Projects

Let me fill you in on a little background.  We moved into an older house 5 years ago.  It was a house built in the early '90's and nothing had been updated since then.  Were talking teal green formica countertops, floral wallpaper everywhere except for the master which had a seashell print in the bathroom and an African jungle of lions and tigers on the border in the bedroom.  Nice, huh??   Don't worry, I will dig out the pictures and post them sometime.  Who am I to keep all of that beauty to myself??

Because I cannot leave things well enough alone, no room in this house was left out.  The bones of the house were good so we didn't have to dip into re-framing, re-trimming or completely remodeling anything, but we have taken down wallpaper, retextured the walls, painted walls and ceilings (a couple of times because sometimes I'm finicky on colors) and also repainted all the kitchen cabinets, had cabinets built to make the dining room into a study, replaced hardware, countertops, light fixtures, re-tiled, re-carpeted, etc., etc., etc.  I think you catch my drift.

I love the undertaking of it all and really like fixing things up.

A lot of this was with the help of my wonderful mom who is super creative and a real do-it-yourself type of girl.

My husband thought that we were in the homestretch with only one room to go, but little did he know that I would take my sights to the outdoors.

This is the view from the kitchen.   It wasn't too bad, but wait until you get up close.  

This is a little house on our property that we call the game/poker/man room.

It has a bathroom but no shower.  

And no Ethan, you cannot live down here when you are in highschool.

No ifs, ands or buts.

I always knew that we needed to work on it, but it was never in my scope due to our home needing the fixing-up.

This wall was completely covered with ivy, which I loved but the hubs hated it.  Now I see why.  The aftermath of all the sticky little fingers it uses to grab hold and make its way through the window, the frame and also the siding.  

Do you see that big piece missing from the siding near the ground?  Thank you ivy.

Man, I hate when he is right.

So we pulled off all of the vines to not let it further ruin the house.

The back of the house.

Notice the entry door.  That is not a knob, that is a deadbolt.  So you are only able to enter back here with a key, which I never have on me.  And when I do, this forces me to not be able to exit here unless I want to perfectly fit the door back in the jamb while pulling on the key.  Then I have to keep that exact position and carefully turn the key to keep the door closed while locking it.  

It was usually a 5-10 minute process and took me twice to realize that it was definitely not ideal!

This wasn't on purpose, we keyed a new deadbolt when we moved in and didn't know there wasn't room for a deadbolt, only a door knob.  So we replaced it anyway.

Didn't want any hooligans fooling with our poker chips and such.

Needless to say after five years, this will be changed.

Why again has it taken this long to finally do this??

The front door, with the beautiful sun-bleached glass frame and the mismatched handle and the door knob.

Maybe you shouldn't take a closer, things aren't looking any better.  

The part that I am most excited for is replacing this unattractive, industrial looking light.

We received a beautiful, oversized black iron sconce light for a wedding present that has been looking for its new home.

Well I am happy to say that after five years, the search is over.  

You will replace this eyesore and be in my line of sight every time I do the dishes, which is way too often.

If my husband knew of this happy little home the wasps have made in this light, he would flail and flap his arms and run like a chicken inside. 

(Not that chickens run from wasps, my husband truly runs like a chicken.  His arms go swinging behind him and he looks very odd.  He claims it is for speed.  I claim he looks like a fairy.)

Honey, will you please kill the wasps nest for me??

And I will, for the umpteenth time.

So stick with me as I journey on yet another project, which looks to be oodles of fun!!

First on the list, exterior painting.