So I told you I’m new to WordPress, right?

Well, many of you read my first blog post. And it was long. Really long. And guess what? I managed to somehow write over it with my second blog post. I still don’t really know what I did, but I did it and now I can’t figure out how to find it again. So, I’m left with the reality that I need to rewrite the first blog. Why? Because some of you didn’t get to read that masterpiece and see my vision for our house.

Let me tell you a little bit about my vision for the house. I’ll run you through it space by space. It’s a fluid vision and we’re already having to adapt a few things based on what we are finding behind walls, etc. We have the basic plan and are moving forward accordingly!

I’ll start with the outside of the house. Teaser here that progress has already been made on it, but you’ll have to wait until my next post to see it.

It’s a very pretty color of gray and has an almost-new tin roof on it. However, the color choices make the house look a little “squatty” and don’t really emphasize its charm. My vision for the house is to widen up the stairs to the porch (in progress right now), paint the exterior and railings white with black trim around the windows and gray paint for the steps and deck floor. Additionally, we will change out the old and somewhat tired front door and replace the front light fixtures (happening very soon). We’ve already given all of the bushes a really good trim, which made a huge difference. So here is my vision board for the front to give you a better idea of what it will look like.

Now let’s move on to the front hall. It seems like something you wouldn’t ordinarily focus on but it’s important to talk about. It’s long and narrow – about 3 1/2 feet wide and about 14 feet long. There is a door to the guest bath and a door to a hall closet but otherwise nothing to break up that long hall.

My plans for the hall are to replace the light fixture which hangs down with 1 or 2 recessed cans, add board and batten trim to dress it up a bit, and add some interesting artwork (which I already have, thanks to my artist friend Linda!). Oh – and change out that front door too.

Now let’s move on to the den. Today, once you walk down the hall to the den, you’re faced with a protruding bookshelf, potbelly stove and hearth setup which blocks the amazing view. Once you get into the den, though, you see the amazing view and a large room which has beautiful hardwood floors and picture windows throughout.

• 

• 

• 

See how the potbelly stove protrudes quite a bit out into the room? I’m shocked that my mom and I haven’t tripped over it yet, because we Lamson ladies have a tendency to be a bit … shall we say … clumsy? Plus, it takes up a LOT of square footage. Picture it gone. Because it will be soon and I mean REAL soon! Like this weekend! Woo hoo! Notice you also can’t see past it into the kitchen. That’s about to be a part of the past. My vision for the room is to remove all of that and open up the stairwell to the basement, which we’ll get to in a moment. Keith & I are not huge potbelly stove people, but we do want a fireplace. We struggled with it as Keith really wanted to build a real fireplace with a real chimney, etc. Given that we are on a budget and we are trying to be smart with this project and do as much as we can on our own, we’ve settled on putting in a direct vent gas (propane) fireplace in between the two windows on the side of the room (see pictures above). Speaking of that wall, we’ll also be removing the door there and drywalling over it. We’ll wait until all demo in the house is done before we do that, as it’s a great way for us to throw things into the dumpster which will be placed right below it!

Now on to that stairwell. It bisects the house and was really a design challenge for me when we decided to buy the house. It’s smack dab in the middle of the house, cutting the kitchen and den off from each other, and it opens right into the slider doors to the deck. We talked about moving it but that’s a HUGE expense. But one good thing about the house is that the walls in the middle of the house are not load-bearing, so removing everything won’t be an issue. But who wants a stairwell heading down to a basement in their house? Not me.

• 

• 

Code is to have a 42″ knee wall surrounding a stairwell. But how do I hide it, you ask? Well, on the den side I’m going to make the wall be a bookshelf and on the kitchen side a banquette.

The kitchen is on hold until our “shelter in place” is over and Ikea opens back up. However we’ll hopefully have the rest of the place in pretty good shape by the time that happens. The kitchen is currently small and not laid out particularly well, but has 3 pantries/closets for it. Yep, you read that right – 3 pantries/closets. We’ll be ditching all of them and using cabinetry to replace them. The true “pantry” is part of the middle of the house which will be demoed this weekend and then there’s a utility closet and another closet which I can’t quite figure out what it’s for? Maybe a coat closet? Regardless, those will be demoed when we demo the kitchen. By demoing the true pantry and the laundry closet which is behind it, we’ll be able to put a beautiful French antique table in front of the banquette we’ll be building.

• 

• 

• 

I mentioned Ikea. We love the Ikea cabinets. They’re smart, inexpensive and well-built. I designed my aunt and uncle’s kitchen a couple of years ago and we went with Ikea and it turned out awesome. We plan to rip out all of the kitchen as well as the extra closet and pantry and make it all a large U shaped kitchen with an island. If we were to go with custom cabinets or even something from Lowes or Home Depot, we’d spend a small fortune, as the kitchen will be 17′ wide by 11′ deep. So Ikea it is. The only thing we’ll do different is that we will build our own fronts to them. I got a commercial paint sprayer for Christmas and I cannot wait to use it for them. It will be significantly cheaper for us to make the fronts ourselves plus I think they’ll look better. We’ll make them shaker-style so they won’t be hard to make.

There are two bedrooms and two bathrooms in the house. Again, eventually we’ll finish the basement and put in at least 1 more bedroom and bath down there, but for now we are working with what we have. The bathrooms have both had their tile replaced and nice showers put in. We’re still deciding what to do with the guest bath as the shower is very tight, so that’s in flux a little bit. Both could use new vanities and the master bath already has a new one put in. I’ll share more in a future post about that.

• 

• 

• 

• 

Again, for now we’re leaving the guest bath as is but hopefully in the fairly near future we’ll be able to make a larger shower by moving the toilet to the opposite side of the bathroom and make a smaller vanity. The master bath is already a work in progress. Here’s the vision but stay tuned for an update on it hopefully within a week or two when we wrap it up.

There are a lot more things to share, but I’ll save those for another time. I hope you enjoyed learning a little more about our project.