For Christmas last year, we identified one of our greatest needs: our master bedroom closets. (You may remember back in January that I mentioned this remodeling job.) Keith's is atrocious; it is encumbered by a huge HVAC soffit and has a ginormous section shoved into a corner that isn't even accessible, given that there is a wall blocking it. Lovely. Mine is a straight-shot reach-in closet that takes up the better part of one wall of our master. Not pretty, but functional nonetheless. Thanks to Dad and Yvette, our Christmas gift was about to be realized! Except it would take a little longer than we thought...
For a month and a half, we contacted and met with various contractors and handymen, all of whom gave differing suggestions on what we could do with the space. At one point, we were even considering removing part of our fourth bedroom and converting the space into more closet space for the master. While potentially great for us, this would be suicide for resale value. Add that to the conundrum of where to put kid #2 when he/she comes along and you've
got yourself a bad solution.
Enter John, the owner of Yorba Linda Remodel. I have never met this man before, nor do I have any personal connection to him. Yet when I invited him in for a free estimate, he was the most honest businessman I've ever met. He and his wife were also in the position of having their first child together and he totally understood the need for a growing family. In addition, he was extremely realistic, pointing out the flaws of trying to change the infrastructure of our imperfect master; in short, creating a walk-in closet would encroach on our already small space and not do much of anything for storage solutions. He actually (gasp) recommended going with a company like California Closets, a company with which he had no personal experience, but about which he has had clients rave for years. Color me surprised. I thanked John and sent him on his way with the assurance that if we ever had any remodeling needs, he'd be my first phone call.
We had such a horrible space in which to design, but Bonnie over at CC really did work her tail off for us. Three weeks later, we're finally getting installed on Monday (it feels like it's been forever to someone who is notorious for instant gratification, but I realize that it hasn't).
In preparing for our new arrival (no, not the baby yet!), Keith and I had some major work we had to do. Over the past three weekends, we've cleaned out the baby's closet, the guest closet, and done some more pruning of our own--we're usually pretty good about weeding for Goodwill a couple of times a year, so this wasn't too difficult.
Keith and Jack, my wonderful bro-in-law, also cleaned out the entire gym and transformed it into our guest suite. Since I'm not allowed to do any heavy-lifting, Keith even put up all of the wall trimmings! I did some minor demolition, ridding the room of its bright blue metal horizontal blinds (no tears here!) and hanging a gorgeous set of brown drapery panels that we already had from our previous office in Irvine. Bonus! No money spent! The result is a zen space that Ali and Mom have already enjoyed immensely. They both agree that the new room is lovely enough to come visit frequently once Princess arrives. Joy!
This weekend, I'm still on modified bed rest and can't do anything to help. Fortunately, I have a handy hubby who was able to move everything out of both closets in record time and do demo. He's set to spackle and paint tomorrow, readying the space for our installers. It just pleases me to no end to see both closets totally empty and ready for their makeovers. I'm a long-time devotee of HGTV, so I feel like this before and after will be extra-special for me!
By moving the entire guest room into the front bedroom, Princess' room has also been totally cleared and is now ready for decorating...that is, until all of our closets were dumped into the empty space. But no fear, we'll be filling our new, organized space with these things again on Monday night. I can't wait!!
