New Year, New Window

Well the holidays are over and the house is all cleaned up of all holiday decorations. So, in honor of this newfound cleanliness, what we do but start tearing stuff apart again?

Sunday Mike started in the old bathroom soon-to-be new bathroom by going downstairs and completely leveling out the floor. (When we put the vanity in there - not to install, but just to store it - we couldn't help but notice that it was leaning drastically.) Mike removed one of the old beams underneath and created a new one, carefully shimming and leveling as he went.

Monday we made our list - checked it twice - and went to the Home Depot yet again. (And this time we kept our distance from the shower department.) We bought the first round of construction materials - rafters for the ceiling, strapping for the walls, a new window, electrical boxes, a bathroom vent/fan, a fan duct, and a whole buncha LED christmas lights that were 75% off. (Two guesses who picked those out - chaching! $6.99 for a 17' long outdoor LED icicle light set is a dang good deal in my book. I bought four!

When we returned home, know what time it was?! WINDOW TIME!

One of the things I despised most about that old bathroom, (and I use the term lightly because I despised many things about that bathroom) was the window.

Here is a photo of the bathroom in what was probably its best, cleanest state. Note the location of the window in proximity to the toilet. IT'S RIGHT THERE. Know what's right outside that window? Our neighbor's house. Our neighbor who likes to come over a lot and walks right past that window to get to our driveway. No me gusta.

So I always had to have a shade covering the window... which made the room incredibly dark and even less appealing.

To keep things easy, Mike wanted to simply replace the old window with one of the same size in the same location. I said, "No way!" And after a bit of discussion, (since there is no other wall that the window could go on and no possibility of totally rebuilding the bathroom) we agreed on a smaller window of close-to the same width. It would be placed at the top of the old window frame and Mike would rip off the exterior old siding and replace with shingles. (Since it's such a small wall, time and cost expenditures would be minimal.)

Now onto - WINDOW TIME!

 

First, cutting the hole. Mike removed the old siding and even older shingles underneath the siding. Then, he removed the old window.

Next, re-ply. Mike put up new plywood on that entire side of the bathroom. (Which isn't very much room at all - we had enough plywood in stock to take care of it easily.) Then, he stapled up tar paper over the entire wall.

Now, time to cut a new hole. Mike cut and framed a space for the new window, which as you can see, has a bit of a different location then the old one. Keep in mind that to the left of the window, on the outside, is where our chimney is. We couldn't go any more to the left. So, since the new window was winder then the old window, we went right and left the chimney with plenty of breathing room.

And finally, by the end of the evening, the new window was in! We couldn't be happier with its location. You'd have to really make an effort to look through this one to see someone in the bathroom. (Although for showering purposes, we will still likely put up a shade.) But it's still enough to let in lots of light... probably more then that dirty old window did, even at twice the size.

Next up - new ceiling rafters, wall shimming, and exterior shingling on the new window wall...