Two weekends ago B and I celebrated our 1-year wedding anniversary! 🙂 That sounds like such a small amount of time, but in that year, we’ve moved twice, dealt with unemployment and new jobs, bought a house, and a slew of other day-to-day stuff. Its been a busy year!

We celebrated with brunch (ok, breakfast) at a favorite local spot called The Old Fashioned. Being one of only 5 groups in the place, we actually got a seat right at the window, overlooking capital square and the State Capitol Building! B had an egg scramble with fresh herbs and cheese, and I indulged in the Wisconsin benedict complete with a brat patty (who knew a brat was a breakfast food). Both the food and the views were tasty.

We spent the rest of the weekend starting the build-out on a pantry in our basement! The way the support beams in our basement are situated combined with how we set up our living room area left an odd little drop zone in the far corner of our main basement room. It had become our defacto pantry, with stacks of bubbly water, canned goods, and flour. With no real walls or organizational system, it was looking quite messy. Plus, the freezer was still in the craft room (grumble). B was playing his normal game of “hide behind the support post to confuse the cat” one night when he had a great idea – why not frame that area in? It is just wide enough for our freezer, with plenty of wall space for shelves. There’s an outlet in that area and everything, so power wouldn’t be an issue.

Fast forward one week and we got to work!

Saturday, after the farmer’s market, a trip to the ReStore, and a bit of yard work*, we got busy with framing. Ok, it was more than a bit of yard work. It was supposed to be a quick mow, followed by planting 2 ivy bushes. In reality, it was a quick mow, planting 2 ivy bushes, digging out 2 old nasty bushes on the side yard, pulling out our now-dead garden, and trimming a lilac bush wayyyy back. And then 2 trips to the yard waste drop off.

THEN framing: baseplate 2×4 screwed into the concrete floor, supports attached to the basement wall and the beam, top plate attached to yet another beam, and 4 framing 2×4’s. Plus we had to cut away some trim that turned out to be in the way. Its complicated – the previous owners tried to make the basement into a pool hall (?), and the trim level reflects that. Ie, a weird ledge type thing that rings the basement. It took B about 30 minutes and the sawzall to cut away about a 4 foot chunk of that. But he did. And by dinnertime we had the main wall framed out and ready for drywall!

Sunday after the above-mentioned yummy brunch we drywalled! Since it is a basement partition, we decided to use the slightly heavier mold-resistant drywall. Worth the extra weight and cost, in my opinion. Basements are, well, wonky, so we had some creative cuts to make, but did so with aplomb. At least, nobody yelled at anybody, so that’s a win. With the drywall attached, we plastered the gaps and cracks and let it dry!

We’re spending our evenings this week sanding and plastering and sanding and plastering. By the end of this week, we should have a finished wall. Well mostly finished. We’ll be missing some trims (quarter round, mostly), and for now it’ll only be primed and painted a basic white.

I can’t wait to scoot the couch back against our new wall and see the coziness of our new living space!!

Next up: Paint, Primer, and more Paint!