How do you clean up after the holidays?  For us, it is a tad more interesting.  Madison’s birthday was yesterday (she turned 5!), so we always have the quick cleanup that needs to be done from the time we get back from visiting Wisconsin and her birthday party.  I usually get about a week if we are lucky.  Since we have the basement now, Bill let me keep up the Christmasy decorations, but we did pull down the Christmas tree.  I need as much room as we can get, and this is pretty much the only way I was going to get it.  I figure everybody will hang out downstairs for her party just like they did for Christmas Eve.  The sad thing is that we are the only one on the block who still has their outdoor lights up.  Now, we don’t leave them up till June or anything, but it seems that it is kinda odd that on 8th of January that everyone has packed up everything already.  Now, I’ve slacked this week, and I have to get all my cleaning done tomorrow with the kids underfoot.  This should be interesting.  My sister is arriving tomorrow, so its not quite the end of the world if she’s the only one who sees my non-clean house.

How do you clean up?  Do you have a set plan?  Do you just do a little bit each day?

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I have looked at more showers in the last year than I ever have wanted to.  We remodeled my upstairs bathroom and added a new shower last summer.  We also added a new tub and had to tear down all the tile that was there before (good times, let me tell you).  This summer we added a new bathroom to the basement downstairs.  I don’t miss living in a construction zone.  However, it is very nice to have two full bathrooms now.  However, both of my bathrooms spaces are small, so I could not go all out like I wanted to.

In the basement, we had very little space to work with due to the configuration of my basement.  We ended up putting up a shower enclosure (However, I had no idea that you could get a shower enclosures online.  If I would have known that, I would not have let my husband pick it out.  Somebody had to stay home with the kids, so I let him pick it out by himself.  He did do a good job, but I probably would have picked something different.)  However, if you only have a small space and want to add a full bath, I definitely recommend shower enclosures.  They offer a lot more room than they look, and it is nice having two showers when you are trying to get ready for parties and such.

Eventually, when we add on to upstairs, I am going to check out the shower store and look into getting discount steam shower.  We are going to add in a hot tub up there, so we need the shower to be seperate.  What would be better than a steam shower?  They look awesome and extremely relaxing.  If you are lacking on space, they even offer steam showers with minitubs attached!

I personally can’t wait to remodel again, so we can spruce up our house.  Even the economy is in the tank, houses still are a good value.  Even though houses prices have dropped for the time being, they will bounce back.  Remodeling also makes it more enjoyable for you to stay in the house you are in.  By building out our basement, we can definitely stay in this house a lot longer (my upstairs only has 980 square feet, so we were a little cramped up here).

What does your bathroom look like?  What kind of upgrades would you like to make?

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We have a very busy weekend ahead of us.  Our original plan was to finally finish putting the basement together.  We still have a ton of crap in the garage that needs to come in, pictures need to be hung, totes need to be gone through and put away, wall plates need to be put up, etc.  However, Bill got invited to a gold outing, so he’ll be doing that all day Saturday!  My parents are coming down too, so my dad will be going with him golfing.  My mom and I will be stuck with the kids, so I don’t think we will be doing any shopping.  However, I think I may try and go into the attic and pull out the kids winter clothes.  It is October, so it needs to be done.  My only fear is that the minute I put their summer clothes away, it will get warm again.  I’m just not sure what we will do with the rest of the time.

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As Christmas nears, we are starting to figure out what we should get for our newly remodeled basement.  We think Santa may bring Will a train table for down there, since Madison has a nice wooden train and track, and we really have no place for the kids to play with it.  That being said, daddy would love to get a pool table for down there.  We actually know exactly where we would put it. Once the main things is that the pool table felt would definitely have to match the rest of the basement. I think I would go with a basic blue like Border Billards has.  Having played in many pool halls, I have learned that it is defintely important to have good quality felt on your table, since there is definitely a lot of wear and tear (literally) involved.  When the felt starts wearing out, it definitely effects your game.  Of course, if I do let Bill get a pool table there will definitely be some extra that will have to bought like pool cues, pool cue chalk, pool table covers, pool balls, etc.

Any other suggestions for the basement?  I personally would love a dart board too, but I really don’t want to put holes in my new walls!

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Today was not a good day at my house. My toilet overflowed. ALL DAY LONG. No, I didn’t know that there was a turn off switch behind the toilet till about ten minutes before Bill got home from work. Yes, this was in the bathroom that we did the bathroom remodel in. I seriously could have cried the whole time. I tried plunging for over 20 minutes to no avail. Also, for some stupid reason, our toilet kicks in all the time. I don’t know why it does it nor do I know how to make it stop. What I did not realize was that every time it kicks in that it runs water. Sooo, we were leaking water all over the bathroom before I even knew it. Yes, the water made its way downstairs too. I think I ended up wrapping the toilet in something like 20 towels throughout the afternoon. I even drained some of the water using a cup. It was crazy. Bill came home and plunged the stupid thing 4 times and fixed it. I could have screamed!

Now, we installed a new tub in this bathroom. However, we did that mainly, because Bill wanted to add a whirlpool tub. The tub that was in here before we think was the original one put in the house (which would have been in the 1920s). Before we tore it out, we looked at doing a bath tub refinishing project but really couldn’t find any companies who did it. I did like my old tub and a bath tub refinishing would have been nice. However, since we did go with the whirlpool tub, we have been told we greatly improved the value of the bathroom. Seriously, if you were looking at a house, would you want a tub that was flaking paint off or one that was brand new or one that looked nice? That is a no brainer for us, so we replaced the tub as part of the basement remodel.

Now, my mom has back issues and has a hard time getting in and out of tubs. I would love to be able to buy her one of these someday:

This is one of those walk in showers. I think she would absolutely love it. Plus, if you end up selling your home to a family with kids or a senior citizen couple, they would love it too!

What kind of tub do you have in your bathroom?

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