can of Worms <<You are here
- Family Room Gets Wired Up
- Making Progress on the Family Room
- Design Choices for the Family Room
- Family Effort this Weekend
- The Built-in Bookshelf and Why It’s Not Finished
- Built-in Bookshelf Using IKEA BESTA
- Self-Leveling Concrete
- Tiling Herringbone Floor
- Grouting the Herringbone Floor
- New Step into Family Room
- Lego Coffee Table
- Under Couch Lego Storage
What a project friend!!!! I am so sorry to have not seen any of your posts….I was wondering where you were and with all of the issues I have been having with blogger I came to bloglovin and here you are! So glad to reconnect with you! I can’t wait to see where this project goes! Nicole xo
That is so crazy because I was just thinking about you today! We must be on the same wave length!!! I’m so glad you found me again. I’m sure you are as excited as I am for the weather to warm up so you can get your gardening on. I can’t wait!!