fireplace re-do part one

We are all about child labor here at the Cottage of Stone. When you find adult contractors that will work for milk and cookies, let us know!

Seriously, our kids actually ask to help out on our house projects, so we try to include them whenever we can. Because Bowie's room and the dining room are half-way done, I felt it was a logical time to start tearing apart the living room again. (What!?!) I don't know... I just get brilliant ideas that don't always follow a great timeline...

Since Bowie (and his crib, toys, chairs, etc) will be vacating the living room soon, I wanted to take the opportunity to get the living room presentable. Nothing like having to apologize to guests every time someone new comes over. (Sorry about the mess, we are renovating every single room in our house at the same time!!!)

We knew that we wanted to put shelves in the living room to organize our large vinyl record collection. And the fireplace has been sitting half-way demoed for over a year. So it was time to kick it in gear again.

Here is what we started with:


I never understood why they put up the ugly paneled wall. So much space wasted. And I do not miss the lighthouse wallpaper!

Pulling out the boxed-in wall and cheap-o mantel (we put it for free on Craigslist) and some paint left us with this:


I am not a fan of the brass doors. So out they came:


Looking better, but we are not even close yet...


Cleaning out the ashes and grates revealed a neat trapdoor in the fireplace. This dumps down to the massive clean-out in the basement.


We wanted to salvage the granite and donate it to Habitat ReStore, but it wouldn't come off in one piece. Steven had to pry it off in pieces.


Emery helped Steven remove the side pieces.


I think even this is a massive improvement!


Next comes up the floor piece. Steven used a prybar...


While I used a hammer to break it up...


Which left us with this:


Which will lead to some of this:

Stay tuned!