And a PS:

That piece of paper is really, really helping me to envision what our home will be like. And when I start to think about evenings spent with the dog on the couch, watching our Adult Swim favorites and smelling that new flooring/fresh paint smell throughout the place - maybe taking a time out for a bath in a lovely tub surrounded by soft lighting and sleek tile . . . cooking dinner and talking while Nate sits on a stool at the kitchen island - when I can actually picture these things, I get really happy and excited.
So, yeah, this location is a little farther out than I ever thought we'd be living, but as long as I have him and our puppy out there with me, life will be good.

Blueishprints

I was bored today for the first time in ages. Ended up watching Helvetica and taking a nap. Not the worst way to spend an afternoon, but tomorrow I need to get going on something or else I'll feel pretty blah.

This is the floorplan my mom came up with:




It's fairly similar to the current structural layout - we'd be knocking down a large part of the wall that currently separates the living room and kitchen/den areas, walling up a doorway that exists where the future dining room would be, and creating a foyer by putting a half wall near the front door. And then the kitchen would be demolished and a new one installed in a completely different configuration.
The existing dining room is in what would be our TV area in the living room. That gets moved to the area where the current den is, next to the kitchen.

The future office is in the first current bedroom, and there are two more that extend past Mom's drawing - one on either side of that hallway.
The next structural dilemma would be deciding how to split them up/shave them down so we have a master that's spacious and a master bath that's ALSO spacious (the current one is essentially just a shower stall and toilet) while retaining 3 bedrooms on the main level. Knocking out closets for more square footage and installing wardrobes (with molding and drywall so they look built-in) is probably going to be the solution.
But right now we're too overwhelmed by the main living space to think about it.

Nate's best friend's dad is a part time contractor, and he's going to meet with us on Friday afternoon to take a look at the place and help us figure out what can be done and what would be inordinately expensive. I'm just praying like hell that I can have a big bathroom.
Cross them fingers.

DIY silhouettes

On Sunday my folks came over to see the house and after 1.5 trips out there (someone forgot the key, but I'm not naming names), Mom came up with a plan for the layout of the kitchen and living room. I'll post a picture later, but first I wanted to tuck this little gem in here.





DIY silhouette art

DIYideas.com provides templates for the silhouettes pictured above, but you could easily personalize things by taking a picture of yourself, your better half, your dog, whatever, and creating a stencil in Photoshop. That's my plan, anyway.

"Create your own dramatic shadow art with black art paper and mat board. Here’s how:

Click on the illustrations and each will appear in its own window. Print, and use a photocopier to enlarge the illustrations to the desired size. Tape the image to heavy black art paper and use a crafts knife to cut through both layers, protecting your work surface with a self-healing mat. Use spray adhesive to adhere the silhouette to white mat board, then frame the finished piece."

Sweet.

Gorgeous kitchen renovation

http://www.designspongeonline.com/2009/07/before-after-a-tale-of-2-kitchens-a-bath.html#more-26386

Design*Sponge is one of my favorite ways to waste vast amounts of time.

"maria of vintage simple said it took about four months worth of weekends (and a whole week in december during the holidays) to get her kitchen where she wanted it. she ripped out “hideous” tile countertops and replaced them with ikea butcher block counters, took out the lower cabinets and put in place unfinished, off-the-rack oak cabinets from lowe’s (which they painted and distressed), put in a new farmhouse sink (ebay), faucet (ditto), and appliances (craigslist, friend’s cast-off, lowe’s). whew! for the upper cabinets, maria took out a couple of doors and added period details with moldings, brackets and trim, then covered some of the remaining glass doors with pretty fabric and painted the fronts of a couple of solid doors with chalkboard paint. then they added beadboard all around and put up vintage tin tile for the backsplash and as a detail on the vent hood over the stove. in the unused space next to the fridge wall, they made a built-in bench and hung a vintage chandelier (but painted it blue-gray) and an old beveled mirror, and bought a round table from ikea (”some day, I hope to be able to afford a Saarinen one, but for now, docksta will have to do…”). the result is really gorgeous and i’m so impressed with all of maria’s hard work. great job!!"

This kitchen is attainable and affordable. Smells like holy grail around here.

Walter.

This is who we're creating the backyard for.
He's a little bigger now, but he am my baby still.

Kitchen ideas

Andrea and I went to Ikea today to get ideas for the house, because we've been feeling pretty overwhelmed with this huge project we're starting. Thankfully, we came away with a lot of really good ideas. I'm posting this mostly as a way to organize our thoughts because we looked at a million kitchen and storage and lighting combinations and it's hard to sort through it all.

