Independant living

Not totally.  They're not that grown up, but they are looking forward to having their own rooms.  Their owns spaces to personalize. 

Beth and Laura have been sharing a room for years.  Before that, Laura and Alice shared, and before that Beth and Laura again.

Until moving out of their shared room in order for demolition to happen, Laura had never had her own space.  Now she shares a cramped space with all of the contents of the cold storage, a bedroom and a bath, a hallway closet and understairs storage.  It's full and a total mess, but she's alone for the first time.  By choice.

I think they miss each other though.  Beth is all the way upstairs while Laura remained in the basement.  

They borrow each other's clothes all the time, so it makes sense that they remain close.  And I do hope that they continue to visit with each other for nightime chats.  The new layout of their end of the basement looks like this:

And the current state?  So exciting!

This will be Laura's room.

Perhaps it's just a rectangle, but it will be HER rectangle.  And she has design plans that I won't reveal here.  Not yet.

Oh, and it's not just a rectangle.  It's a rectangle with a window she will be able to crawl through if she needed to (not to escape us - let's be clear about that!) and one with insulation in the walls for warmth, and in the floor for warmth and water barrier, and in the ceiling for sound.  It's cozy.

And it's also a rectangle with a closet.  Something she's never really had before either.  Not one of her own and not one without pipes running through it.

It's upside down right now, but this is an outlet that kind of excites me.  

Did you notice?  Two USB charging outlets.  Nice.  It is just above where her dropleaf desk will be installed.

Beth's room is not much bigger, but she has two things that I can't wait to see finished. 

The area above that stool will be a 7 foot desk surface.  With shelves spanning the wall above it.  She also has the USB outlets and will have under-shelf lighting for her desk.

Do you know why that is all exciting?  Because one day she will move out of the house and I will move my sewing machines there!  I'm not allowed to dream out loud about that too often because I don't want her to feel like I'm pushing her out of the house quite yet.  I'd really like her to stay home during her university years.

But still.  What a nice sewing room it will be.  I'm just saying.

But I didn't say that again.  I'm keeping my excitement hidden.

And this wall is going to be really quite awesome too.  

In the past we just shoved boxes under the stairs from the opposite side.  We had to stoop and climb between the furnace and hot water heater to get anything out of there.  Now it is a closet and drawers will be built between the studs.  No dresser required.

And the fabric you could stash there....No, I didn't say that out loud either.

And their room are only divided by the shared bathroom, so the sharing of clothes, accessories and late night sisterly chats can still go on.  It's all pretty cool.