I need to go back a bit for this to make sense....
For starters, we have been looking for about 6 months for a fixer-upper of a home. Lots of you may think this is a crazy idea....why buy a fixer-upper when you can buy something updated in a similar price range? Well, the answer is this: I don't usually like the looks up updated homes...or I like parts of them, but not all of them. First off, it seems that most newly installed kitchens come in dark brown to black wood colours. Don't get me wrong, they can be beautiful! However, I am personally a white-kitchen fanatic and would have a serious moral dilemma ripping out a brand new dark-wood kitchen, or even repainting it, to have my white kitchen. Or, there are things that are too "modern", and that will need replacing in the next 5-10 years simply because they will become dated. I'm more a fan of classic style in the home... style that only needs new throw pillows and maybe a fresh coat of paint to stay trendy. The stuff that you can find in a home magazine from the early 90's and still love. (Like white kitchens, for example!)
Six months ago, we did find this home, with a gorgeous lot and a pool, and way above our price range. We put in the offer, crossed our fingers...and lost to someone with a higher bid. We were devastated. However, everyone we talked to reassured us that they, too, had been through a similar experience, only to find an even better home down the road. So, the (not-so-serious) search continued.
Anyway, on weekends Joe and I have taken up the new past-time of going to open houses around town in areas we would like to live. Last weekend, we went to an open house at a story and a half home with a large yard. Let me tell you...the inside was horrendous! Thick wool carpets, wall paper in almost every room, panelling, floral curtains...the list goes on! There is almost no space that I would be able to live with unchanged. So obviously, we fell in love! We couldn't ignore the fact that the bones of the house seem almost flawless, with a double garage, endless storage, 3 bathrooms and a finished basement, on top of having 3 fireplaces! We actually went back to the same house an hour later to walk through again.
To make it clear, we have (had) no current plans of moving/selling our place. But...we were in complete agreement that this house could be "the one". We could picture ourselves turning this house into our dream home and raising a family there. We couldn't fight the urge, and decided to pursue this house.
Currently, we have gone back and forth and are waiting on what we hope will be the final offer. We shall see...we're very excited/nervous. If we get this house, there will be MANY more stories about renos/redos/decorating. My fave!
So, back to where this post was meant to go...this weekend.
This weekend we have done a complete clean up/de-clutter/organization/fix-up of our house, in case we need to put it up for sale this week. We've packed a bunch of our extra furniture over to my dad's for storage, organized our entire (messy disastrous) basement, dusted every nook and cranny, re-grouted the kitchen tiles, and painted the floors in our parlour.
The floors of our parlour were great when we moved in, but on moving day my sister slid a couch across the floor and with it went the paint. This was just the beginning, and there wasn't a square inch of un-scratched surface by this fall. It looked like this:
So, we went out to Home Hardware and bought a can of a richer brown floor paint to cover this problem. It looked really nice when it was still shiny and wet!
We put on the fans and with the dryness from our furnace, it was dry by 24 hours later! We may regret having put the furniture down so quickly, but there was cleaning to be done! And here is the finished product. Beau (the cat) likes it, too!
I will keep you posted on the progress of our dream fixer-upper :)
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