Basement: after...for now

I was looking for the before picture and didn't even recognize this:


Today:

Ceiling: not falling down!
Walls: painted!
Floor: painted!
Missing baseboards and other misc trim: replaced!
And there's so much more....the hours spent scrubbing the floor so the paint would stick, repairing some cracks and nail holes in the floor, and replacing the dryer vent. I'm sure there's more. (I guess I should mention that I didn't like the finish on the first round of painting (satin paint) so we painted the walls and trim all over again with semi-gloss.)

I didn't even get a pic of the door to the crawlspace, but before it was covered over by a baby gate across the top, and a sheet of plywood pushed up against it and held by cinder blocks. Fancy! Now there's an actual door there.

Clearly we haven't put the junk back on the shelf over the sink, etc. And the basement was a huge mess when we started.

Here's a shot from by the sliding glass doors before:


And after! There were 3 wall shelves on the far wall before...you can sort of see them. They were just boards resting on some brackets, and one was so close the the ceiling that it was basically worthless. We painted them, actually attached them to the brackets, and made it one long shelf.


I guess I didn't get a straight on shot of the wall where the new shelves are, but this is close:


And one of the shelves John built:


And we still have room to pile stuff on! Woot!

I am proud of us. We thought it would take a month. Then we thought it would take three months. We started in late August, and John just finished it today. That's a long time. But now we know the pace at which we can do home improvement stuff (glad we didn't decide to tackle the kitchen first!) and stay sane AND parent two toddlers.

I think it will be a while before we start anything else. But John got the shelves he wanted. I hope he's happy:).

Last but not least, the granny blanket I made:


I wish the lighting would have been better, but I figured this picture was better than none. It's so pretty in real life. I hope my customer is pleased.