Two months ago we closed on our new home. While we loved our first home, we knew it was not where we were meant to be and our hearts were being tugged in a new direction. We made the decision to sell our first home, a two-year old new build house, for something older that needed a bit of love.
As soon as we stepped foot in our new house we knew it was home. We were able to get past the dated cosmetic finishes and see all of the potential this house had to truly be our dream home. We were confident this was our future house and we quickly put in an offer. We found out the next day the house was ours, pending inspections and all of the other fun home buying steps. It happened so quickly it didn’t seem real. Now that we have had time to let it sink in we have a full appreciation for how lucky we are to call this place home.
Above is the view from the living room looking back into the entryway. We have heard from our new neighbors the house was once covered in wallpaper (except the living room, which has wood paneling). Thankfully the interior of the house was painted before we purchased it.
To the left of the entry is the dining room, with an enormous paneled window that I absolutely love. Hello natural light!
To the right of the entry is the office, with its own fireplace! A real wood-burning fireplace at that. This room is a tad small for a real wood-burning fireplace, so we plan to convert it to gas in the future.
Between the entry and living room is a catwalk open to the upstairs hallway. The banisters and spindles will be replaced for both safety and design. I can stick my whole head through the spindles! Definitely not safe for dogs, kids, or curious grown-ups for that matter. Plus we would like the stairway to feel more updated since it is such a focal point in the house.
Through the entry is the living room. There is a whole lot of gray-ish paneling and brick for one room, but we love the windows flanking the fireplace and the cathedral ceilings. We plan to brighten the space up by painting the paneling a lighter color.
We love that brick fireplace. I am excited to see how it looks once the paneling is lighter. I think the room will be much brighter without the brown on gray vibe it has going on now. Many people have said they love the color of the paneling and that we would be crazy to paint it, but we know we would prefer a room that is a bit brighter.
The master bedroom is much larger than we are used to. I may even have room for the reading nook I have always wanted. If you look closely you can see we already started to lift the carpet up. We can hardly wait until it is all gone and we have hardwoods throughout the main level! Yes, our master bedroom is on the main level, which I love.
Our kitchen has an extra wide sliding glass door and a very large window over the sink. Those two windows alone nearly sold me on the house. I know this kitchen can be the kitchen of our dreams with a little attention. Bonus that the laundry room/extra pantry space is right off the kitchen, which is an added convenience I didn’t realize how much I would love.
There is carpet in every room except the bathrooms, entry, and kitchen area. Multi-colored carpet, I might add. Each bedroom has it’s own color of carpet. I still can’t wrap my mind around why this was popular once upon a time. Maybe it’s because I am most definitely partial to hardwoods over carpet.
This backyard is everything we wanted. We plan to expand the patio even more to make room for a fire pit and a larger outdoor dining area. This may be the part of the whole house I am most excited about. We love to have our family and friends over, especially for nice nights on the patio.
There is so much we love about our new home while at the same time there are many things we want to do. So many projects on our do to list that it is often overwhelming, but we feel complete joy in our new house just the way it is.
I would love for you to follow along with our journey as we turn this house into our dream home!
