Let me introduce you to our new house (and the most gigantic moving van which AJ was somehow allowed to drive without a special license, he credits his success not hitting anything to growing up driving farm equipment).
We’ve been living here for two days… I want to just put everything away immediately so it feels like home, even if it’s not in it’s forever spot. The kids are acting up and not like themselves so I just want to restore our life and family back to a stable spot… although I’m pretty sure that won’t happen right away. I remember this happening with Drew’s last big life change (Elle joining our family) and if it’s anything like that it’ll take a week or two to learn the new normal.
Let me introduce you to our home through the mudroom door you see down the stairs. When you come in you see a big open area, a built in desk, a huge coat closet, the door to the garage and a mini closet. There is no lack of stoarage in this home (let’s hope we don’t come close to accumulating the amount of stuff needed to fill it. :))
From the mudroom stairs you can walk down into the addition (we aren’t sure when it was put on). It is an incredibly long and somewhat skinny space that has incredible sunlight thanks to skylights and the entire back wall that is filled with sliders.
Let’s go up a step into the kitchen. I’m not sure when the kitchen was added, because it protrudes into the addition. The home is from 1966 and the kitchen feels like it could have been done sometime in the 1970s. I can’t praise the former owners enough, they took incredible care of their home. The cabinets might not be new but they are in excellent condition. They have the most incredible built in system that I’ve seen in a kitchen of this age, but I’ll share more of those details with you in another post.
We have two Jenn-Air appliances (the cooktop and oven) and a Bosch dishwasher, it will be fun working with higher end appliances (I’ll let you know if they really do work better! :)). We’ve already discovered the dishwasher is so much quieter than our former GE dishwasher. Notice all my food on the back cabinet area, we had a pantry in our first home so now I’m figuring out the best spaces for food in relation to where the utensils, dishes, etc should go. I’m on my second rearranging now. 🙂
My mom brought us over a giant vase full of hydrangeas to add a spark of beauty in an otherwise chaotic, box-filled house. Last night I had it with the kitchen looking like a dumping zone so my goal before bed was to clean everything up and make this area feel restful.
From the kitchen you walk into the entryway hallway that has the broom closet, the basement door and the half bath.
The wallpaper in the half bath is so unique, I’m not even sure how to describe it other than it’s an Asian Toile.
Also off the kitchen is the area they used as the dining room and what we will use as an office so we can comfortably have real estate clients over and shut the door.
From there let’s walk into the area the former owners used as the living room and that we are going to use as a dining room. For the past few years I’ve been dreaming of a dining room table that can seat 12. I think I’ve found the one I want on Pottery Barn but let’s just say I’ll need to use the office to do another real estate deal before that happens. 🙂 The other reason I really want to use this room as a dining room is because of the fireplace. Can’t you just picture a fire roaring while you have Thanksgiving dinner?
The former owners were so gracious and left us that couch. This room is currently a mystery to me as I figure out how to make our current six-seater table not look lost in this space.
From there you move into the family room. I think this area was also an addition. The there are four skylights so the light during the day is incredible. The walls and trim are a light pink. I hope you can see it in these photos but there are panels on the long wall, each of those offers additional storage. This has been fantastic for the kids toys!
The other side of the room has two amazing window seats with fabric that matches the wallpaper and pillows. The built-ins are currently sitting mostly empty but I’m so excited to start fooling around with different ideas I have for them. The two love seats you see below were also a gift from the former owners.
The entire downstairs of our first house was double the size of the pink room so it’s no surprise we were so thrilled when the owners wanted to leave some furniture to help us furnish what would have been bare rooms. There is one more space downstairs I haven’t show you yet. The other side of the back addition is the area we are planning on using for a kids playroom so that we can easily watch them when we are in the kitchen.
Let’s move upstairs. One of my favorite parts of this house is that as a general rule the owner used the most neutral paint colors (the only exception is the pink family room). Everything else is some form of sage or tan. While we figure out what colors go best with our furniture these colors are amazing and don’t clash with anything we have.