We really love the Liatorp entertainment center for the living room. We were going to knock out an entire wall separating two rooms, but with a center like this we could leave a section of wall that's the same width as the Liatorp (which is approximately 132", or 11 feet) . Our 46" TV would be perfect for this spot and if we're doing work on the wall we could also hide all the wires. It might also save us some money - we'd be trying to shave down a load-bearing wall, so the more that's left standing, the less expensive the structural work would be.



We really liked the built-in molding and recessed lighting. I think it would look pretty slick. The matching coffee table was pretty good-looking, too.

We spent most of our time looking at kitchen options, mainly because there are just so many ways to construct one. We might convert the whole den into a kitchen /eat-in area since it could feel too small otherwise. Andrea wants white cabinets since we're going for an airy beach bungalow feel, but we haven't decided on what color the countertops will be yet. We're either going to choose quartz or granite, and it may just come down to price. One kitchen stood out in particular - standard cabinet frames with a cottagey finish on the doors:



Definitely want some cabinets with glass fronts, they contribute to that open, airy look that Andrea wants so much.
Ikea has great organizational storage systems to fit their cabinets. Lazy susans and shelves that slide out into the room mean you never lose an item in the back of a cramped cupboard.
The drawer hardware is also really impressive. They have special hinges that shut slowly on their own even if you try to slam a door. Good stuff. Here's a couple cabinet/counter combinations we liked:



I prefer the black, she likes the lighter color. Although the lighter countertops might be more airy, I really like the contrast of the darker color. This could be similar to what we might be going for:



We both love the glass shelving. Backsplashes are gonna be a tough decision.

I was going to write about ideas we had for bedrooms, bathrooms and the office, but that can be saved for a later post. The kitchen is enough to think about on its own, and sorting through the 100+ pictures we took is a task in and of itself.

So we're going to do some more shopping around for kitchen inspiration, but the cool thing is that Ikea has a kitchen planner/measuring service that will come out and help you design your kitchen as well as measure what you need. Each respective service costs $99, but they subtract the cost from your final bill. I don't know what other cabinet designs cost because we haven't looked at them yet, but sturdy hardware/hinging is a big deal to me so hopefully they're all as good as what we've looked at. Ikea kitchens definitely give you a great balance between aesthetics and cost.

I guess for now we need to focus on getting the house empty, namely removing the furniture and gutting the kitchen. Hopefully that will happen soon because I'm pretty eager to start planning this in earnest - we need to get an idea of what the realistic budget will be.

First visit.

Nate and I went over to the house tonight for the first real look at what we're dealing with - I've seen it twice before then and never with the eyes I used this time.
It's full. It's so, so full of things. The first goal is to help his mama sort out what goes where, because seeing this place empty will help a whole lot in visualizing what we can do.

I saw an antique frame on the living room wall with a woman in a Victorian dress, and I want to keep that. Not sure where it'll go yet, but it'll have a place in the new place.

After walking through and taking millions of pictures, this is our list of thoughts to think:

*Complete restructuring of the kitchen and living room
*New appliances, tile, backsplash, hardware
*Replacing sliding glass door in living room with french doors
*Knocking down the wall separating the formal and casual living rooms
*Floors for the kitchen and living room
*Staining those floors and the original oak floors in the rest of the house
*Wallpaper everywhere has to come down
*Knocking down a wall to combine two bedrooms into a master
*Extending or creating a master bath
*Complete gutting of the existing bathrooms
*New tile and fixtures for bathrooms
*New fixtures for everything - ceiling fans, doors, etc
*Complete carpet removal
*Painting entire interior including basement
*New flooring for the basement
*Creating extra bedroom in basement
*Creating half bath in basement
*Recessed lighting throughout the house
*New doors throughout the house
*Exterior paint and new shutters
*Removal of exterior columns
*New and pretty exterior columns
*Clearing of all backyard brush/ivy
*Removal of a couple trees
*Removal of shrubs in front of the house
*Slate tile on the back patio
*Screening in back patio
*Walling in carport and creating a garage
*New fence
*Garden

Aaaaand that's not including furniture and decor.

We're using what would have been our down payment to renovate completely.
Our apartment lease is up in October.
We're calling a contractor tomorrow.

If we can do this, I can't imagine how proud we'll be.

The short version is the only version - for now.

This year's been eventful. That's the shortest version.

A slightly less short version would explain our house hunt, the fire that was lit under our asses by my father after his two hospital stays, the decision that was made after the 4th of July weekend, when Nate lost his grandmother.

But all I want to say at first is, this project is rooted in, centered around, based on, love. And since nothing has bloomed quite yet, we're a little scared. But what grows from here can never be too bad.

And our address is Pair Street.