Before and After

It has been a crazy four months as we've been redoing all the stuff in our house that "everyone" told us we needed to do in order to sell it.  So here we have the next set of before and after pictures, as well as a list of what has been done to each area.  (In the interest of full disclosure, there are currently 75 boxes packed up in our garage to make the house look more spacious as we prepped for moving.  It's working.  That stuff may never make it back in the house and may instead go directly to Goodwill.  The walls are mostly bare at the moment as we try to decide what makes the cut for going back up.)

DINING ROOM:
- All furniture & junk was either moved or gotten rid of.
- Bought a beautiful dining room set off Craigslist
- Replaced the carpet

June 2010:

May 2012:

LIVING ROOM: 

- Rearranged and decluttered

- Drywall cracks repaired

- Repainted

- Carpet replaced

June 2010:

May 2012:

KITCHEN:
- Replaced microwave, dishwasher, vent hood, and garbage disposal as each of those things broke in the past two years
- Replaced the countertops, backsplash, sink, and faucet
- Removed wallpaper and had walls textured & painted

June 2010:

May 2012:

June 2010:

May 2012:

BREAKFAST AREA:
- Removed wallpaper and had walls textured & repainted

June 2010:

May 2012:

LAUNDRY ROOM:
- Decluttered and repainted
- Made the area behind the door into a hang-dry area

June 2010:

May 2012:

SUNROOM:
- Changed it from a junk-collecting, pseudo-"hobby" room into the big kids' playroom.  Final arrangement of furniture is still being determined.

June 2010:

May 2012:

June 2010:

May 2012:

LIBRARY:
- Removed all the big kids' toys and left only the baby's
- Got rid of a TON of stuff
- Replaced the carpet

June 2010:

May 2012:

June 2010:

May 2012:

HALL BATHROOM
- Damaged drywall removed & replaced
- Replaced shower surround, plumbing, and shower fixtures
- Replaced the toilet
- Replaced the flooring
- New sink fixture, cabinet handles, and towel/TP holders
- Repainted

June 2010:

May 2012:

June 2010:

May 2012:

THE BOYS' ROOM:
- New furniture
- Water softener removed from closet & all holes patched up
- Drywall cracks repaired
- New carpet

June 2010:

May 2012:

DD'S ROOM:
- Water-damaged ceiling repaired & repainted
- New carpet

June 2010:

May 2012:

MASTER BEDROOM:
- Repaired ant damage to drywall at ceiling and baseboards
- Repaired drywall cracks from foundation work
- Ceiling texture repaired and ceiling repainted
- Repainted
- New carpet

June 2010:

May 2012:

MASTER BATHROOM:
- New tub, shower surround, plumbing, and shower fixtures
- New countertops & faucets
- Cabinets repainted & handles replaced
- New ceiling texture
- All lighting replaced
- Ant damage in my closet repaired & closet repainted

June 2010:

May 2012:

June 2010:

May 2012:

EXTERIOR:  I didn't take any pictures, but we did do a bunch there too.
- Foundation piers put in
- Front sprinkler zones repaired - twice
- Front and back doors restained
- Backyard path redone
- Some garden space taken out to make more room for playing

All of this was done with the intention of selling the house and moving to our forever house.  Now?  We love it.  I can't stomach starting all over again.  I think we're staying.

The Difference a Year (and a half) Makes!

Obviously, I haven't been keeping up with this blog. But I ran across it in my bookmarks list the other day and was amazed at how much progress has been made in the last year and a half. So I went through the house and took some current pictures to share here.

EXTERIOR:
The dead areas are almost completely regrown and the bushes have been tamed down somewhat. Still some work to go. Eventually, I'd love to get more perennials in.

June 2010
December 2011: (The grass isn't very green-looking since it's going into winter hibernation)

ENTRYWAY: No real change, so no current picture.

DINING ROOM: We bought a gorgeous dining room set on Craigslist and all the furniture/junk that was in this room got moved to other rooms or gotten rid of.

June 2010:
December 2011:

LIVING ROOM: Rearranged using Peter Walsh's idea of creating different zones for the room's different functions. The room now has zones for relaxing/entertainment, household management, and a "take-off" zone for shoes, backpacks, and keys (and, at the moment, a Christmas zone).

June 2010:
December 2011:

KITCHEN: A work-in-progress. We have replaced the dishwasher, vent hood, and garbage disposal as each of those failed this past year. I'm also in the process of stripping the wallpaper so it can be painted a nice, neutral color. New counters and backsplash are still on the list.

June 2010:
December 2011:

BREAKFAST AREA: Working on the wallpaper in here also. (Note addition of cute baby, too, LOL!)
June 2010:
December 2011:

LAUNDRY ROOM: Decluttered and repainted. It is amazing how much more calming this room is now!

June 2010:
December 2011:

SUNROOM: This room was basically a storage/getting organized room. We moved the kids' toys in here and made it a playroom. They love it and it makes much better use of our space.

June 2010:
December 2011:
June 2010:
December 2011:

LIBRARY: This room used to be the playroom, but the kids would only play right in the doorway. When we moved the toys, this room became a living area that was never used. So when the oldest and the baby had problems sharing a room, we made part of this room into a baby room. Still trying to figure out what to do with the room long-term.

June 2010:

December 2011:

HALL BATHROOM: This room has been totally redone. It has a new toilet, shower tile, shower & sink fixtures, paint, floor tile, and even some new drywall & floorboards. Thank you, ant damage.

June 2010:
December 2011:
June 2010:
December 2011:

DS's ROOM: Thanks to a generous Christmas gift from my parents, DS got a new set of bedroom furniture and the furniture he was using went to DD, which is where we intended it to go from the start. We had the water softener in his closet removed so now the whole closet can be used.

June 2010:
December 2011:

DD's ROOM: She went from the crib to the toddler bed to the big-girl bed in this time period, and we got to pass the changing table along to the baby. The damaged area of her ceiling was repaired and the whole ceiling repainted.

June 2010:
December 2011:

MASTER BEDROOM: It looks just the same, so here's the before picture....
...but we had to pay about $500 for the privilege of making it look exactly the same, thanks to ants eating the drywall and the baseboards, and the popcorn ceiling texture falling off in chunks.
(Picture that top layer breaking off around half of the room and that's what we had to have fixed.)

MASTER BATHROOM: This one has gone from bad to worse. The cabinets have been repainted and new hardware put on, but the shower no longer functions and it's just waiting for when we save up enough for a full redo.

June 2010:
December 2011:
June 2010:
December 2011:
(You probably can't see it, but the knobs are gone since they don't function anymore. The tiles are only held in by the pressure from each other, as ants have eaten the backerboard. And yes, my DH thought it would be funny to hang his high-school-Physics-project Christmas mobile from the showerhead.)

And here is the most important change of the last 18 months:

That's it! And the best thing is we have done all this zero debt, and zero raiding of our emergency fund. I can't wait to see what the house looks like in another year or so!