Living Room

The front reception room is more of a grown-up room.  It's mostly baby safe, but it has a lovely walnut and glass cabinet and our antique chaise longue.  Oh, and it's where Niall plays Black Ops on the Wii (also know as "merc-ing".)

When we bought the house I liked the front bay windows and the light in the room.  And the old, thick baseboards and the crown molding.

And, of course, I liked the door.

The floor was covered in laminate.  (Which we ended up removing and selling.)

As with the rest of the house, there were problems.  There were obvious signs of rising damp.  I decided to try and address the problem myself, and so began our work on the house.

After getting a survey done and talking with some experts, I decided to put in a damp course.  It basically involves drilling a series of holes and injecting a special paste. Supposedly the injection dissipates through the bricks over time, forming a protective layer that prevents the moisture from rising up into the walls.  Sheesh.  I'm from the desert.  Rising damp is news to me.  To start the course I had to remove the laminate.  And then the baseboard/skirting.  And I totally botched it and ruined the baseboard.  (Later we'd learn this baseboard is old and no longer sold.  Luckily a friend found a matching piece in a skip/dumpster which we "reclaimed".)

I put in the damp course.  After some discussion, Niall and I (mostly I) decided to lift the floorboards to put in underfloor insulation.  I went to a builder's merchant to buy a crowbar.  I guess it was odd having a woman with a baby buying a crowbar in this particular store.  Several of the guys there asked if I was mad at an old boyfriend.

The floorboards were in pretty good shape.  But on the left hand side you can see the shorter, mismatched boards.  They were put in, presumably, to replace a rotten joist some time ago.  We decided to relay the boards and replace the shorter ones with some from the salvage yard.

I had no idea how hard it would be to pry up the floorboards.  Getting two up took hours for me!

 As a birthday gift for me, Niall came and lifted the rest.

For about two months the "floor" was just a gaping hole while we waited for the salvage yard to get the right floorboards and started on the backroom/Family Room.

We found there was additional damp on the outer wall, so made the necessary repairs.

We put in another damp course on the outside.  (Don't ask my why the first one was put in so high, and why they drilled right into the bricks!)

Finally the salvage yard got boards so we put in the underfloor insulation and then laid the boards.  (Handyman Dave helped so much in this room!)

We sanded the floor.  Then put back in the baseboards/skirting, finished the floor, laid tiles where the hearth used to be, added a new vent and painted.  (Mostly the handymen did those bits.)  And moved in!

The piano and the round cabinet were given to us by a friend.  The painting of the lady is from Jared Gillett and is one of my favorite.  The painting of Niall looking like stained glass is by me, back when I used to paint pictures instead of walls. 

The same friend gave us an old telephone.  The chaise longue is in front of the bay.  (And no, we don't have any window coverings yet.  Our living room is on display for anyone who walks by!)

The baby wanted to be in this shot, I guess.  She does live here after all, and has spent a lot of time putting up with us renovating this house.  If you've been anywhere Niall has lived in the past decade, you'll probably recognize his photo of Dora.  (He doesn't know her, he picked it up in Detroit years ago.)  And another painting I did of Niall.

The living room was the first one we started working on and was almost the last one finished.  But I guess it was worth it, because for the past week Niall has hardly left the sofa!  (In his defense, he is writing.)

Suspended Underfloor Insulation

Guys, we bought a house that needs so much work.  And I had this stupid idea that I could try doing some of the work myself.  So I started going all DIY and stopped taking pictures of food.  (I still cook but not quite as much.  I'll get back to it soon.)  So will you forgive me while I talk about some of the non-food things I've been trying to make?  The first is suspended underfloor insulation.

I love older homes, but the floors are so drafty (by design).  I wanted to make our period property warmer and insulated the floor with suspended insulation.  I am posting this just because I looked all over the internet for a step-by-step and  couldn't find it.  Maybe my search skills need serious help. 

We bought a terraced house from 1920 that has the typical build for a British house of the time.  I don't know the technical terms, but the house foundation is made of bricks.  There are supporting walls that make up the rooms, and then in between there rows of little brick walls. About a meter above the ground the mini-walls stop and long joists rest on top of the bricks.   The floor is made up of floorboards laid across the joists and then nailed in place.  You want to see a picture of me demonstrating, right?  All the floorboards in the room have been removed and I'm standing down on the dirt between the mini-walls.

In order to insulate (oh, and repair some rotten joists), we took up all the floorboards.  I did this by removing the baseboards (skirting) with a crowbar and then carefully prying up each of the boards.  I wanted to lay the floorboards again so I numbered them and removed them carefully. (Some still broke.)  Also-these are photos from two different rooms.

Once all the boards were removed, I got breathable roofing membrane (PermaVent-it was cheaper on Ebay than anywhere I could find locally) and used duct tape to tape the individual sheets together.  I wanted to make a breathable, hanging "net" for the insulation.  I taped the front and back of all the adjoining pieces.  I made it big enough to allow for about six inches of insulation between each joist.

The goal was to allow the joists to still be exposed to the air from the vents but then to have breathable insulation on top.  (So the floorboards would have the benefit of the air without the cold drafts!)

We rolled the breathable membrane over the joists.

We used batons and screws to fasten the membrane to the wall.  We also used some spray foam in some of the gaps to prevent thermal bridging.  We wanted to allow the ends of the joists to still breath (and not touch the wall), but also to make the membrane layer as tight as possible.

Once about half of the membrane was fastened (we wanted to still have wiggle room to make adjustments as we started putting the floorboards on) we put back the first floorboard.  (This is where I was so glad for the numbers!)  I used floorboard brads from Screwfix, they're about 2 1/2 inches long.  We hammered them in by hand. 

We put a second board on and then starting pushing the insulation (it looks like dirt, but really it's loose fill insulation made from recycled newspaper that I got from the EcoCentre) under the floorboards.  So what we have is dirt, then about 2 1/2 feet of air, then the membrane draped over the joists, six inches of insulation and the floorboards on top.

We kept adding more boards and adding more insulation. 

And then filled the insulation to the end of the room.

And hammered in the rest of the boards.

The floorboards have been down for about four months and it has made SUCH a difference. Our house has been under renovation with no heating all winter (don't worry, we're in a rental) but these rooms still felt warm.  It was a huge pain and because I'm so slow and I waited for the salvage yard to get the right replacement boards it took about two months.  But (as long as we did this right and the wood stays nice and dry) I am so glad we did it.