May I take your coat?

The mudroom is mostly finished!
Here's the before shot, to refresh your memory:


And here's the much improved, filled with conveniences, now with storage, after photos:



Jeff finished the bench this morning, and if you look closely, you will notice how out-of-level the floor is. The bench is 100% level, the floor slopes about 1.5 inches.

The walls were painted Sherwin William Shagreen and trim was painted with (leftover) Benjamin Moore Decorator's White.

The hooks came from Lowes and the cabinets are the Expedit and the bookshelves are the Besta from Ikea.

We aren't sure if we'll add another bench, or just put some spare chairs to use in the other space.
I want to add a clothes hanger for drying mittens and snowsuits, a mirror, and a key-holder, but for now, its usable and lit!

Mudroom: Ready for paint

The mudroom walls have been plastered and a coat of primer applied. Ceinling was painted so we could finish the lights.

Now, for the paint. I read this article about the Best Green Paint but when we got the paint chip it seemed a little dark, so we're going with the color above it on the strip. Sherwin Williams Shagreen is the color we will be applying to the walls this weekend. Keep your fingers crossed that it works out!

Mudroom Update

The wall hangers came and hung the walls. This photo is from the back of the basement, looking toward the walk-out. Jeff hooked up all the recessed lighting and did the framing and strapping before he ran out of energy and called in a pro to put up the wall board.
Now its really, really time to design the mudroom.

Fancy New Heat Pipes!

When adding new walls to the mudroom, we had to re-route the heat pipes to be inside new the walls. I'm sure the proximity of the heating pipes to the outside walls are part of our heat problems anyway.

To do this we used PEX piping (orange pipes in the above photo) and to avoid having to buy the 100$ crimping tool, we used SHARKBITE push fittings.

We also use the WATTS push fittings since SHARKBITE doesn't have a 45 degree.
after it was all hooked up, we fired up the boiler. Of course, the pipes didn't get hot. We needed to bleed the system first.

About 20 - 5 gallon buckets later, the air was purged from the system and the water ( and heat ) was flowing. Don't worry though, Jeff promptly shut off the heat and it will remain off until Novemeber.

Next up: Strapping the Ceiling! Will the fun ever stop?

Mud Room progress

Jeff has been tackling this project in his spare time, and I wanted to share some of the progress as he turns the basement into a finished mudroom.

We started with the cold room, which was insulated with Icyene last spring.


Jeff then framed out this wall.


That's as far as we've gotten.

Mud Room

Our house is missing a foyer. No mudroom, no coatroom, no "keep the detritus contained" room.
We are sick of tripping over the pile of shoes that accumulate, even though we have a nice shoe rack, and we determined we needed a mudroom. Looking to the walk-out (or in our case, walk-in) basement, we found a place to build a mud room.

The goals are simple:
1. Look stunning
2. While containing all our clutter

Here's where I looked for inspiration.

I like the varying heights of the shelves, good for the vertically-challenged in our house:

The retractable closeline in this photo is brilliant. Perfect for snowpants and mittens after sledding or raincoats after playing in the monsoon:

I like the upper cabinets here to keep everything out of sight. Since our basement has a low ceiling, this is out, but I can still dream...
This is pretty much what I want to end up with:
An open locker for everyone with a bench for sitting while you slip on your shoes, and an open hole for the inevitable pile of shoes. All this while looking good!
All photos from BHG.com