Dining rooms have long served as mainstays of American homeowners, but at some point in our recent history, we stopped using them with any frequency. In that light, in the remodeling world, we often ask homeowners whether they still need a dining room.

Our lifestyles have radically changed regarding the traditional notion of a family gathering, eating together at a set time in the evening. Its now easier to do grab-and-go meals or stay in the kitchen to eat and chat with whoevers around; theres just no need to go into the dining room on a daily basis. People also eat out far more than they did even 10 years ago. When they do entertain at home, they congregate in the kitchen and casual living spaces open to the kitchen.

The dining room, in short, has become a victim of its own isolation and formality. Even its placement in older homes creates a barrier from the kitchen, and when that room opens onto a seldom-used front living room, its close to dinosaur extinction!

The remaining purpose of a traditional dining room is to accommodate large, infrequent gatherings of family and friends, typically at the holidays. So how do you expand a dining rooms life beyond Thanksgiving dinner?

Making the dining room a multipurpose space is a useful option. Create a home office or library that can easily convert into a dining room when needed. Built-in bookcases can hold a combination of dinnerware and books. A large dining table easily becomes an excellent desk or work surface with a change of accessories. Dining chairs needed only for large gatherings can be placed in other areas of your home, such as a pair of dining chairs creating a conversation area in an empty corner of a great room. Or you can completely change the function of a dining room. If you remove the dining table and chairs and simply view it as an extra room in the house, what would you do with it?

In a recent project, my colleagues and I knocked down a wall between the kitchen and the living room, and the dining set moved into that new open space, which left the dining room empty. We conferred with our clients about what type of room they always wanted but couldnt have, and the answer was a fully decked-out home office. They now have a room they love which gets used every day rather than just a few times a year.

Just as our lifestyles have changed, so must our thinking of what to do with a dining room. Its just too much valuable square footage to let go to waste.

Becky Trent is a designer and Certified Aging-in-Place Specialist (through the National Association of Home Builders) with St. Louis remodeling and design firm Mosby Building Arts. Her passion for kitchen and bath design has resulted in several local and national remodeling awards.

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Inside Design: Do You Still Need a Dining Room? - Ladue News

MARQUETTE Design is more than just a pretty space. It really can impact the way we live our lives, the way that we run our business and the way that we feel in a space.

Allison Clark loves to design things. Whether its a home or just one-room, the Marquette native has been doing it professionally the last five years through her business, Curio Design Studio.

Clark came up with an idea she coined, Blueprint for Change, a way to give back to the community by designing and remodeling a room for one lucky person.

I think everyone is in to HGTV, Extreme Home Makeover and all of those shows, said Clark. People could get involved and businesses could get involved in making a difference in someones life.

Over sixty nominations came into Clark. In June, the decision was made to redesign a room for Charlotte Newcomb, 7, who suffers from cyclical vomiting syndrome, a chronic condition that causes recurring attacks of intense vomiting.

We really wanted to make sure that the design elements we were putting into the space really spoke to the specific needs; storage needs, clean-ability, durability, the ability for the space to be darkened, said Clark.

Clark worked with local small businesses, corporate sponsors and volunteers to make the renovation happen. It took six weeks of planning and a week of construction to transform the playroom at the Newcomb residence into a multi-purpose room.

It was amazing. It was a huge payoff to a lot of work and a lot of planning from every person who volunteered their time, their services and donated items, said Clark. It was really gratifying to see it come together.

The room was put together to not only benefit Charlotte, but her sisters as well. Clark says the first Blueprint for Change was successful.

Shes looking forward to being involved with another one next year.

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'Blueprint for Change' works to change lives & living spaces - ABC 10 News NOW

PRINCETON People hoping to add a cat or dog to their households got their first look Tuesday at new and more comfortable quarters for felines at the Mercer County Animal Shelter.

We started the remodeling last Monday, Assistant Director Stacey Harman said. We finished up last night and today were reopening.

The remodeled cat facilities gives the felines more room to roam and interact. Enrichment items such as shelves for lounging and cubes they can enter are part of the new arrangements.