This is the room AJ and I are in:
Let’s walk down the hall to Drew’s room where I’m standing to take the photo below.
He chose this room primarily because there was a soccer ball in it when we looked at the house. 🙂 This bedroom is in the back of the house.
We gave Elle the bedroom in the front of the house next to Drew. She has a very small walk in closet that leads to the attic.
The bathroom is almost directly across from our bedroom door:
To get to the area we will rent out you will walk over the mudroom through a wall of closets and into the master suite:
To get to the full bath you walk down half a flight of stairs into the area that is half way in between the first and second floor.
I’ll keep you updated about the entire process of renting this out. Our goal is to make the space work for a renter now but not at all detract from us, or a potential future owner, using it as a master suite. I think we have a pretty good plan in place but it’s all tentative right now. Our reasoning behind renting it out is to make our mortgage payment be the same or less than it was in our first house and because we just don’t need this amount of space right now.
There you have it! Our complete house tour! We aren’t sure what we are planning on doing in each space but I see a dressier coastal style than we had in our first home while still feeling comfortable and inviting. Over the next few posts I’ll be sharing more of what the space looks like as we’ve gotten settled. It’s strange to have such a large space to work with after a relatively small first home. I’m excited for dinners and parties and space for the kids to just run (especially if we have an epic winter like we did in 2014 where it was miserable to go outside!).
What room are you most excited to see how we put our own spin on it?
I have been waiting for this post! I can’t wait to see what comes next!
So wonderful to have a playroom for your kids. And all the rooms have so much light! One comment – please remove the curtains ASAP (sorry, was that rude?) I can’t wait to see what you do with the family room first, then the kitchen.
BTW – Bosch dishwashers are wonderful – you will be spoiled now.
So happy for you!
I can’t wait to show you what’s next, Kim! You’re totally right, the rooms have ooddles of light. Our first house’s living room and front bedrooms were very dark so this is a welcome change.
CONGRATS! I’ve been checking in to see if you posted a tour yet, even though I can imagine it has been a crazy and emotional few days 🙂 I’m living vicariously- I was exactly in the same spot three years ago and it was fun to dream about all that I wanted to do (and a bit daunting!). I know that you will make it even more lovely, it’s a great canvas to begin with!
It has been the most incredibly emotional and crazy few days… I’ve been randomly crying at very inopportune times. 🙂 We finally got internet up and working yesterday, hence having to wait a few days for a post. 🙂
The house is awesome. You can tell the former owner took very good care of it. Looks spotless. I bet your excited to add your touches to it. If it were me I’d be losing sleep dreaming of what beautiful things I could do ! I’m sure once your over the exhaustion of moving , you will be nonstop dreaming up projects !
The former owners not only kept the house up beautifully but were so completely wonderful and gracious to us throughout the entire process. I’m recovering from the exhaustion of moving and am itching to finish unpacking!
So very exciting, Jen! The house has great potential and a lot of nice built-ins. I can’t wait to see what you do with all the rooms. I think the family room will intrigue me the most. Happy planning and good luck unpacking!
I was just telling AJ this morning my vision for the family room… I’m hoping I can make it happen sooner than later because I don’t think it’ll cost much at all! 🙂
I can’t wait to see the dining room. I’ve always wanted to switch our living room with the dining room so that I could have a very large table also. I can’t wait to see what you do with this house.
That might be the area I’m most excited about too, Fran! I’m soooo excited to have tons of friends and family gathering here! 🙂
Hey Girl- So happy for y’all!! Have fun and enjoy putting things where you want them! Love the house!
I’m already having a blast getting settled in… it’s so therapeutic each time a box is emptied! 🙂
Congrats on a gorgeous house! Can’t wait to see how you turn it into your own home. I’ve also moved recently and getting things settled into place made such a difference…now the fun of decorating can begin. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, having dinner in front of roaring fire would be heaven!
