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| Shot of the front! |
Here is a room by room look into our house...well, the "before" pics! When we first walked in we knew this was "the one"...I also knew we had a LOT of work to do before it would feel like home.
Here is our front room. Notice the lovely pink door, blood red trim, and salmon colored carpet? This room was atrocious but proved to be the easiest of fixes with a little paint, removal of carpet, and 4 coats of white paint over that trim. Much time and dedication but all so worth the effort. Stand by for the after shot...
The kitchen...oh the kitchen. This was the first thing we tackled. I could not bare to work in this setting. There was barely any counter space, the cabinets were old and reeked of must and cigarette smoke, there was no room for anything next to that crazy huge fridge which blocked part of the doorway from the dining nook, and there was water damage and a bug farm under the sink. Not good. My intent was to paint the cabinets and work with what we had but after a couple months we decided to rip it out. More on the remodel here and here!!!
Here is the family room. It was originally a 3 season room separated from the kitchen by some big glass patio doors. We tore those suckers out and made it a great room combined with the kitchen. Only problem is it sits on a crawl space and only has a tiny space heater so it is always cold in that part of the house. That is a major (EXPENSIVE) project we hope to tackle in 2011.
Here is our backyard. It is pretty straight forward but lacks some oomph. I ripped out that baby tree seen to the right of the patio. Other than that it looks about the same right now. I would LOVE LOVE LOVE to put in french doors where our door is and add them to the side as well for a nice slate patio or a screened in porch to the right of our house. You cant tell from the pic but the backyard is pretty big so we could lose the grass space on that side and still have plenty of space for the dog to run!
This shot actually shows the size a little better. I hate the circle pavers - total tripping hazard! - but we will work on those when we work on the rest of the yard later. I would prefer to get the inside nice first!
A shot of the basement in all its beige glory. We built E's office down here which took up about 1/3 of the floor space right about where the photographer is standing. When we were doing the office a pipe was accidentally nicked which prompted us to rip out some drywall. That was a blessing in disguise as we found some mold that had been hidden behind the drywall. We will be pulling it all out in due time and sealing the basement foundation from the inside and outside. Another project slated for 2011!!
Must I tell you how much I would like to gut this baby. E has it listed as his next priority but I think it should wait until the basement sealing and new windows are put in...we will see what happens first. Until then we are stuck with this unsightly bathroom. The wood in here smells musty and like cigarette smoke too. That makes the medicine cabinet and the vanity unusable in my eyes. E has slowly gotten used to it and is starting to put some items in the med cab...more power to him! Yuck!!
Those shots are of our vegetable garden from July. It was in full bloom here so I don't have a before picture. I put in all the pavers and mulch and created little beds. This year (2010) we grew: cucumbers (way too many), zucchini, 10 tomato plants, corn, onions, eggplant, carrots, radishes, lettuce, pumpkin, brussel sprouts, broccoli, strawberries, blackberries, blueberries, and peppers. None of the berries came out, the eggplant were eaten by squirrels, the corn got infested, the brussel sprouts got worms, and the pumpkin started to strangle everything. Regardless of all of that it turned out to be a pretty good harvest. Next year we have already decided on a few plants we can do without and a few different ones we will add. Some we wont plant as much and others we will plant more. It was a good learning experience and I hope to make my thumb much greener by next year!
That's it for now! Stay tuned for the after shots...
Bianca
