Dining room remodel started Sept 2002

The simple comment "Mom, we think you should add some color in here" started this project. They were right, the room needed color and LOTS more! The room is only 10' x 12' and is small for a dining room. There were a few things I wanted to correct with this project. I wanted the dining room to look bigger, I needed to get rid of the hallway that looked like a dark cave and the sliding door had to go.








Before you start something like this, make sure you know where your electric wires are running, if any. You certainly don't want to cut one of them. You also want to know if you are cutting into or removing a bearing wall. If it is, you need to plan for extra support for what you are removing. Knowing when you can do something yourself and when to get a professional is very IMPORTANT. Once you've done all this research and planning, you get brave and take a hammer ...wham!



In my case, this was not a bearing wall, but there was an electrical wire running through it. You can also see that the hallway ceiling is lower than the dining room wall. I could have torn the entire wall out and raised the ceiling but that would have gotten into a major project, more than I wanted to deal with for a number of reasons.












John (Armstrong Construction) knows how much I don't
like doing electrical so I was willing to leave to wire
where it was and put a column around each stud.
Thank you John for pushing me to
let you do what you knew needed to be done.
He moved the electrical wire out of sight and routed it inside
the wall to the left side. This allowed me to take all the studs
out so there would be an open view.


I went round and round with these doors. I took the slats out thinking I would put stained glass in, painted them to match the rest of the room and then decided to take them out all together. There just wasn't room to accommodate them when open. Bought some wood, played with the router a bit and finished up the opening, changed out the door frame too.

















When John went up into the attic for the wiring, I stuck my head up there and came up with an entire new project.. for John! He raised the ceiling up 7" for me so I could add some depth to the room. I wanted a simpler design with the crown moulding so John did that as well. I can't find the photo's of what he did when he raised the ceiling so that will just have to stay a trade secret!














I had to draw the design on the ceiling free hand first, then painted with a small brush while standing on a ladder.. I painted/faux finished the walls Nov 2002 before much of the remaining construction was done.

















Armstrong Construction comes to the rescue again when the chandelier was installed. It's a late 1800's European, almost solid brass, extremely heavy light fixture. The ceiling structure was beefed up when the ceiling was raised so it would take the weight.








The window was installed by TLB Builders from Colfax, Calif, June of 2003.













Flooring finish work:

















































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Page created 1 August 2003. Last updated 16 September 2003 at 8:02 AM.
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