Weve made all the cats in there cage free, Harman said. We have eight cages in there, but only for those that dont get along and everyone else is free to run.

Getting the cats out of cages decreases the chances for them to get sick, decreases their boredom and keeps their stress levels down, she said. There are plans to give the shelters cats even more space.

We didnt get to do this today because our supplies didnt come in, Harman said. Were going to have an outside patio area.

A pet door in a window will allow the cats to go outside and into a caged area. The cats wont be able to get out, and nobody except for shelter personnel will be able to enter it, she stated. Plans call for starting the patios construction this week and finishing it by next week. A donation from an estate helped fund the remodeling projects.

Dixie is held up by new owner Kim Smith as she waits for her new family to finish adoption papers at the Mercer County Animal Shelter Tuesday. The animal shelter hosted an open house where they encouraged the community to come and check out their remodeled facilities and look for a new pet.

We also have the dog play park that didnt get finished, Harman added. It will be started this week. Theyre actually getting an exercise/play yard. The whole goal behind this is to get them some exercise and out of the cages. What we see happen a lot of times is if they stay in kennels day after day, they get kennel aggression. This will give them exercise and fresh air.

The animal shelter currently houses about 47 cats, but the goal is to get this number down to 30. Between 40 to 45 dogs were at the shelter as of Tuesday.

We put a fresh coat of paint on everything, Harman said. We try to make the shelter more appealing to the public. Its really been amazing, what weve been able to do.

Contact Greg Jordan at gjordan@bdtonline.com

Originally posted here:
Shelter pets get more room to roam - Bluefield Daily Telegraph

Orange County and Los Angeles residents spend about a third more on kitchen remodels and nearly twice the national average to redo their bathrooms, according to an analysis by HomeAdvisor, a home servicesmarketplace.

Room additions, meanwhile, can set you back more than double what it costs in the U.S. as a whole, the analysis shows.

HomeAdvisor based the analysis on service requests to the site between July 2016 and July 2017 and costs provided by homeowners.

HomeAdvisor didnt disclose the exact number of projects it reviewed, but said it received 14 million service requests in the past yearand looked at hundreds of thousands of data points throughout Los Angeles and Orange County.

The findings correlate to Southern Californias higher home prices. The median price of an Orange County home the price at the midpoint of all sales was $695,000 in June, tying with May for an all-time high, according to real estate data firm CoreLogic.

Nationwide, home improvement is increasing at nearly 6 percent a year, the Leading Index for Remodeling Activity shows.

With home equity rising, owners are completing larger, discretionary projects, said Brad Hunter, HomeAdvisors chief economist. In 2016, they spent an average of nearly $2,000 more than they did in 2015, he said.

Expected to keep the trend going: Millennials putting money into fixer uppers and aging Baby Boomers making modifications to their homes so they can stay put. And, Hunter said, rising mortgage interest rates likely will create anadditional impetus for home improvement spending.

Heres a tool to help figure out remodeling costs in different places.

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How much could your home remodeling job cost? More in OC and LA than elsewhere - OCRegister

DANVILLE Danville Public Library officials seek library and non-library users to answer surveys, with the results used to update the librarys strategic plan.

About 200 surveys have been filled out. Library board members handed them out at the recent library book sale. The survey also is available at the library and will be put on the librarys website at http://www.danville.lib.us after more questions are added.

DPL Director Theresa Tyner said the initial survey was very minimal and they have been in the process of adding more questions. She said the library usually updates its strategic plan about every three to five years or more.

Were looking at future services and asking (respondents) how do you use the library now and if not, why not, Tyner said.

We really want to know if people are using the library or certain services or certain collections, she said, this includes whether patrons use electronic collections or only prefer physical books.

Survey questions also ask about library programming, if the respondent attended certain programs and what programs respondents would like the library to offer that haven't been offered in the past.

Another strategic planning meeting will be 4-8 p.m. Sept. 13 in the library's first floor meeting room at 319 N. Vermilion St.

Also at a recent board meeting, library board members approved a $27,984 contract with Dewberry Architects Inc. that outlines services for the construction documents, bidding and construction administration phases of the library's interior remodeling project. Project funding comes from the Danville Library Foundation.

