Sunday, November 22, 2020

Our New (and still extremely unpacked) House Tour!

Hello friends!

We have been in our new house for just under a month, and so far, we are LOVING it. Harrison has yet to get bored of running from room to room and pretty much refuses to walk anywhere.

I think he’s enjoying the extra space just a bit. 

And you KNOW that Mom is enjoying the extra space. 😊 You guys, we have CLOSETS. Plural. As in one in each bedroom as well as the hallway and in the basement. We’ve also gained about twice as much square footage, 2 1/2 more bathrooms, and a GARAGE! Eeeek! We have never had a garage before. They handed us the remote during the closing and I could not stop smiling.

I adored our old house. It was the absolute perfect starter home, and last week when we did our final walk through to make sure everything was set for the new owners, it seemed twice as small as what I remembered. Makes me laugh now, considering our new master bedroom, bath, and closet have a larger footprint than the entire upstairs. I am beyond grateful for the life we spent there. It kept us humble. We never needed a lot of space, and we were so so happy in those old walls, with its creeks and cracks that a building of over 100 years will undoubtedly possess. 

Makes being thankful for what we’ve worked for and been blessed with extremely easy.

Ok, enough sappy stuff. 😉 Let’s see some pictures! 

Now I warn you, this is a raw and authentic house tour. Boxes are everywhere, things are untidy, and that's because...well...we live here. But what a joy it will be to compare these crazy and cluttered BEFORE pics to the amazing and styled AFTERS! Won't that be fun?! Let's dive in! 

Our new neighborhood is one of the more developed in the area, the trees are large, the houses are similar but not in a creepy Stepford Wives way, and there are sidewalks leading to quiet caul-de-sacs in every direction. That was a big thing for me. We take tons of walks, so being able to do that safely was high on my priority list.

Starting in the garage, everything is kind of a hot mess. Ironically, even though we finally don’t have to park outside anymore, we’ve been doing just that. Until this week that is! While I was away on a work trip, Eric called and said the CRV finally fits! Woohoo! And even though this is “Eric’s territory” I’ve kind of been sucked into garage organization methods via Pinterest. I’m obsessed. We’re going to utilize ALL of the shelves.
Heading towards the front entrance we have our porch! A bonus feature that I was super stoked about. One of those “not a necessity…but would be awesome to have” type of things. I’m picturing cutting the bushes down slightly so it’s not so hidden and adding some adorable chairs to chill out on, maybe even another swing. After you step into the house, you’ll find yourself in our foyer, the hallway will lead you straight into the kitchen while the stairs will bring you…well…upstairs.

Directly to your left is the playroom. I believe it was originally designed as a formal living area, which we don’t really need, so for the time being it’s serving as a catch-all for the boxes of décor as well as Harrison’s toys. It’s nice to have somewhere to store his things besides the living room and keeps them (more or less) out of the way. 

Through the playroom is the dining room. I’m still not sure where I want our china cabinet to stand, so nothing has really been done in here except pile the boxes up high so everything fragile is out of the Harrison zone.

I would love to swap out the light feature for something funkier (that goes for every light in the whole house actually) and maybe try a dark and moody color for the walls. 

From the dining room, you have our kitchen which is also open to the living room. I'm seeing white upper cabinets, deep teal lowers, and beautiful gold hardware. Just you wait! 

Peaking through those sliding doors to the outside, you can see another reason why Eric and I fell in love with this house. For a planned neighborhood, the backyard is HUGE! 
Looking at it from an aerial view, I think it's one of the largest properties in the entire development. It just keeps going. Behind the treeline is a field, so there's a sense of "country living" while still being extremely close to everything we would need. Already we both have visions of gardens, another pergola, and of course a swing set for the kiddos. I'd also love to fence off the left portion as well as plant some fur trees for greenery and additional privacy. 

Back inside, off of the living room, is the mudroom! This of course would lead you directly into the garage and is another amazing bonus I was tickled to discover. I have always wanted some sort of landing pad to drop your things before heading into the house. My dream is to have cubbies or cabinets, to keep shoes, coats, cleaning supplies, whatever! 
Backing up slightly, another door off of the living room/kitchen space leads you down to our FINISHED basement! YES! We have made it to the world of a fully functioning 3rd floor! Woop woop! 

