I knew when we bought our house nine years ago that the family room would, along with much of the rest of the house, need a remodel. The carpet was old and worn, the walls had heavily sculpted dust catching texture and the hearth was hideous. The lights were just fluorescent shop lights and were poorly placed. We started the remodel last winter and I am now closing in on it.

Here are some pics.

It all started with the harvesting of some Alaskan birch for lumber. Here I'm loading some logs for the mill.



Here's a load of birch ready to stack and dry. It takes about a year per inch to air dry lumber.



Here's a stack, tent tarped, stickered and drying.



The old hearth in all it's hideousness.



The new hearth. I still need to trim out the sides.



The built in book case. The face frames, doors, drawer and base boards are from some that birch. I haven't got all the books out yet and haven't settled on the exact arrangement of the shelves. My wife's discerning eye will be helpful with that.



More of the book case.



I just finished this today. It's my reloading hutch. Room for most of my supplies and gear and hopefully keep the bench clutter to a minimum.



I created a cubby for all my reloading and reference manuals.



We have done a lot of work. The ceiling had old acoustic tile which, when removed showed the drywall had never been taped or mudded and was only 1/2" instead of the required 5/8". Don't get me started on the wiring misadventures we found. We scraped the walls and floated them flat, textured and painted. I corrected the wiring issues, put up a new 5/8" ceiling, installed new lighting and windows, laid a tile floor and wrapped the glue lam beam in birch. I still have to trim the windows and there are a couple of pieces of furniture yet to build but the room is finally coming together. Pretty soon I can get pictures, antlers, skins and all the other man room stuff up. Thanks for looking.

Mart

Very nice work should give you many hours of enjoyment!

nice work! I really like the slate.

Very ambitious and it appears well worth it. Great job!

Great looking man room you have there, should be really nice looking with all the man stuff. Congrats and enjoy.

Thank you for showing us these pictures. You have dome a lot better than just well. It shows that you took time and put a lot of care into your work. I like the new look a lot. It looks even nicer since we know you harvested and dried the wood. It is truly a start to finish kind of project. You have every right to be proud of the work of your hands.

GREAT WORK Marty! Your skillset and patinece FAR surpases mine.

Thanks guys. I have enjoyed for the most part. It was pretty discouraging at first when one step led to another problem which led to another problem. Remodels just go that way I guess. Now it's all coming together. I still need to build a reloading desk. It will look more like a desk than a reloading bench. My presses are on a stand made from 3/8" plate steel, 18" square and mounted on a section of 2 1/2" steel tubing so that it turns offering a different side for presses, bullet luber, shotgun press etc. I plan to wrap the base (a steel tire rim) in walnut plywood so that it looks nice instead of having an ugly old rim in my new room. Thanks again for the kind words.

Mart

You have been busy...from logs to furniture. Nice job.

Wayne

Nice! Well done!