The approximately $412,000 renovation project will include a dedicated Teen Space on the first floor across from the childrens area, two meeting/study rooms in the second floor archives area, a facilities office and additional storage. There also will be sound insulation added to the study room areas and some lighting changes.

Library board members have requested fundraising assistance up to $500,000 from the Danville Library Foundation for the project.

Tyner said theyre still not sure on a timeline for the project. Construction could take six months, with the project possibly being bid this fall. The project planning process started under former library director Barb Nolan.

In other library board business, the library will refill the assistant director and outreach department director positions when Mike and Leslie Boedicker leave within the next two months. Tyner said they will be moving some tasks around with the positions.

Read more:
Library to update its strategic plan - Danville Commercial News

IF YOU GO

What: 3rd annual Ave Maria Village Family and Friends Community Fun Walk When: 9 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 5 Where: Ave Maria Village, 501 19th St. NE Info: The cost to register is $25 for adults, $10 for Heritage Centre residents, and Ave Maria Village residents and children 12 years old and younger can enter for free. Registration forms may be picked up and returned to Ave Maria Village.

The 3rd annual Ave Maria Village Family and Friends Community Fun Walk is raising funds for phase one of Ave Maria Villages private room campaign.

Lisa Wagner, who came up with idea for the walk three years ago and is a walk organizer, said about 65 people have registered for the walk so far this year. Last year there were 100 participants, but this year Wagner said she would like to get 120 to 150 participants.

Wagner said same-day registration for the walk will be allowed. People wanting to register on the day of the walk should arrive between 8:30 to 8:45 a.m. to allow for extra time.

Participants will walk along a paved path starting from the Ave Maria Village pavilion area, which is located north of the parking lot for employees. The path is 1 mile long. Prize drawings will start at 10 a.m.

Jan Barnes, development and volunteer director for Ave Maria Village, said phase one of the private room campaign is raising funds to improve the rooms and other physical amenities the long-term care facility offers to its residents. She said a new phone system was just installed so each resident has a new phone and his or her own phone number.

Its a more versatile phone system, Barnes said.

Barnes said she has raised enough money through the private room campaign to create two bath suites. The work, once it starts sometime in August, will renovate the bathrooms in two rooms and make those bathrooms more spa like, she said. The estimated cost to create the two bath suites is $57,000 each.

Barnes said the next project is remodeling the kitchen for the Ave Maria Village building. She said the building is 55 years old and the kitchen has never been remodeled. She had no estimate on how much the kitchen remodeling will cost. The last thing to be done as part of the private room campaign is to remove all the wallpaper in each room and throughout the building and paint the walls.

We want to give the building a new look, she said.

colson@jamestownsun.com

(701) 952-8454

Excerpt from:
Fun Walk raises funds for private room campaign - Jamestown Sun

Split Level renovations have been growing in the last few years. It is a fast and convenient way to add more space to the unfinished or partly-finished areas of the home. Some ideas are opening up the main floor, updating the kitchen, adding bathrooms and formal living rooms.

Many people want to create more openness in the main floor of a split level, which usually consists of living room, dining room, kitchen and possibly a bedroom. Openness can certainly be achieved by removing some of the walls between rooms. You will need to be sure you know which walls are load-bearing walls. For example, you might want more openness between the kitchen and the dining room. Either removing the wall or replacing the wall with a counter will open up the area and feel more spacious. Removing the wall between the living room and dining room can also open up the area and make it more conducive to entertaining.

It is not uncommon for split level homes with four levels to have an unfinished bottom level. Finishing this area is really no different from finishing any basement. It will be important, however, to check on ceiling height early in the planning stages of the project. A number of split level homes have lower ceilings on the bottom floor.

