We’ve become weekend warriors working on our lake house basement project.  If you’re new here, we are in the process of creating a family room, bathroom, and extra room in the unfinished basement of our Smith Mountain Lake house.  You can read about our plans for this space here and read my first update here.

Lake House Basement Project

In my last basement update post I shared that Mr. SP and I planned to finish hanging the drywall over the three day Labor Day weekend.  Labor we did and we came oh-so-close to finishing.  More on that in a moment, let’s take a look at what we accomplished last weekend.

Extra Room

Our long weekend of drywalling started in the extra room where Mr. SP and I had already hung a few sheets of drywall the previous weekend.

Half of the wall with the window that faces the lake had drywall.

And the wall to the right of the closet had drywall as did the small wall to the right of the door.

There was a lot of measuring, cutting, glueing, and screwing going on in this room.  Here we’ve finished this wall and are about to tackle the closet.

These pictures make the work look like it goes so quickly when in reality each sheet takes a good while to install when you factor in measuring, cutting, and glueing.  Screwing it into place often ended up being the easy part.

You can tell by my outfit change that the above work was completed on Saturday and the work below on Sunday.

After the walls were finished, we moved on to the header.

The header was soon complete and this room was looking less like a basement and more like a usable space.

I’ve already discovered that this room isn’t easy to photograph.  In this shot I’m standing beside the window.

Here I’m standing in the opposite corner.

Here’s the left side of that same wall.

I’m really happy that we are hiring out the taping, mudding, and sanding of this space.  If we were to do the work, it would take who knows how many weekends to complete it.  While we were working the young man who is doing the work for us stopped by to take measurements.

While we worked Sherman lounged outside and kept a close eye on geese or herons that might dare get close to his property.

Next up, the bathroom.

The Bathroom

The first thing Mr. SP did in the bathroom was add insulation to the wall adjoining the family room.  He used insulation pulled out of the ceiling when the ductwork was moved.

This bathroom is small but it took a long time to drywall, especially the area over the tub. 

The wall where the vanity and toilet will go also was time consuming due to having to cut out areas for the drain pipe and the supply lines.

Note that I’m in my third outfit so it’s now Monday.

The bathroom is complete other than trim around the tub.

Sherman wondered why we weren’t boating or doing something fun over the three day weekend but he stayed close by our sides as we worked.

We then moved on to the hallway that connects the bathroom and closet with the family room.

Hallway and Closet

Our shop vac was unfortunately out of commision, so we did a lot of sweeping over the three days.

I didn’t get any pictures of the closet but here is Mr. SP at the end of our working weekend drywalling the door frame.

Working lakeside had its advantages.  Every evening we jumped in the lake in our clothes to get washed off.  The water felt great and it was nice to go back into the house feeling relatively clean.

On Monday we ran out of Liquid Nails and used that as a good excuse to quit work and go for a boat ride.  Sherman was very happy with this decision.

What’s Next?

This weekend we will finish drywalling a few spots including around the tub, the frames of both closets, and a wall of the extra room closet that we forgot. 

We also will hang the remaining sheets of drywall in the part of the basement that is going to stay unfinished.

Another task is to take one final pass to drive any screws that are slightly proud, in anticipation of taping and mudding.

We also are picking up our flooring on the way to the lake as it needs to acclimate in the space before installation.

Look for another project update next week!

Lake House Basement Project

Lake House Basement Project Plans

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Lake House Basement Project - Update One

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