Renovation Ramblings pt. 4-What's inside our walls?!

The time has finally come to begin our renovation in our 1831/1875 farmhouse! We’re starting with one wall in particular, on the back end of the house and working our way forward. I shared more details + floor plans (current and future) in my post from last week, I suggest checking that out first if you haven’t already- or if you need a refresher. Before we can get to the fun stuff, which includes installing quite a few windows, exposing historic beams and fully constructing a new kitchen in what’s currently just a storage space, we need to address the practical things first.

The very first thing on the list is figuring out what the heck is going on with this sagging wall … and fixing it. This is the first and possibly most important step, because you obviously don’t want to put a fancy new kitchen or install tens of thousands of dollars worth of windows (the cost was a jumpscare for me, too) in a potentially falling-down house. The picture below doesn’t do it justice, I think you need to be in person and walk around to really appreciate the bulge, but trust me when I say this wall is whacky. We knew it was gonna be a big thing from day one, we couldn’t not notice it, and we worried it could potentially be a huge issue, but we had faith. Luckily, from what we can see , and what we’ve discussed from a few experts we’ve had come consult, the problem isn’t quite as severe as we had initially feared. So, what is causing this wall to be so out of plumb?!