A hole in the floor, no more kitchen

The first wave of steel is now welded into place. The steel floor supports have been welded in to form the basis of the floor between the first and second floors. In the process, it looks like they decided to remove all the existing wooden floor joists after all. (Given how cut up they had to be by the steel, and how unlevel the original floor was, it probably made the most sense. They'll now need to insert wooden joists between the steel to form the bottom of the floor.) The supports for the new stairs are also in -- two cylindrical supports which will anchor the new stairway. To be honest, I'm not sure how they're supposed to be finished -- it will be interesting to see them in their final form!

Now that all this work has been done, you can really get an idea of the sizes and placement of the new rooms, even though some of the existing interior walls have yet to be removed. The new family room will be a bit bigger (and more intelligently laid out) than the old one. The bathroom downstairs may be a little bit smaller than the original one, but is still of ample size. The downstairs bedroom will be of a good size. The downstairs storage closet (beneath the laundry room) will get turned into a computer storage room, with conduits for wiring upstairs to the new office. It will be nice to have all that equipment out of sight!

There is still more steel to come -- the two ceiling trusses, for example. However, I don't know what's left to do before they can put those supports in. I think the crane will need to come one more time before those trusses can go in. I'm not sure how much of the roof they'll need to pull off before they do that, however.

The kitchen is almost completely disassembled. Habitat for Humanity will come on Wednesday to pick up the cabinets, sinks, ovens, etc. Hopefully removal of the kitchen and other items will clear out some space in the garage and make it easier to move around. We are still working on the new kitchen design, waiting for one more cabinet bid so we can make our decision. We've got to finalize the design before the end of the year to have a hope of not delaying our move-in date. Fortunately, I'm taking the next two weeks off from work, so I'll have some time to work on the kitchen and finalize the design!

As always, there are many more pictures available.