Well, our experience with hiring out people to drywall the ceiling of the laundry room was less than stellar. They showed up late, wanted more money than agreed upon and didn't fully finish the job. Regardless we have drywall everywhere now and I didn't have to do some of it! The next step is an awesome one — primer and then paint.

Here you can see the side where we did all the drywall ourselves. The old ceiling was removed along with all unnecessary wires. Plumbing and electrical were rerouted and boxed out. Ceiling was insulated and wires for surround sound ran. Then drywall, drywall and more drywall. After a million sandings, two coats of primer (had some drywall touchups) and 2 coats of paint:


What a tremendous improvement it is to see drywall up and finished. It took several coats of paint but WOW. Now I'm no Picasso and I usually manage to get more paint on the ground and furniture than I do the walls, but this came out great.



Next steps are clean, clean and clean. Then we are almost done with the basement. Who would have thought?

FINAL PROJECTS FOR BASEMENT:

-Shiplap will go up around the furnace to box it in  (finished)
-Jumbo pegboard will go up behind the craft room counters
-Baseboard moulding will go on the walls where applicable
-Carpet installed (today is the day!)
-Shelving made for storage room
-Shiplap sliding barn door for storage room
-Audio/Visual guys come out to calibrate theatre equipment