We Have a Loft and a Decent Basement!

Well, I should rephrase that. We've had a loft and basement ever since we moved into our house over two years ago, but we were lazy and put a bunch of junk in the loft, like boxes that we didn't feel like unpacking. The basement had our exercise bike, punching bag, and my dad's desk that he gave us. Neither room was being used at all by any of us and I was beginning to feel claustrophobic. This past weekend, we gritted our teeth and got both rooms fixed up.

For the loft, we had to unpack or move all the boxes, take the wonderful gold chairs to the basement (they are from Jeff's parents when we moved in), move the desk upstairs (disassembling it in the basement and reassembling it upstairs), move the boxing equipment to the garage for later installation there, and finally take our old TV and stand from the garage to the basement.

The boxes were simple enough to go through - we unpacked most of them and moved a few of them into the office for later unpacking. Jeff took the chairs to the living room and he and Jordan then went down to the basement and took apart the desk while I vacuumed the now-empty loft. I then went down and helped them bring up the desk in pieces. Back in the loft, we reassembled the desk and it looks fantastic. I moved all our office supplies into it.

In the basement, Jeff and Jordan took apart the boxing equipment (punching bag and speed bag, all on a stand), and we took that out to the garage.

Then came the really hard part. We had to move the TV into the house from the garage, down the stairs, and into the basement. Our TV is an old 36-inch Sony Trinitron and weighs more than any TV I've ever encountered. It took Jeff and I quite a while to get it off the stand and onto the padded dolly. We then had to wheel it up three steps from the garage to the house, which took probably 15 minutes. The stairs to the basement took another 30-40 minutes, then we had to do it again with the stand (which doesn't weigh nearly as much, but it's still a ton). I think it took a total of about 2 hours to move both the TV and the stand and get them set up in the basement. But the results are fantastic. We got the PS2 and the Xbox set up. Both devices can play DVDs, so movies are now an option for down there.

Since completing the work over the weekend, Jordan has spent every evening (after his homework is done) in the basement playing games. Why he would never play them when they were upstairs, I do not know. He seems to like his solitude down there. He has also taken to practicing his trumpet down there. I don't mind hearing him practice, but he seems more at peace when he knows he isn't bothering others and that we're not eavesdropping. Whenever I am in the kitchen while he's practicing, I can barely make out the songs he is working on.

Having two more rooms in use for us is proving to be quite wonderful. While we still have some unpacking to do, the entire house is becoming more open and less crowded. It even seems much bigger now.

Here are some pictures of the loft. As you can see, there isn't a box or pile of junk to be seen now. Plus, the view from the living room no longer looks like it's all walled off up there. I'm so happy. I haven't taken any of the basement yet, but will do so sometime soon.

Loft as seen from the office

Loft as seen from Jordan's doorway

Loft as seen from the living room (kind of blurry, as I took this with my cell phone and apparently can't stand still...lol)