Ta-Da!

My two year old, Greta, is really into exclaiming, "ta-da" at random moments and most times used inappropriately. She did however understand the concept the other day when her little naked self came running out of the bathroom after going potty on the big girls toilet yelling, "TA-DA!". Adam and I had one of those ta-da moments the other day. And it had nothing to do with using a big girls potty. :)


This is the new living room with the wall to the right housing a walled up double-sided hearth. Our homework assignment from our contractor was to get in there, rip down the sheetrock and expose the fireplace and chimney so he could advise us on how best to take it out.

We got to work ripping off the sheetrock right away and as expected found the lapboard underneath. We pryed off every piece as gingerly as possible so that we might be able to reuse it for possible flooring in the hallway and dining room. You can see the fireplace hearth boarded up down at the bottom of the pic. Well, little did we expect, once we took off the boards what exactly the fireplace and chimney would look like...

TA-DA!!!

Okay, seriously, how awesome is this? We were giddy when we discovered just how cool it looked and the thought of taking it out went completely out the window. Right away we started dreaming up new kitchen designs and furniture placement in the living room. I think it can work. We just have to pray that our contractor can figure out an inexpensive way for us to reinforce it from underneath.

This is the view from the front door with the fireplace to the left. Has some wow-factor to it huh?

This is the other side of the wall pre-demo in the to-be kitchen.

I was on the other side of the wall hammering on the lapboards so Adam could pry them off easier.

This is the side from the kitchen with the hearth filled in. I love how the chimney narrows at the top because it still gives us the roomy open air feel that we were trying to achieve. High ceilings are nothing to complain about either. Kitchen design is coming along slowly but surely, but let me tell you, that is hard work! I lose sleep every night trying to come up with a perfect work triangle design and still give me all the cabinet space I need including the plate rack and pantry that I want. I've tried Google Sketch-up to try to visualize it on the computer, but it took more mental energy to figure it out and I ended up using a pencil and paper. If anyone knows of a good kitchen design resource to use, do tell!