The desire to add a bathroom to any home is quite common. Split levels often offer two important opportunities for bathroom additions. First, most split level homes were not built with a bathroom on the main (formal living area) floor. Many homeowners would like to add at least a half-bath or powder room on the main floor for the comfort and convenience of guests or for elderly or disabled family members. Determining the location of the new bathroom is a challenge in most split levels. Logic and cost-consciousness would suggest locating the new bathroom near (next to, above or below) existing plumbing. This allows you to use existing supply and removal pipes. Depending on the floor plan, however, this might not be workable. Location of pipes to a new bathroom on the main floor will also require some attention to the ceiling height of the floor below (if there is one). If the lower level has typically lower ceilings, placement of plumbing might depend upon where you can run pipes without making the lower level unusable.

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Whole House Remodeling, Room Additions

Jul 27, 2017 at 7:41 am | Print View

Stepping into The Map Room, a new pub in downtown Cedar Rapids, is a little like stepping into the pages of an atlas maps from around the world line the walls.

We traveled a lot, and we were always picking up maps wherever we went. We joked we would put them in the map room someday, said owner Christina Springman, who opened the bar and restaurant with her husband, Mitch Springman.

Instead of creating that room in their house, they decided to share their maps with the public, alongside servings of homemade pub food and signature cocktails. Together, the decor and the menu are meant to provide a friendly, comfortable atmosphere.

We wanted a spot that would inspire people to talk about their travels, Christina Springman said.

The food also comes with a globe-trotting aesthetic. The kitchen is small, about 4 feet wide, so they had to keep the menu focused; chef Quincey Sproston mainly serves burgers, along with a selection of loaded fries and crostinis.

Each burger focuses on a different global city, with a flavor profile and toppings inspired by that areas cuisine. The Delhi burger, for example, is topped with paneer, garam masala and mint chutney, while the New Orleans burger is topped with mortadella, ham, salami, mozzarella, provolone and spicy olive relish. Others include the Marrakesh, Seoul, Memphis and Napoli burgers.

We tried to hit every continent with the menu, Springman said. We just had to figure out how to put them on a burger.

The drink menu, meanwhile, features beer and wine alongside craft cocktails like the La Mure, which includes blackberry brandy, fresh lemon juice and sparkling wine, or the Porch Life, with gin, Domaine de Canton ginger and house-made strawberry lemonade.

We went for light, refreshing summer drinks, Springman said. I want this to be a comfortable tavern. I dont want it to be pretentious by any means.

Both of the Springmans have a restaurant industry background. Christina Springman most recently managed the Black Sheep Social Club, and Mitch Springman manages The Lucky Penny in Hiawatha.

Black Sheep Social Club owner Graig Cone gave them the loan to get started with The Map Room. When Stellas closed during the 2016 flood and didnt reopen, Springman got in touch with building owner Kory Nanke with her business proposal. After some remodeling, The Map Room opened June 30.

Springman said the small downtown bar has always appealed to her, nestled among much taller buildings. Along with the snug indoor seating, she plans to open patio seating this week.

Everything else is so big and towering. Its a tiny little respite, she said. I like the size of it. I can talk to everyone in here. Its nice and cozy.

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Travel the world on a plate at The Map Room - The Gazette: Eastern Iowa Breaking News and Headlines

David Beard's Catfish Village at 2005 Toler Road is being closed through Aug. 31 for a remodeling project that will give it a fresher look, according to Kriste Jones, who owns it with husband Harold.

She said the project would give the restaurant the Joneses have owned since March "a more pleasant dining experience."

They hired contractor Richard Kessler, who said he started demolition Monday. The project calls for adding a waitress station, moving and refinishing interior walls and painting the exterior, according to an application for a commercial alteration permit Kessler submitted July 18 to the Longview Development Services Department. The project has a construction value of $45,800, documents showed.

The Catfish Village has been around since the mid-1980s and seats about 200 people, Jones said. She and her husband also own Catfish King in Atlanta.

Jones said no date has yet been set for reopening

Photo, floral neighbors

Ashley Hill and Rashell Garcia, who have worked together on photo shoots, opened adjacent studios at 5804 Judson Road.

Hill said she moved Ashley Hill Photography from 1903 Eastwood Road to get more space, while Garcia said she moved her business, Timber Bloom Design, out of her home.

Hill said she began dabbling in photography six years ago in Japan while her husband, Cody, was stationed there with the U.S. Marine Corps. She and her business moved to Longview four years ago when he became a Marine recruiter.

