One Year Later (with a small update!!)

It's hard to believe it's been a year since we signed for the house! (and by year, I really mean over a year because I've been bogged down with work and have been too lazy to post when I'm at home).

BUT, it's close enough

Look at how happy Ellie is as we enter for the first time as owners!

It's hard to believe we've been in this house a year. Sometimes I think we've gotten so far since we started scraping the wallpaper in our master bedroom and cleaned/primed the Hobbit Hole (no pictures up yet, I'm getting there). At other times, I think about the 6 other wallpapered rooms, and all the trim that is hung wrong/different colors/etc and feel entirely overwhelmed.

Yes, I wish we had money to throw at all these issues. But it's not an option, and we have to be careful in our decisions for what to toss money at and what has to be done ourselves. And ultimately, it's NICE to work on these things together, like gutting the super overgrown flower bed that's been haunting me since we moved in

Is that a garden bed or the jungle?

I did about half of the right side (where you now see mulch),
Ellie powered through the rest because she is an amazing rockstar

So, we need more mulch. A lot more

Looking at that now getting overgrown again because I haven't bought that mulch I was supposed to empty bed is SO heartening, and I'm already planning what I'll plant come next Spring. This bed is MINE, something I'm not sure I'd feel if someone else had done the grunt work. Once it gets cool again, I hope to dig up the bed near this one to re-plant the billion spring bulbs that I dug out & hopefully saved.

It Only Took 5 Months...

When we last saw our heroines, they had finally removed all the paper from the bedroom walls (well, most of it, I wouldn't take down any of the trim if I were you...) and were fixing all the damage from removing the paper.

It all started with learning how to spackle (thanks YouTube!!)

Then taping and priming

Finally, paint. The guy who helped us at ACE hardware was super kind and patient and was able to give us a ton of good advice--things we rarely get at the big box hardware stores. Be warned, the color we picked for the room is blue. A damn bright blue. Brighter than I think either of us expected.

"I'm super bad-ass with my teeny-tiny roller"

Ellie was attacked by Smurfs!!

I cut in, Ellie rolled; a system that mostly worked out.

A second coat should do the trick...

And finally, FINALLY, we are able to sleep in our own room:

First time using the comforter we got for our wedding!

Some things we learned from our first attempt at redoing a room:

• Sanding takes a lot more time than you anticipate. And it's really hard to make the wall smooth.
• Do not use tape that is the same color as your intended paint
• Two coats of paint make everything better
• Furniture really helps break up solid blocks of color
• Pick up the bits of wallpaper as soon as possible, because they will totally adhere to your hardwood floors

We're still trying to think of the best way to arrange the room--we have a baseboard heater along one long wall, an off-center window on a short wall, aren't quite sue how we'll eventually set up access to the closet on the other short wall, and neither of us seem keen on putting the bed on the wall that the door is on. We'll just keep moving furniture around until it feels right I guess.

Wait, We Have 6 More Rooms of This?

It's been forever since we gave a house update, hasn't it? Well, we've had some setbacks, but I think we're on track again. We better be, because I really want to sleep in my own bedroom rather than my future walk-in closet!

As you may remember, when we moved in, the bedroom looked something like this:

Baby blue flowers, how nice

And then we discovered this:

Why WOULDN'T there be Jungle wallpaper underneath?

And this:

Notice that under Layer 1? Blue stripes on the other 3 walls!

We're making progress, right?

But Ellie really busted her ass (I helped!!) and before long, we were finally here:

No monster can scare us away from finishing!

Paper-free!

Right now, Ellie is we're finishing up fixing all the damage to the drywall that came from inexperienced wallpaper removers working on wallpaper applied to unprepped walls. Honestly, I think we'd be well done with this room (the walls at any rate, I want to consult with someone who has a clue when we decide to tackle fixing/replacing the trim) if the walls had actually been prepped before the first layer of paper was applied. But our inexperience lead to what was probably too much research on how to properly correct the damage which, added to the other setbacks, just delayed everything.

Over/under on getting at least one layer of paint up by the end of the weekend?

The Problem With Pinterest

Screenshot of my "Home Sweet Home" Pinterest page

Anyone who knows me knows that I have a small love affair with Pinterest. The affair began while planning the wedding, and is growing as we are working on the house.

The problem lies in having too much of a good thing. EVERY style known to man (and woman) is available on Pinterest, from the oh-so-trendy shabby chic (pallets & mason jars anyone?) to the super modern (hello metal and straight lines!) to everything in between.

I have no idea how I want to decorate my house.

I know I'm not in a rush (dear Gods do I know that), and we're really just tackling one room at a time, but I still want flow throughout the house, and fear making the place look completely out of sync with itself because there are SO MANY cool ideas out there. Everything matters, from wall paint to the color of the trim to the hardware on doors and windows. Then you get into the unending cycles of "If I stain the trim in the bedroom to match the oak floor, should I just go ahead with that in the other oak rooms too? But I like a darker dining room, and that's only laminate right now (should we look into laying hard wood to match the other rooms?), so it's a different color floor anyway. And if I do stain, that means pulling everything down, which will be good for actually lining things up since nothing is aligned--wold it just be better to buy new rather than strip and re-stain; or should I just take the easy route and paint...can I get a color of pain that will look okay enough to make up for the absence of natural wood.

