House Tour: //BEFORE//

I promise to come back with some more wide-angle images to show rooms better. But for now, here are a few images showing each room when we first got the place. Seems to not be so bad looking at the pictures. Too bad smell-o-vision still hasn't had its kinks all worked out!! The damp, musty, moth ball smell totally puts things into perspective!

//KITCHEN//

Left side of the kitchen. Windows face the front of the house.

Right side of kitchen. Windows face left side of the house from the road.

Kitchen built-in shelving. Facing the back of kitchen.

Looking into the kitchen from the back door.

Kitchen floor. Wowzers. There's hardwood under there!
Too bad it is covered in tar :( But look at the cute checkerboard linoleum!

//BATHROOM//

Pink & Gross... Hello? Pinterest, are you there?

Nasty light switches and lovely plastic "tile".

Fancy schmancy mirror and lights.

Another fancy light and gross ceiling vent. Also shows the old leaks.

Sheet laminate flooring. Gross. 'nuff said.

Another view of the vanity & sink.

//MASTER BEDROOM & FUTURE SITTING ROOM/CLOSET//

Looking into the back of the future Master Bedroom.

Side view of Master Bedroom. Windows look out onto left side of house.

Landing area. Will be future sitting area/Master dressing area.

//DINING ROOM//

Future Dining Room. Window looks out to right side of house.

The peeling ceilings.

View into front room. Closet cut off on right side.

The spooky ole closet under the stairs.

//FUTURE BUNK ROOM//

Door opens to right side of house. Old porch or sunroom?

Set of four windows looking out to front yard.

End window looks out to left side of house.

//LIVING ROOM//

Looking into Dining Room. Side Door to left.

Door into hallway. House is a big circle.

Window looks out to back yard. Nasty laminate everywhere.

//FUTURE CRAFT/SPARE ROOM//

Closet to left. Window looks to back yard.

//BASEMENT/CELLAR//

Window looks to left of house. Amazing old sink/shower area.

Rotten shelves to be replaced.

//OTHER AREAS//

Future linen closet/spare potty. Odd room!

Stairway from middle room in house.
(not pictured)

Door from hallway into middle room. (not pictured)
Used to be door to outside before addition in 70's.

Hope that gives you a good idea of our "canvas" that we will be working with! Home was built in the 20's with only 3 rooms, 4 including the landing area upstairs. In the 70's they added on what will be the living room, bathroom and spare/craft room & hallway. Can't wait to see this place take shape!! MORE IMAGES TO COME!

The Ones I Actually Got

I wanted these....

Or these.... (and I will have these suckers....one day...in bright red. no pink. no green?!?!)

But I got these instead.

And I dare you to tell me that a chick isn't hot in camo boots. Shooooooot! (in my best Mater voice) Either you are hot, lookin' smokin' hot,...or your hot, heat hot, in these suckers!!

Ok, so they aren't as stylish as the fancy colorful ones above, but at least I can hide from deer while I'm painting cabinets and sanding pallet wood! These are the "Fieldblazer" style Muck Boots for men. The were on-sale at Bass Pro Shop a few weeks back so we were all over them. Hubs even got a pair. They are hotter on him! like smokin' hot. He probably thinks the opposite. Men. 

I can't wait to try them out. Honestly it was too hot there for a while for me to even think about putting my sandal-lovin' toes in these babies but now that the arctic chill has swept through, I think I'll break them in this weekend! I'm excited!! Go get you some so we can be hot together, please?!

Making things difficult

Why I make things so difficult is beyond me. Seriously.

There are a few things I'm OCD over (like my sticky notes!) but for the most part....laundry goes unfolded, toys.are.everywhere, piles of unopened mail, half empty water bottles in the car (hey, you never know!)....that's me. It is what it is. Right now LIFE is so much more important. My kids will only be little once. I'll never get this time back being 30-something.

So WHY do I make things more difficult than they ought be?

So, before I even go any further with this blog, let me just clarify a few things:

1. The cute little blog frames. Gone. Done. Too much work!
2. Yes, I have a photography business, fancy equipment but NO I normally don't have it with me and even when I do, I still use my cellphone 98% of the time for taking pictures. And yes, most of my images are blurry and crazy but honestly, this blog is for fun. I'm going to keep it that way and NOT stress over the perfect blog pictures for now! And I'm refusing to feel bad about it. Got it, self? mmkay.
3. There will be no rhyme or reason to my posts. I will do them when I get the chance and hopefully I will figure out some sort of schedule later on. But for now, I'll be jumping all over the place with my posts. Sorry about that.
4. Well thought out posts - yeah that's tiring! 

