What the heck are we doing?

Back in October, in fact, the very day the San Francisco Giants became 2012 World Champions* we met with Mark and Marc to talk about creative ideas we could employ in redoing our basement.
*The United States, according to Major League Baseball, is the World. 

Mark and Marc are the proprietors of 2M Architecture. They were the architects on our kitchen remodel in 2009.  (If you want the details of that, you can check out this link:  Linda and Rebecca's Kitchen Remodel.)  Mark and Marc were and are also nice enough to become our friends. As our 2013 job grew beyond the scope of a run to Ikea, they became our architects again.

So here's what we agreed on:

• Let's put in a new drainage system. Our house is built on top of a covert little creek that has been known to wreak havoc and cause dampness in our basement during heavy rains. This new drainage system means excavating the whole frickin' floor downstairs. 
• Let's cut a hole in our deck, which overhangs (and darkens) the basement. Let's replace some of the wood with tempered glass that will let natural light in downstairs.

We'll cut a rectangle near the house and replace it with glass.

• Let's put in big windows downstairs to let in even more light.
• Let's destroy our downstairs half-bathroom, currently located in the northeast corner of the house.
• Let's replace it with a full bath and locate it in the southwest corner of the house. Because we can.
• Let's move the washer and dryer there, too.
• Let's replace our interior stairs. They're narrow and treacherous, especially when we're carrying stuff on them.
• Let's take the bathtub out of the upstairs bathroom, since we'll need the space it occupies to make headroom for the more gently sloped interior staircase. Oh, and let's take out the wall to the right of the tub, too.  

Bye-bye bathtub!

• Let's put in closets and shelves and a pantry and a cool computery workspace for Rebecca.

And then, as a little afterthought, I asked Mark and Marc if there was any way our one-car garage could be made into a two-car garage. The 2Ms, who think nothing of having other people's walls destroyed and rebuilt, said "sure." Which was just the answer we were looking for. 

So the contractors will indeed take down that wall you see in the far end of this picture and put up a new one further into the basement, thereby making enough room for Rebecca's Prius and my Mini Clubber* to snuggle together inside, one in front of the other.

*Officially, it's a Mini Clubman, but that's so gender-exclusive, don't you think?

To sum up, during this remodel, our floors will be jackhammered to bits, the heat will be turned off (and heat is much needed during San Francisco summers), and our garage, washer and dryer will be unavailable to us.

Look for us to move the hell out of here this Monday.  More on that in my next post.