There are two main spaces in the basement, this large room features a bar and tiled floor area which Eric can use as his "man space", then heading toward the back there is another full bathroom, and a hallway leading to one more room which we're currently using for storage. 
There are two decently sized closets back here, and Eric has already drawn up plans to build shelves so we can use their vertical space to the fullest.

So that pretty much wraps up the main floor and lower level, so let's head upstairs! I'm currently debating if I want to recreate our gallery wall...or keep it simple since overall this staircase isn't as open compared to our last. 
When you reach the top you'll find all four bedrooms, a bathroom, linen closet, and laundry room! You read that right, the laundry room is UPSTAIRS. As in where all the clothes are. As in I no longer will be hauling baskets up and down flights of stairs. 

We can't actually utilize the laundry room yet because the previous owners took their washer and dryer, but below is a peek into this glorious ("glorious" based on it's potential...not actual appearance) space as well as the kid's bathroom which is the next room down the hallway. 
Directly behind where the previous hallway pic was taken (or immediately to your right once you've reached the 2nd floor) is our master suite. This puppy is WAY more space than we'll ever need. I truly feel spoiled every time I set foot in it. Not only do we have a large area for our bed, but the bathroom is also a great size, we have our own little linen closet, and our walk-in closet is almost equivalent to Harrison's old nursery. 
Told you these are raw, our bedroom was a disaster when I snapped that pic. The only areas I feel 90% organized with are our bathroom, linen closet, and walk-in. I Home Edited the crap out of those spaces. We're talking categories, bins, labels, stations, dividers, the whole works. Eric even took notice and arranged his dress shirts in rainbow order. SO PROUD! 
The remaining rooms upstairs include the office/guest bedroom, future nursery to a little lady coming in February, and of course Harrison's room.
I'm still not sure of the vibe I want for either of the kid's rooms. Harrison is super into trucks, cars, and really anything with a motor. But I don't want this to end up looking like a cliche man cave or dude garage. For the baby, I'm leaning towards mermaids, ocean waves, and bungalow beachiness.

Well, that pretty much wraps up the entire house! Thank you so much for giving me the space to share our home with you, and I can't wait to dive into the redesign. I've already begun hanging pictures everywhere, and Eric is tackling the idea of built-ins around the living room fireplace. Both of us have so many ideas we have to check-in every now and then to the reality it won't get done overnight. Ha! A girl can dream though. 


Check out all of our home improvements, by visiting the OUR NEST page.

Saturday, October 3, 2020

Saying Goodbye - Final House Tour

Hello friends! 
Thank you all for your wonderful support since announcing our decision to sell, and take on the wild beast that is today's housing market. I'm happy to announce that we DID indeed find a new house, and as of today I already have 13 Pinterest boards dedicated to its design. 

Don't judge. Focusing on the new space is helping me coup with the emotions of leaving this one. And there are PLENTY of emotions. I've been diving deep into the pics from when we first bought the place and comparing them to how our home currently looks all spick and span for the showings. Honestly, it's been insanely satisfying. We've done SO MUCH over the past seven years it really is impressive, even to me and I lived it! 

So to celebrate this next chapter of our lives, I'd like to present one final house tour (check out our first-ever tour here!). Stuffed full of links to past posts, products, and sources to all my favorite thingamabobs and whatnots. I've also been posting these transformational Before and After pics on Instagram, so if you haven't already been following our journey there, just keep scrolling for a photo explosion! Let's begin!

Starting outside, our biggest and most recent update was removing the large burning bushes planted in front of the porch. I always felt like they looked too bulky, so when they randomly all died this past Summer (no I had nothing to do with it) Eric ripped them out and we replaced them with low flowering plants and two small trees flanking the stairs. I immediately loved how open and inviting it made our house look. 

Other changes included updating the house numbers, painting our mailbox and hanging light black, as well as painting the front door a spunky orange. 
Moving inside to our foyer and stairs, one of my top five favorite moments of the whole house. I've gushed at length about our gallery wall, and looking back at how much it's grown is crazy fun. Our banister, along with the stair runner, is another reason this space took on such a transformation. I don't think the black and white look will ever go out of style. 
We used Bristlecone by Olympic on the walls and Simply White on all of the trim. One of my other favorite projects (you're going to hear me say that a lot in this post) although not pictured, is our yellow upcycled chandelier. What began as a basic thrift score, ended up being the perfect pop of color our entrance needed. 

