Renovations have truly begun

Our family had planned on going to see Hubby's grandparents this weekend, but his mama got sick so we needed to call off the trip. Hubby had already planned on taking Friday off so we decided to use it to work on the house.
We have spent a while coming up with ideas to make our house more liveable for us. The two most important were #1: a more direct route for guests to get to the bathroom and #2: more storage space in the kitchen.
The current floor plan is

Our plans are


We cut out the new hall and got our supports put in this weekend.
Before (the hallway will be in the back right corner of this picture)

After


We also widened the existing door into the laundry room. I was a two foot door, which we thought was too narrow to be the only pathway to the bathroom.
Before

Halfway there

After


After such a long wait to get going on these projects, the little that is done is so very exciting for me.
We will work next weekend (it is lucky we have another long one) and I will stay there next week to try and get as much done as possible. We are hoping to get the floors refinished early in March.
Thank you for your support and encouragment!
Stay tuned for more pictures and updates.
Jenny <3

Life

Life has been.... well.... life!
Things are as crazy as ever, but we are getting closer to having a regular life.
I've been stressed a ton lately due to MESSY houses and boxes and suitcases up to my ears. The past few weeks have been interesting to say the least.
We found mold in the basement of the house we are renovating, we removed it and it wasn't as bad as we thought it was. Things were looking up.
On Friday when we went to get in bed, we found rodent droppings in our bed. After catching one of the critters, we have determinded that they are either shrews or moles. Either way, they are NOT welcome! So now we are working on getting rid of them. Hopefully it will be a short stay for them.

To help myself de-stress today and to try and get rid of some clutter, I found a project.
My maid-of-honor got us some beautiful champaign flutes for our wedding. I haven't been sure what to do with them since, so they have sat in a box in our basement.
We also had our unity candles from our wedding (two candle sticks and a pilar) that -have sat in a box since our wedding. The sticks somehow got deformed and the pilar turned yellow! I had no idea what to do with them since they are sentimental but looked gross.
So here is what I did!
- Cut up the candle sticks and reused the wicks
- Melted the wax from all 3 candles in a pot on the stove
- Poured them in the flutes
Super easy, but I love them!




Jenny <3

One Thing at a Time

For those of you that have been following, you will remember that a few months ago I purchased a few chairs to go with my dinning room table. This week I began refinishing them and I am getting more and more excited about them. I still have many coats and another chair to do, but I am on my way to a new dinning set.
Before



During



The after will come when I am done!
Jenny <3

Working on it

Things are coming together slowly.
We've decided that we need all new windows and siding, so we are waiting to figure out what those are going to cost before we go forward with the rest of the renos.
Since I needed something to do with my time, I started working more on the master bedroom.
I reupholstered a headboard and recovered a roller blind. I am really happy with how they turned out and I am looking forward to when we have all of our newly refinished furniture here to match.

Jenny <3

Waiting for time to pass

I've been working on small projects lately and trying to make life a little more routine.




I will try and get some pictures of more projects up soon.
Jenny <3

Kitchen

Two days of intense cleaning and the kitchen is ready to be demolished! Well, soon. For now it is nice and clean for us to live in when we'd like.
Before:



After:



Jenny <3

Colours... Colors? COLOURS!!

With the help of my mother and sister, I was able to pick out colours for the school house.
For our bedroom


For the kitchen


For the living room