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It's official: our house has been replumbed. With the exception of the copper lines to the kitchen sink and the tub, our house has been completely replumbed while we've lived here. We're really lucky! Working with the local plumbing company has been a great experience, and we worked with the same person who plumbed our bathroom (rough in, progress, and finish!)... and fixed our toilet. The trickiest part, for us, was the amount of access required to replace all the PVC supplies (PVC is great for drains, not great for potable water). The DIY plumbing from previous generations has had a few issues that will now all be in the past! But first, we had to open up most of the basement to fix it. 
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Our stock tank pool has been a fixture for our back yard for five years now! And in that time, we’ve made a lot of changes and adjustments to the pool, from changing our filtration system to trying now three different types of covers… While my rolling cover was a great DIY hardcover option, it struggled to keep up in winter, and it was cumbersome to remove solo. So, we opted for a fairly expensive option, and we purchased the Cowboy Pools hard cover. After reading reviews from areas with real winter (lake effect snow!) seeing pictures with dogs on top (a German shepherd!), and their updated design to shed rain water... I figured this might be the answer we were looking for.  When we bought our house, we had an inspection. I vetted the inspector, and while MN doesn’t require a license, he was licensed in WI right next door. Well, he missed some things. From the knob and tube wiring (that was visible right at the top of the stairs) to the PVC water supply to our house. In his defense, it’s been 10 whole years since we first saw this house and had it inspected! I’ve known enough to question his analysis for a long time, and I should’ve considered fixing it before failure occurred. He listed it as CPVC: a similar type of plastic that is perfectly safe for potable water. Schedule 40 PVC however… not so much. So, we had a failure of the incorrectly installed exterior spigot and yet another drip in the basement. Upon talking with the plumber (if you know me and need a plumber, I have the right folks for you!), it confirmed my long-held suspicion that this wasn’t CPVC and we should replumb half the house. Too bad that I just finished -two weeks prior- the basement ceilings.  When we added the mini-beam next to the chimney, I instantly knew we'd have a great opportunity to add some additional storage this hallway. My not-so-secret opinion on hallways is they are typically wasted space that can often be more useful not as a hallway... So I knew when we put the freezer in and committed to the office wall location that I was in trouble. But the posts under the mini-beam gave me the perfect opportunity to finally find a permanent place for two salvaged cabinets that had been rolling around my parents' laundry rooms and eventually my house. The white doors already blend with the rest of the hall, and these were sturdy enough to be our temporary kitchen when we renovated upstairs. It's the perfect set up.  While I love my little pocket office, its secure ceiling joists, and its pocket door, adding these elements separates the office from a fairly large, mostly usable, area of our basement. Nothing in our house exists without working for us, and this hallway is no exception. The freezer has been in its spot for years, and there is no chance it is moving anytime soon. If it does, it will be replaced by appliance movers. These are hefty! So, I wanted to work around the freezer and make use of the old water heater position by the chimney. These really amounted to two separate problems that we were able to address with a lot of salvaged components and some left over lumber. This is about the 6" gap between the freezer and the wall: a tight space to make something work for us!  |
Katie SwansonI am a parent, creative spirit, and old house lover. My big passions are sustainable design and preservation. Bringing these together is key to moving existing homes into the future. * By subscribing to the monthly newsletter, you consent to receive links this month's blog posts and other relevant blog updates, a round up of things I love, and as a throwback to my DIY days, I may toss in an exclusive knit or crochet pattern of mine. Archives
April 2026
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