here i am in our new temporary place – 25 weeks preggers.
things are still a little wild and unbalanced over here but i’m trying to let it all go, embrace the chaos, and move along with an open heart. i was reminded on my birthday (i turned 35 on on father’s day!) that we’re so often living in the future (i’ll do xyz when our house is done being renovated, when we have a baby, when the e-course is over, when when when). but really i want to be in the very center of where i’m at right now. because where i’m at right now is in the middle of my life’s living dreams. it’s so remarkable. i don’t want to miss anything.
i wanted to give you guys a photo update on our house renovation! things are still moving along FAST and we are learning tons throughout this process. i can’t help but wonder if all the lessons we are learning while renovating this house will serve us when we’re new parents. the biggest being: letting go of our timelines, constantly adjusting expectations, having to give up control to a million variables that we can’t simply make nice and tidy, working together as a team, and patiently juggling a lot of multi-tasking of this massive project while working our full-time jobs and focusing on preparing for a child. man o man.
in the end, i know it will worth it and it seems like we’re getting to the REALLY fun phase of picking out paint colors (exterior paint done tomorrow – can’t wait to share!). we have about five more weeks left…can barely believe it. this is seriously a dream in many ways! i love love love this old cozy 1911 bungalow.
okay, a photo update tour for you!
remember the story of this wall? how we started to scrap off the paint only to find some pretty amazing patchworked wallpaper? this is what it looks like today:
john has been scraping and scraping some more and boy do we LOVE IT – looks like an old map or one of my collaged painting backgrounds. we still have quite a bit more of scraping to do, but we’re in love! we decided to sheetrock under the chair rail molding – still not sure what color that will be but above is how it looks today! pretty cool, eh?
unfortunately we couldn’t save these walls in another bedroom. we tried, but as of today all this gorgeous old wallpaper has been covered up with sheetrock and primed for painting. so sad!
here’s a sequence of photos showing what the living room into the dining room into the kitchen looked like the day we bought the place to today…
we have walls, people! and inside those walls are updated electrical, plumbing, insulation (we found old phone books and newspapers being used as insulation in the walls when we ripped them down!), and the floors have been sanded! and check out those windows in the kitchen! still so much to do including casing the walkways with molding, trim work througout, built-ins, lighting, floor varnishing, etc etc but we are getting there and fast!
here’s the kitchen tour:
here’s the kitchen the day we bought the house. that’s sponge painted linoleum flooring (ugh!) and the kitchen was TINY. it also had this odd space on the opposite wall:
we decided to totally gut the kitchen, expand its size, and start over. here’s what it looked like last week:
those five spaces are place holders for windows and that giant piece of plywood on the right will be a dutch door (OMG!!!). they all look out onto the back yard. underneath the windows will be the sink and countertops. the wall that you can’t see on the left will be for fridge, stove, etc.
and here’s what the kitchen looked like today:
windows are in! it’s going to be awesome….and we are going to have an island. a kitchen island!
here’s a photo tour of the attic which we’re turning into a master suite. here’s what it looked like on day one with its painted orange floors and thin plywood walls with zero insulation behind the walls:
and here’s the same view today:
we have skylights and closet spaces and sanded floors and that nook back there with the windows is a master bath in the making. and the walls you see are brand new. we totally gutted this attic and started over completely with electrical, insulation, walls, etc etc
here’s another view:
and here’s a view from the opposite end:
on the other side of the plastic on the left is an awesome shower. the toilet will be on the right. still lots of work to do but i love how it’s coming together. it feels like a cozy fort of up here!
whew! so, there you have it. we’re in week 6 of this project. about five more to go! i’ll save the basement photos for another post. it’s a total mess down there at the moment but hopefully it will shape up soon! ditto for the backyard where if you were to walk out of the kitchen door at the moment, you would fall about 6 feet to the ground (no steps yet!).
seriously, this is crazy and wild and most days i’m not even sure what to think. up next: can’t wait to show you the new exterior paint. it’s good. and colorful. and just perfect for us.
Oh, Kelly! How exciting! LOVE everything that you are doing! And LOVE being able to go on this journey with you through your blog! Sending lots of positive energy your way!
Oh, heaven….the house (and you) is looking good…