It goes on from there, and not just about trim, but curtains/shades/furniture/arranging decorations/wall color/hardware/etc. I'm not naive about this, I know for a FACT these cycles would be happening without Pinterest or Young House Love, or Apartment Therapy. but I know they are contributing factors because I'm getting ideas I never would have thought of on my own (seal and paint a tree branch as a curtain rod?! HELLS YES!), which increases the possibilities. It's beautiful and terrifying. I guess we'll see what happens, right?

It's the Little Things

Seriously, when we moved in, our basement den looked kind of like this:

Sorry for the quality, it was done a a cell phone

If you look closely in that back left corner, there is a ginormous desk the previous owners left (they offered, we accepted) plus a ton of our stuff all crammed in to allow for passage through the basement, which wasn't much, we still had to negotiate to access the pantry and craft room.

The other day, Ellie took apart that behemoth desk and we hauled it upstairs to it's permanent home in the guest room. She also worked some magic to create a semblance of what the den could look like once we have things like a couch and TV:

Same angle as the first picture above

Not a bad concept, huh? Obviously we'll have to do a bunch of measuring, and shopping, and will most likely re-arrange some stuff, but it makes me feel like things are coming together (unlike the bedroom, which is haunting and teasing me...more on that later though). I'm glad those pictures are a little dark though, because everything else in the basement is...shall we say...messy and piled up, and the crappy cell phone hides all that very nicely :D

The kitchen and pantry are also going well, they just don't make interesting before/after-type posts because it's just plates and glasses and small appliances and canned goods. Having a mostly-functioning kitchen (can't find those damn mixing bowls!) and what looks like a nice living area really make a difference, especially as these are 2 of the rooms I see the most.

What We've Been Up To

It's funny, I feel like we have both been working our asses off and accomplished nothing in the last week. Yes, we have officially lived in our house for a week! Sunday, June 23 was the first night sleeping there, and as of 8pm on Monday, all of our things were in the house. I have to admit to feeling a little nostalgic for the apartment. *cue Bare Naked Ladies*

As much as I loved it, and for all the memories we made there, we knew it was only temporary.

In the house, we can really set down roots and make the place ours. Even before closing, we knew that the master bedroom would be the first room to get a makeover. I'm not going to say that the wallpaper in there was ugly--honestly, for wallpaper, it wasn't half bad. But it is wallpaper, in a baby blue flower pattern with years worth of cigarette smoke. One of the first things we did the day of signing was make our first foray into home renovation and begin to peel wallpaper. We were treated to a little surprise:

Jungle print UNDER the blue!

But that's not all folks, the lovely jungle print was only relegated to a single wall. The other three wall had this lovely paper:

Slow and steady wins the race, right?

As of tomorrow it will be 2 weeks since we got the keys, and I have to say that Ellie has been a wallpaper removing machine. Saturday night when we showed off the house to a friend, I discovered that we were down to the last layer of glue on 2.5-ish (I use really technical measuring tools) walls (pictures coming, I need to upload them). We are fairly confident that the paper will be all gone and the skim coat will be applied by the end of the week at the latest. I think we'll be able to actually set up our bedroom next week! *fingers crossed*

There is a lot of work to be done still, and maybe someday I'll get around to creating a Master List (a la Sherry & John at Young House Love), but I'm so thankful the house IS in living condition, and that all the "issues" are cosmetic.

A New Focus

After the wedding and honeymoon, Ellie and I started to look for a house. It wasn't a speedy process as we had to contend with the winter, and finding houses that fit our desires AND was within our price range wasn't the easiest thing.

With the help of my friend Eric Rollo at Raveis Real Estate, and a lucky break on a "let's just hit up a bunch of Open Houses this weekend", we found our new home.

Picture saved from original listing at Raveis Real Estate.
This is technically the back of the house, but it's the main entrance.

Admittedly, we were not expecting a whole lot from the pictures (pics Pinned from the agent's webpage, our pictures will go up in full soon)--it looked nice enough, but we had difficulty grasping the layout, or wondering how all that fit into 1500 sq feet, and honestly, the kitchen needs love. But we went, and were impressed by just how much bigger it was than the pictures let on. I'll say it right now, when it comes to a house and yard, we are TOTAL size-queens, and not ashamed to admit it. The square-footage listed was not accurate, the almost-finished basement isn't included, and gives us a ton more room to work with. The yard is huge and wooded, but with enough open space to let us garden and build a deck.

I think what really sold me was seeing it the second time, with Eric in tow. Ellie & I had already begun talking about making it "ours", but discussing it with an outsider, someone who has seen a LOT more houses than we have, allowed us to--in a way--validate our thoughts. Eric has been very diplomatic through the whole process (a good thing!!), but also let us know if he thought something was particularly awesome or terrible.

It's funny that we've been unofficially shopping for a house for most of our relationship. After the wedding, we knew it was time, but took the time and energy to really look at many houses, both online and in person, because we want this to be our forever home--neither of us had the desire to get a starter home just to move in 5-ish years and start over. We want roots, and to really take our time to make this place OUR home rather than going into it knowing that it wouldn't be permanent. I think, if we' bought a starter home, neither of us would be as dedicated to improving and updating as we will be here--I feel Jelli-fying the house will be less half-assed because we'll be living with it forever. I know I would not be NEARLY as dedicated to some of the small things if I felt there was a possibility of leaving this place--I don't have that kind of drive or dedication.

I hope all our friends and family enjoy the ride as much as we will!