that70shouse

We have been keeping plenty busy. There is so much prep work, stuff to buy, and small things to mess with before you can really get going on a project. Sometimes that’s frustrating…but we are trucking along.

First things first, our Master Bedroom. We decided we were going to finish this room before moving in.

Sometimes it’s hard to really show the size of a room, but this is a MUCH larger space than we are accustomed to. If you count the closet and bathroom, this space is about half the square footage of our tiny current home. :)

Another view.

I am so happy to have a half bath attached to our room. So, so happy.

We also love the giant closet, even with the 100 screw and nail holes.

Jono and Levi spent a considerable amount of time filling in so.many.holes.

On a whim I thought it would be an awesome idea to get rid of the popcorn ceiling while we were updating everything else. That whim cost Jono and I about 12 hours of our life.

We started out by spraying down the space we would be working on. Throughout the process we learned that there seems to be a fine line between not enough water, and too much. You live, you learn.While scraping we tried to be careful to not cut into the paper of the sheetrock underneath. This proved sometimes impossible.Once it was scraped, though, we knew it had been worth the effort. So happy to see that popcorn gone!

Once that was done, the Hubs had to putty all the holes and scratches we created while scraping.

Then came the sanding. Not fun. So dirty.

This is just an example of how much this man loves me. He knows how much I want to document e v e r y t h i n g. So even though I was actually gone, not being helpful at all for the following steps, he had the camera on a timer to capture some of the process. What a guy.

He wanted to replace the popcorn ceiling with a knockdown ceiling, which is perhaps the most messy thing you can possibly do to a room. So he covered everything first.

Next came spraying the gunk (technical term) all over.

Then he smoothed it out a bit.

All that was left, after it dried, was to slap a couple of coats of white paint up there.

At this point I was pretty much ready to be done. It took over a week of working evenings after work to make this happen, but I am so pleased to say that as of this morning, the ceiling is done!

Several weeks ago the husband and I got a call from our Realtor, informing us of an open house that we might be interested in. That Sunday, we walked through a house that had pretty much everything we were looking for and more. There were only two catches:

1) The house was being sold, at auction, in just 4 days

2) It hadn’t been updated since it was built in 1971

We spent the next four days doing research, pouring over the numbers, setting up an inspection, generally freaking out, and praying quite fervently that this wasn’t a huge mistake. :)

Thursday came and that husband of mine whipped out the most fantastic poker face you’ve ever seen and bid on that house, and darned if we didn’t get it.

So here we are, 1 week out from our closing date, and making some serious plans on what to tackle first.

I started this blog for a number of reasons. The most important to me is that we document the blood, sweat, tears, and love that we pour into this house so we can look back and see how far we took it. There will be tons of before, during, during, during, during, and (hopefully sooner than later) after pictures. I also hope that my family and friends who don’t live near us can enjoy seeing our home transformed. Beyond that, there will be pleas for advice, ideas, and inspiration from anyone willing to follow along.

This blog will probably often show us walking a precarious line between finding the cheapest ways to remodel, and getting an end result that we will be happy with for decades to come.

Don’t worry, though. I wouldn’t make you read all that without a single picture. :) Below is a picture of the front of the house, as well as some of our completely fantastic backyard. These pictures really don’t even do it justice. I’m in love!