You are preaching to the choir, Amy. I totally get what you mean about needing to be settled before decorating. I can’t concentrate on the decorating when I have unemptied boxes. And just reading your comment about the roaring fire is getting me sooo excited! 🙂
Took me forever to read through the post. Massive….all the possibilities! Congrats! My goodness, your head must be spinning with what room to work on first! My thoughts about what should be worked right out of the gate is the kitchen area. Making that area home and comfortable would be my priority. In my house, that is where we all congregate when hosting a party (unless its summer then we are out on the deck!) From your pictures, its looks like you have fantastic space for having all over!
Good luck with everything and happiness to us who get to watch is come together!
Beth
It took me forever to write it… maybe someday I’ll try to do a video tour so you can get a feel for how it all flows. My head is spinning on what to do first… it won’t be the kitchen because of budget constraints but it may be getting a new rug for the pink living room and then the resulting painting based off the rug colors. I’m itching to get a roller on the walls… the space is so gorgeous in there and I’m loving the window seats so I think it’ll be a great project!
Congrats!!! Not sure who is more excited… Your readers or you guys??? Can’t wait to see what you do with this house! Good luck and looking forward to every post! Thanks for bringing us along for the ride
You’re great, Cathe. I cannot wait to share what I have in mind… of course, it could all change by next week. 🙂
Beautiful and unending possibilities! My first goal as a renter and now as a homeowner is to do the kitchen and eating area! Seems my Italian family always gathers in the kitchen/dining area regardless of the size house we’re in! My house is 1280 sf total so not huge by any means and yep, all in the kitchen! A cousin’s house was 5000+ sf and still all in the kitchen (except me … hey! they had a pool!) Since your business office is important in order to work with clients that may tie the kitchen for 1st place!
We’ve found the same thing, Guerrina. It does seem that no matter how big the kitchen is that is where people will gravitate. Our current thought is to take the entire back addition and make that into the kitchen because of the amazing light. Of course, completely changing things require money so it won’t happen right away but even though the kitchen is on the older side it is in amazing shape and sooo clean which makes waiting for an updated one a lot easier (compared to our first house which was in pretty rough shape and not very clean).
So happy for your family and can’t wait to see what you do. Kitchen first – especially that floor. 🙂 Would love to see the outside too. You have so much to show us and we’re all anxiously awaiting future posts.
I’ll show more of the outside in the next post. The interior post was getting too long already. 🙂
The kitchen will probably be something we wait about a year-ish or more for. We’ve heard it’s great to live in a space for a while to see what you love and don’t love about it (the way the sun comes in, the way the cabinets are laid out, etc). I’m already compiling a list to create the kitchen of our dreams. It’s funny though, the part I was saddest to leave about our first house was the kitchen (or the porch) but the amazing amount of cabinets and counter space here is making up for my sadness of no marble and white cabinets. 🙂
Love it! I hope you’ll show us what things look like when you’ve put all your things in, but before any projects. You have such gorgeous reveals when you’re all finished, but I also love seeing the ways that you adapt while you wait. 🙂
I love that you said this, Becky, because that’s exactly what I intend to do and I worried people would think everything was ugly and unfinished (which, of course, it will be unfinished) but it will give people a better jumping off point to see the direction we intend to head in.
I’m a new follower of your website and love your style, both in your decorating and your informative writing. Wish you the best in making your new house truly your own.
I’m thrilled to have you following along, Kim! 🙂
LOVE the new house! I can’t wait to see how you decorate it and make it your own. Congrats!
Thank you so much, Karmen! We are so excited to make it our own… it has such great bones!
Jen…SO happy for you all to move into this wonderful space. Can’t wait to see how you make it yours! Enjoy!
Looks great!! So many great rooms. I can’t wait to see what you guys do with the space – I know it will be great!
Congratulations! I can’t wait to see you make it your home! What a beautiful blank canvas!