Learning New Skills–Carpentry

As I’m working on redoing our kitchen, I’ve had to learn to do a few things I’d never thought about before.    This week I removed a doorway that lead from the kitchen into Lindsey’s bedroom; and replaced it with a wall. 

This is what it looked like before I started.

Then I removed the door and the hinges.

Next I used a pry bar to remove the trim on both sides of the door.

Still using the pry bar,  I removed the door frame itself.

Then I used the circular saw to cut my 2X4’s and frame in the wall.  

On a side note, before using the saw I reviewed “emergency procedures” with Olivia….just in case there was a glitch.   I asked what she should do if I had an ut-oh moment.   “Remain calm, call 911 and don’t let Lindsey see what’s happened.”  Exactly!! “But Mom, if there’s a lot of blood, I’m probably going to puke before I do any of that.”   Thanks for the honesty.

Next I cut and installed the drywall.  Working with drywall is messy.

Then came the fun part…time to mud and tape the wall.  Originally I had a joint compound mix that dried faster than I could use it.  Then I moved to a premixed product and had much better results.  Let me just say this mudding the wall, and WAITING has been the bane of my existence for the last week.  I’m a results driven person and this part of the task just annoyed me horribly.

After several layers and several days of mud/dry/sand/repeat, it was finally time to apply the primer.

If you’re wondering what the wall looks like from the other side, here it is.  (Which now means I’ll have to repaint Lindsey’s room when I finish the kitchen.)

It may not look like Bob Villa completed the project, but I’m pretty proud of how it turned out!