To the left of the foyer is our living room. We used Gadget Grey by Dutch Boy on the walls and luckily didn't have to paint the window trim because it was already white. We did have to tackle the doorway trim and baseboards though. In the end, it was completely worth it to sit on the couch and see only white...instead of the three different trim finishes we had before. 

Through the living room, you will find the dining room. We took the same Gadget Grey and used it on the top portion of this space, but painted the bottom Palladian Blue by Benjamin Moore. The china cabinet was a Craigslist score, as was the mirrored table, and the chairs...which took about six years to actually complete.
This room has the best light in the house, which is why it's also been dubbed "the jungle" since my pathos vine seems to have completely taken over. That's one of the characteristics I think I'm going to miss the most, the tall gorgeous windows. I also adore how the green from the plants and blue from the walls look with this bold red rug (similar), as well as the contrast between the white chairs and deep wood from the table.

The last room on the first floor is the kitchen. We painted the cabinetsthe walls (Kensington Green by BM), made curtains for the windows, and refinished the floors. We also replaced the appliances, covered the fan boob light with a shade, and more recently I swapped the fabric on the barstools for the 2nd time. Through the door to the left of the back door is the mini awkward bathroom...which until yesterday also held our makeshift pantry. 
We spend a LOT of time in the kitchen, so what I'm looking forward to most in the new house (besides a pantry that ISN'T also a shower) is counter space!!! It's going to be SO GOOD! 

OK! First floor done! Heading up the stairs to the second floor you'll find our master bedroom. I can't stand bedroom furniture suites, everything too matchy matchy drives me nuts, so the furniture is a mix of IKEA, random pillows and blankets, plus Craigslist finds. We also updated the ceiling fan, and one of my favorite projects (not pictured, unfortunately) is my jewelry organizer made from an old crib mattress spring frame.
Across from the bedroom is our office. For the longest time, it stood as our "catch-all" space, but we finally kicked it into gear and cleared it out to create an area we actually use. It was amazing during my time working from home while in quarantine, so an office in the new house will be a must. To keep your eye from focusing on the sloped ceiling, we painted everything white except for the full wall and also hung shelves. I broke down our process for making the desks in this post, that beauty of a rug is from Rugs USA, and the bookshelves (there are 2 matchings) came from IKEA
The last full room upstairs is Harrison's bedroom. I had a complete blast decorating his nursery, from the random thrift and antique store finds to the handmade sign above the bed, there are personal touches everywhere. Again, collecting pieces gradually like pillows and furniture from a variety of places beats a generic matching set every time.   
Our bathroom is at the end of the hallway, and I'm proud to say I did the majority of the painting myself in this room. The mirror came with the house so I just gave it a quick coat of purple, crafted a simple curtain from fabric and 2 tension rods, and more recently swapped the curvy dated light globes to a sleeker model
Phew. Inside COMPLETE! Let's head to the great outdoors! 

Biggest improvement? Um YES! Hands down yes. A million times YES. We had THE BEST time planning our outdoor oasis. Eric and his dad built the pergola themselves, we had the concrete poured and stamped, and then Eric built the flowerbeds. The hand-painted party table is still one of my obsessions, and you better believe it was put to use when we had the grand reveal.  

The building at the back of our yard is the recreational space, aka Man Cave. If you haven't noticed by now, we don't have a garage. So this became where we did a lot of the projects that involved extensive painting and drying, assembly, or anything that needed to be stored and didn't fit inside the house. It really was the selling factor when we originally walked through the house all those years ago. And although I hate the term "man cave"...it is super sweet. 

I can't even begin to link everything that's in this space. A lot of Craigslist, garage sales, and antique mall trips helped deck out this space. The lights we found at Open Box Outlet and they were an incredible deal, and the barstools came from Bargains and Buyouts. If you've never been to either of those places, do yourself a favor and head down there this weekend. Crazy fun. 
Everyone still with me? Good! Because we're finished! 

Congratulations! You made it through our final, and probably most detailed, house tour!!! I hope you enjoyed this little peek into our home as much as we enjoyed living in and making it our own. SO MUCH LOVE went into each and every room. As we were searching for our next house, finding something that wasn't too finished was important. We really wanted a space we could put our own unique stamp on. Lucky for us the new place is literally a blank canvas! It's currently so boring, which is awesome, and I am ITCHING to start designing each room and start sharing my ideas with you all. 

Until then, I'm going to leave you with a slew of oh-so-satisfying before and afters. Enjoy! 


Check out all of our home improvements, by visiting the OUR NEST page.