Of Barn Wood and Water Valves: A Cautionary Tale with a Happy Ending

We finished another room in our remodel:  the kids' play room.
This Room's Pre-Play Room History

1. The  previous owners of the house thought gluing barn wood to the walls of the room would be so rustic.  It was.  And like a decrepit old barn, the woody walls of this room decayed and molded.
2. We got the moldy wood off the walls, but the globs of glue left behind would not budge.
3. The ice-maker in the fridge upstairs broke. We raced to shut off the main water valve before the house flooded.  The previous owners made this challenging for us because they sheet-rocked the main water valve into a wall inside this room.  We had to attack the walls with a mallet in order to locate and excavate the main water valve and end the deluge.  Note to homeowners everywhere:  Valves should not be inside walls.  You are supposed to be able to turn them on and off.
4.  We added a lovely office space onto the side of our house.  (See the 2/16/2010 post.)  Construction workers blasted through the foundation of the old house (specifically, through this room) to create an entryway connecting the old house to the new addition. 
5. My husband and brother-in-law made fabulous improvements to the heating and cooling and electrical systems in the house.  This involved further damage to what was left of the sheet rock in this room.
6. Fast forwarding to much more recently, my amazing husband performed major reconstructive surgery on what was left of the room, using leftover bits and pieces of sheet rock from previous household projects. He also revamped the closet into a built-in entertainment center/toy box.  I followed up with paint and striped wallpaper (50 cents/roll from the old West Jordan Lowe's that closed and liquidated its inventory a while back).

A room that has survived such past abuse is ideally qualified to deal with the atrocities my none-too-gentle kids are sure to lavish upon it.  Let the games begin.

The kids celebrated the grand opening of their new play room by playing dress-up.