HOME..where Our Story begins...and Love never ends

Friday, February 28, 2014

Our Great Changes are Preceded by Chaos!!

It was a late Saturday afternoon, just after Christmas when we found ourselves driving home from the cabin. The kiddos were snoozing in the back seat and we had an unexpected moment of peace to discuss the house. We are sure our lender will have numerous projects they want completed before we can close on the house so we best get started!

We decided that the upstairs half bath would be a small, quick and cheap job to ease our way into home renovations. The bathroom hasn't been functional since before we moved in. The toilet leaked and the sink hardware was broken so water to the bathroom had been long ago shut off. By the time we arrived home we were motivated to break ground on our very first soon-to-be-our-home project!!

To make things easy we decided Tom would head out to home depot that very evening and purchase a new toilet and hardware for the existing sink so we could have the bathroom up and functional in a day or two. As soon as we unloaded the car Tom headed up to do some measuring and I grabbed the camera so we could document our first project.

Here are the ugly before pictures.
I almost forgot to mention that the light didn't work either, which is why that little lamp with the bendy head is in the picture.

As you can see the bathroom is quite outdated, the flooring was installed by old Mr. Cunningham, The man who owned the home prior to my parents. He was a single father raising four sons in the home. He had somehow come across excess Navy ship materials which he used all over the house- I believe when my parents moved in that every wall in the entire home was painted gray! Oh, and lets not forget to mention that the walls in this bathroom are made of plywood, yep you read that right, PLYWOOD!!

Well, one thing lead to another...and the next thing I know.......

yep, by 11pm that very Saturday night the tiny half bath was gutted to the studs!!

So here we go, our half bath renovation!!

First up: Just the basics!!

new drywall throughout and an additional built in shelf!

oh, and a new working light!!

Fresh Paint and a beautiful floor!!

up next....trim. Then back to the original plan of a new toilet and sink :)

Monday, January 20, 2014

Bringing Our Home up to Code

Before

I vividly remember the excitement my family experienced one hot summer day, almost 30 yrs. ago now, when my father so enthusiastically tore down the back porch!! It was an awful avocado green color, it had a tiny 2x3 landing and 10 or so stairs that went steeply down to the ground to your left (I wonder if my parents have any old picture of it??). My Mother had always talked of the patio she wished they had off the back of the house. She didn't want anything fancy, just a place where we could BBQ and host a family dinner while the kids played in the yard and sun set in the background.
Well, as you can see from the recent picture to the right, that patio never quite materialized. My parents have now moved out of the home and were thinking of placing it on the market when Tom and I decided it was an opportunity to purchase the home and move closer to family.
Which bring us back to this 5 foot drop off the back of the house, seems that our lender wont allow us to buy the property and homeowners insurance won't cover the home unless we have stairs that are up to code! I know, CRAZY!!
So here we go, one of our first projects on our soon-to-be-OUR-home :) Tom and I know that we want to do some big renovations to the kitchen (which is on the other side of that door) and install french doors out to a large patio where we can entertain friends and family. So our goal for now is to just build stairs for the interim, and hopefully in a year (or five) we will build our dream patio :) Wish us luck.