Hill said she shoots photos inside the studio, which also has a gallery.

"My goal is to really create a community," she said.

Garcia said she has been doing design work and decorating for several years for churches and nonprofit groups. She previously owned Sweet Pickins Vintage Rentals, which provided vintage furniture for photo shoots but closed it in January to work full time in floral design, which she has done for photo shoots as far away as Missouri.

The business also works with photographers on weddings, baby showers and corporate events and arranges merchandise for display in online catalogues and storefront windows.

"I strive to create very unique individual designs for each client," Garcia said.

Garcia and Hill work by appointment only. Visit Garcia's business Facebook and Instagram pages and Hill's studio page on Facebook

Accounting firm moves

The family that owns Dennis-Wade Associates Inc. is planning to move to a building that also will contain their home.

"We will be able to walk through our door to be at our house," said Richard Wade, who works with his son Derek as a tax accountant. His wife, Margaret Dennis Wade, founded the company with her father, William Dennis.

Richard Wade said they would move from 1125 Judson Road their office for about 26 years to a building of about 5,200 square feet. The office will be at 1100 Judson Road, Building 200 and their home at 1001 Yates Drive.

They expect the office/home to be ready in a year.

Steve Pirtle Construction has applied for building permits from the Longview Development Services Department. The project has a construction valued of $600,000, city records show.

Healthy vending

San Diego-based KarmaBox Vending said it is bringing vending machines that sell healthful, nutritional snacks to the Longview area.

KarmaBoxes carry a range of beverages and snacks that are low in sugar and calories, including turkey jerky, nuts, berries and coconut water. The company also sells personal care products.

Exact locations are in the works, but KarmaBoxes are generally placed in high-volume locations such as health clubs, hotels, public and private schools and community centers, said A.J. MacQuarrie, founder and president.

He said he started the business in 2010 in his dorm room at St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia, Canada, and has expanded the business to 65 markets in this country,

For more information, visit mykarmabox.com or call (855) 527-6226.

Business Beat appears Sunday. If you have items for the column, email to newstip@news-journal.com; mail to Business Section, Longview News-Journal, P.O. Box 1792, Longview, TX 75606; or call (903) (903) 237- 7744.

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Business Beat: Catfish Village closed for remodeling - Longview News-Journal

HINSDALE, IL Two brothers in Westchester who are battling an autoimmune disease were surprised with bedroom makeovers completed by Normandy Remodeling and non-profit organization Special Spaces. According to a release from the business, Finnegan and Colman, ages 4 and 7, each have an autoimmune disorder that leaves them vulnerable to a simple cold or virus that can quickly become life threatening. Both receive regular transfusions and treatments to minimize the impact of the disease, but theyve spent a large portion of their young lives recovering in hospitals or in their bedrooms.

Prior to the makeover, Finnegan and Colman shared their passions with Normandy Designers, according to the release. In turn, each of their rooms was centered on things that they love. This ensures that the boys can thoroughly enjoy the space, in good health and in bad.

The bedroom makeovers took place on July 14, according to the release. While the family spent the day away from their Westchester home, Special Spaces staff and more than two-dozen Normandy Remodeling volunteers took over to complete the transformation.

According to the release, Colman, age 7, received a room that reflected his love of the Blackhawks. His new space includes a hockey goal headboard, scoreboard and Blackhawks decals and memorabilia. Finn, age 4, is all about Legos and Batman, so his new room features a barn door covered in Legos and a custom Batman mural. Each bedroom also received new paint, bedding, benches, lighting and artwork.

It was extremely gratifying to utilize our resources and talents for these bedroom makeovers, Normandy President Andy Wells said in a release. At the end of the day, the Normandy team was just as thrilled as the boys.

It is always great when we can support local causes that are meaningful to our employees and customers, added Wells in a release.

Normandy Remodeling is a design/build remodeling firm headquartered in Hinsdale.

Photo provided by Normandy Remodeling.

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Originally published July 27, 2017.

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Two Brothers Battling Autoimmune Disorders Receive Bedroom Makeovers From Hinsdale Firm - Patch.com