Project #2 Reorganizing the Storage Rooms of the Basement – the Doing Phase begins

Tearing down walls and throwing away junk

In part 1 of this project I promised you sawdust flying through the air, so there you have it! I try my best to keep my promises. I don’t know whether you share my passion for breaking things, but I find it oddly satisfying. Getting rid of junk that’s not needed (including walls) clears and opens the space. This project is by no means finished yet, but I wanted to give a brief update on how it is going. Since the starting point, when I primarily planned the layout of the room, things have slooowly been moving along.

So far the renovation process has amounted to moving stuff out of the room and tearing down part of the excess walls (there’s still a way to go).

Picture to the left: overview towards storage room II; Picture to the right: overview towards storage room I and III

Admittedly I’m a bit inexperienced in doing the rough-work myself. Mostly I’ve done the planning and left the carpentry to others. I’m discovering I enjoy getting my hands dirty and do some shoving! Keeping it simple is a good approach, I believe. For example when I discovered we don’t have the proper tools for the job, I went out and borrowed a handsaw and an electrical saw from our neighbours (great way to get to know them better too) instead of buying new ones. After all, the point of DIY is to save some dough, right? The neighbours happily lent me a jigsaw to cut the frail plank wall which we needed to keep intact because of the wiring.

Instead of hiring an electrician we decided to keep the upper part of the wall. The shelves for storage will fit nicely underneath it. The result of this makeover won’t be something to publish in a glossy magazine (it is a storage room) but I figure some of you might be interested in our approach.

I enjoy this phase of the process; not before – not after, but in-between. Whatever that was stopping us from getting started has been overcome; and all the possibilities lie ahead. I get inspired by this floating phase; finding the balance between anticipation and patience.

Of course, we need to actually finish the job. If this in-between-stage takes over completely, it will turn into an energy drain. So, please, if the next post revealing the end result isn’t out there by New Year’s, would you kindly give me a virtual kick in the butt?