Oh you didn't even notice the blog frames and you aren't seeing very clever posts? Yeah, chances are that's the case. And part of the reason for this stems from my business blog where I had to always be "on" for clients. Honestly, this post is for me and me only. Most people could care less. But it is off my chest and out there just in case someone wanted to judge me for being so totally "not together".

A famous man once said....“I am what I am, and that's all that I am.” He's so smart, that Popeye!

 

Do you see me? Yep, that's me, clinging on for dear life to life.

This blog will be fun and easy. No fuss. From here on out!

Family, Fungi and Floors....oh my!

Slowly but surely we are seeing changes around the house. For the most part, the hard work going on right now is stuff that will never be seen again. Poo!! Who wants to spend thousands of bucks on duct work? Just makes me shiver but, hey, hopefully my kids will breathe easier and the musty smells will be "gone like a freight train"!

In the meantime, we continue to scope out the land....and I continue to steal kisses....

Check out those studs! This house is SOLID! As for me. I'm a little less than solid these days. "Hey y'all!" But I'm sure proud of how hard we worked in the bathroom and were able to get most of the sheetrock removed, as well as the gross floor.

We are pretty sure that the previous owners held stock in floor glue (and nails!!). The stuff is EVERYWHERE and every bit of floor in this house is stuck like a tongue to a metal pole in the winter!!

  

Raise your hand if you've seen this flooring pattern before? Vintage? Yes! Cute? NO! Had to go. Like I said, everything in this house is gross and dirty. Plus, I have a really awesome plan for this little potty room!

Now, onto some other floor in the house. This is in the front room that will eventually be the boys' room. "Before pictures" to come after..???? I'll get to showing the entire house in its "Before" stage. Sorry, I'm getting ahead of myself!

 

 "Daddy Doc" came in from California to spend a relaxing week here in North Carolina. Little did he know that we don't mess around....we recruit good help when we see it. He didn't even know what he was getting himself into! Pffftt....jet lag or not, get to WORK!!! Ha!! And work he sure did! Look at this!

THANK YOU "DADDY DOC"!!! We hope you'll come back soon to work, I mean, visit!! :) 

Don't these floor boards have the most rustic, amazing "finish"? I wanted to keep them. The horizontal layout, the texture, the vintage, rustic farmhouse look. Sigh. You can't duplicate it! Unfortunately, these are the sub-floor boards and have one million nails. My sweet husband really tried to find a way to make these work, but really the work to get these useable just isn't worth it or cost effective. :( 

There's no way they could be sanded and the cracks are big enough we might could lose a kid.

Hey, wait...... 

then again...... 

Nah. 

I love those little boogers!

Too much mess, too much work. My little heart just had to give up on the dream of reclaiming them. But! We found some fancy laminate flooring that is fairly similar, darker, but has the worn look. It will be lovely!! Can't wait to give a sneak and reveal those suckers, but it will be a while, that is last on the list.

Hubby labored hard this day, bless his little heart. And knees. I am so proud of him. He's worked his patootie off getting this reno going. Maybe it is the toosh-slaps that I give for motivation!! ;)

 

Back on subject. Nasty floors.Seriously. This is GROSS. What IS that yellow stuff? I don't even want to know. ::shivers::

 

Oh looky! GLUE! Black, sticky glue. Everywhere. Again, another floor ruined. My hopes were to expose the concrete and resurface and stain it. No go. Not gonna happen. 

Guess I didn't give enough "toosh-slaps" to get that job done. 

This was tough work. I tried. I would chip off like 1/2" pieces at a time. Hubbs came in and was swinging that sledge hammer like a champ! I was impressed. 

 

This too is getting covered in secret flooring to be revealed later! You can find it on Lumber Liquidators but that's the only hint I'm giving. That, and it's kind-of brownish and pretty, AND it was ON SALE!! WHOOP!

 

And for some randomness, Fungi. We have mushrooms. Red ones, yellow ones, orange fluffy ones, big tall white ones and short tiny skinny ones. We could open a lovely little mushroom farm.

Or become drug dealers......

 

We aren't sure which ones to eat, share, or call the DEA for...... :D