a peek inside the fishbowl

Three reno posts in three days! I can’t believe it either. It’s all I’ve been thinking about lately.

The upstairs was the hardest part of re-imagining our living space. I have always had a pretty clear idea of what I wanted the downstairs to look like but my ideas petered out as soon as I reached the bottom riser of the stairs.

The upper floor has challenged us since day one. Our home is not a full two-storey construction; it’s a half-storey up there, with lots of sloped ceilings. They’re pretty and charming – and they add a lot to the cosy feeling of our house – but they also seriously limit the amount usable wall space we have up there. And CHARMING gets tossed out the window once you realize that it’s impossible to put up shelves or hang artwork. (Just kidding. I like the charming. But I also like bookshelves.)

Here’s what the last version of this floorplan looked like. We tussled with it for awhile and eventually realized that we weren’t using the space as efficiently as we should be.

I am much happier with this new version. (Click the floor plan image to view an enlarged version of what we’re currently considering.)

Sidebar: I feel slightly sorry for our architect. He really is a big ol’ sweetie, but I have a tiny feeling that he thinks I’m a wee bit of a nutcase. I’m sure he’s tired of me crowing about the family bathroom already.

Speaking of which, I am really liking the upstairs bathroom now. I’m excited about a walk-in shower that’s tucked away like that, the double vanity, the enclosed toilet… I think it will really work for our family. I envision lots of mirrors and light and white tiles. This space needs to be superbright (but with a dimmer, I love dimmers in bathrooms!). The best thing about this plan is that there can be three (or more) people in there at the same time and they all have a degree of privacy. Yay! Related: we poked our heads into the plumbing and bathroom showroom at Preston Hardware the other day. Oi. Beautiful things in there eh? Sigh.

Master bedroom
It’s a little bigger now, and Mark gets his own li’l closet. Sadly, my dream window seat has been dropped from the plan. Boo.

Bedroom #2 (Emma’s future bedroom)
This is currently our bedroom. It’ll be a perfect size for Emma. She’s hankering for a loft bed but I’m aiming for something that looks like this.

Bedroom #3 (Sarah’s room)
See the tiny nook there, on this side of the wall from the bathtub? Mark wants to round out that corner and create a little reading area under the window. I think this is a sweet little room, but I do have a concern about the closet. It was designed his way to utilize part of the sloped ceiling. It wouldn’t be a floor to ceiling closet exactly. It would be high enough to meet the top of the slope, and it would be deep enough to accommodate shelving in the back of it. I’m still not convinced this will work and/or look good. What do you think? I’d love to hear your ideas. Personally, I’m inclined to keep a bit of the sloped ceiling (it’s a good place to put a bed) and create a different kind of closet for Sarah in that corner, maybe using the space deemed “storage” on the other side of the wall? Ack. Clearly, this is why I’m not an architect.

Anyway, yes! I feel like we’re on our way finally. And it feels pretty darn good.

One of the things about planning a reno is that you have to really search your brain and figure out how you use your space, how you WANT to use your space, and what changes you can implement that will make your life easier. What I haven’t thought much about is the dog and how she fits into all of this.

If you’re a dog owner you can probably relate to what I’m about to describe.

It’s mucky outside. You walk your dog, come in the house, and you need to rinse your dog’s feet off. What’s the best/easiest way to do that?

I had a large dog growing up. An Airedale terrier. My mother dipped each of his feet – one at a time – in a bucket of warm water and towel dried them. I don’t bother doing this with Piper because she’s relatively lightweight (ETA: 18-19 lbs). I just carry her upstairs and fill the tub with a couple inches of water and rinse her paws that way. But I don’t want to keep doing this. It’s a pain in the butt. Nor do I want to invest in some kind of mudroom dog shower. (You think I’m kidding about dog showers?)

So here’s my question. What if we installed an extra large sink in the powder room off the mud room? Something like this, or this, so I can occasionally dump Piper in there for a paw wash? (I like the corner location of the faucet on that first link. We could also get a single-handed pull out wand for easy rinsing too. It’d be so easy to wipe out the sink afterwards, much easier than a tub.)

I also like the old school look of this Ikea sink but I am not sure if it’d be deep enough. And if it’s curved on the bottom it’d be uncomfortably slippery for doggy feet.

Is this smartly utilitarian? Or just plain gross? Will it look weird dropped into a powder room counter (depicted in the plans here)?

A deep sink in this area could also be handy for other things too. And of course we wouldn’t tell visiting guests that we bathe the dog in there. What do you think?

We’ve pretty much nailed down the floor plan of the new ground floor. Click the image to embiggen.

We decided to make the addition a couple feet larger. I wasn’t convinced there was enough space to move around the (as of yet) non-existent furnishings in the family room. :)

A few things of note:

• On one hand I’m wondering if the kitchen island is too big, but I can’t ignore the fact that will also have to serve as some major storage for us.
• I would like a kitchen like this one. Sigh.
• Notice the little rectangle sketched overtop the island. That space is for a group of two-sided cabinets with glass doors (in other words, accessible from both sides) that hang from the ceiling. We need the storage and I think this might do the trick. I think it will keep the “open” feeling of this area and give it some definition at the same time. (Make sense?) I’m hoping to connect with kitchen/storage experts at some point because I don’t want to go through this whole thing and find out we don’t have room for our pots and pans. Gah. I’M LOOKING FOR A STORAGE MIRACLE.
• Re: the mud room. I think I’ve mentioned this before, but it will become the main entrance for our family. The “built in” marked on this plan is a big wardrobe for all of our coats and gear. Although the diagram shows other closets I have other plans for this space. (We might lose the little walls here, not sure yet.) One side of the room will be a bench and the other will have hooks and a boot tray in the winter.

Next reno post will be the revised second floor! And maybe exterior views (with the carport that’s not really a carport too)! :)