Before & After: Our House

Our House

I was thinking the other day how much I love a great before & after. And as I was cleaning up some of the files on my computer, I found a lovely little gem: the online tour of our house from about a year before we bought it that I had saved to my hard drive. We bought our house from a friend of my sister. This friend, Kristine, was a house flipper DE-LUXE. I mean, the girl has mad style and an amazing vision. Amy had called me and said, “You have GOT to see this next house that Kristine is doing. It is going to be fab, AND they’re going to sell it.” The majority of the houses that Kristine flipped were million dollar homes, and well worth it. We knew she had excellent taste, but the difference in this house was that it was in a more reasonably-priced (for us) neighborhood. So my interest was definitely piqued.

I first saw the house in February of 2008, in the dark, led by a flashlight. It was stripped down to drywall, but knowing the previous projects she’d completed, I had a pretty good idea of what it was going to look like. So once we moved in, I really had very little to do to this house, unlike our previous home that needed a lot of work.  All we’ve done is paint here, unlike new floors, new lighting, etc., that our old house required.

But I’m really amazed at people who can walk into a space and envision how they will totally change it. To be fair, had we seen the house for sale as it was before Kristine had her way with it, we probably would’ve thought, “Ok, we can make it work and do something with this.”  So here you go — a before & after.

Pretty! But slightly different than today. Two dormer windows were added to the roofline (our bonus room).

Formal living room. The original owner really liked pale blue. EVERYTHING was blue.

The dining room.

The kitchen. TOTALLY different!

When we bought it:

The breakfast nook.

The family room. Check out the original wood around the fireplace.  And the delightful TV encased in wood paneling.  Niiice.

Maybe one of the  biggest changes was the removal of the wall between the family room and the kitchen. That was one of the things I loved about this space. I could envision us all hanging out in here while making supper.

The master bedroom. Again with the blue.

And finally, the upstairs bath before:

And after —

How about you? Do you like redoing a space just the way you envision it or do you want to move in and live in it as-is?

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with love,
Rachel

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