Tuesday, July 10, 2012

UPDATESTRAVAGANZA

This is gonna be a big one, y'all. And I refuse to apologize for the amount of opinions, words and pictures that happen in this blog post.

1. First of all, I hate myself for watching the Bachelorette. But I really love myself, so it's a weird kind of conflict. I have to say I am truly shocked at her decision tonight. I mean, SEAN CHASED HER CAR EVERY TIME SHE LEFT. He obviously loved her.

But here's what bugs me about the show: Imagine you have just been anticipating a life-changing relationship commitment (perhaps, a marriage proposal?) and instead you find out that you will never see the person again. It is definitely a devastating moment.

Then imagine that you climb into a car to go home, and someone shoves a camera into your face and orders you to explain in great detail what emotions you're feeling right this instant. Needless to say, I always feel awkward watching that.

The good news is that I don't think Sean cried. Because lets face it: Nothing is more irritating than watching a grown man cry on television.

Random question: Has anyone else watched "The Glass House" that comes on after the Bachelorette? I have. But only because the remote was over there and I couldn't reach it. I feel like I the TV tricked me into watching. Literally one of the most blase shows I've ever accidentally watched.

WHO WILL EMILY CHOOSE NEXT WEEK? Only time (and Reality Steve) will tell!

2. Let's move on, shall we? The next update is about our house. I don't want to jinx anything or jump any guns (dangerous!) or what not, but we have accepted an offer! It's a great offer and the offer-ers seems to really love the house, which makes me feel better about having to sell it. Barring any crazy, unseen roadblocks, we will close at the end of the month. Perfect timing in the grand scheme.

3. Our master bedroom and bath are officially...OFFICIALLY...OFFICIALLY complete. And now I would like to share befores and afters of this labor of love. Irony is...finishing your dream master suite just in time to sell it. Or am I still kind of wrong about how to use irony? Ah, well.

I'll start with the bedroom!

Or should I say, bedrooms?

When we moved in, the upstairs had 4 bedrooms. They were all somewhat small, including the master bedroom. I don't really even have a very good photo of the master bedroom, but I'll go ahead and humor all you Nosy Nancies.

(This is the view from the original closet area.)


This is actually the old bathroom layout. The photo above this one (with all the mattresses) was taken as if you were standing between the two closets looking away from the bathroom.


And this was the guest room that eventually became part of our master suite. Before, the bedrooms were side by side and shared a wall in between respective closets. (Does that make sense?)
We knocked out the closet from our master bedroom and the closet from the guest room and ended up with one large space.

We also took the closets that were once at the entrance of the bathroom and decided to use that as additional bathroom space.

That left us with absolutely no closets, but we had an ace in the hole. (Is that ok to use there?) The ace in the hole being the room pictured below.

The previous owners had converted attic space into this little beaut. They had originally housed a teenage boy in it, but he had to walk through the blue/grey guest bedroom to get to it. It is now our huge walk-in closet.

These plans have been 3 years in the making, with actual labor dragging on for over a year and a half. It's great to be done, and it's sad to have to sell, but I'm glad that the potential buyers love it as much as we do.

Oh, you want to see the after pictures? Well, alright.

I didn't take any pictures from similar angles as before shots, sorry! But in my defense, there wasn't much to look at before. And also, I have a baby. (How long can I get away with the baby excuse before I have to have another one?)

View from the corner by MY side of the bed.
View of the sitting area from Kennedy's side/bathroom door. There was some strategery on which side of the bed I chose. You can see in the photo above our "sitting area". Or as we like to call it, "The most expensive laundry basket ever." (When we weren't forced to clean for house showings...)

Looking toward the bathroom.

The sleeping area.

Now let's be girls and go to the bathroom together.

Our (Kennedy's) masterpiece. FINALLY.

I'll save you the trouble of scrolling up so you can see the old bathroom layout below.
We removed the two closets to make the bathroom more open.

Looking from the old water closet that housed the toilet and a dark, tiny shower with a dash of mold. Just outside that doorway are the closets on either side.

Looking in. Remember how there were mirrors on almost every wall, yet it was still SUUUUUUPER dark? And notice the vanity. We reused it. Or upcycled it. Yeah, that's the new hot phrase. Upcycled.

Old is made new again. We lifted the vanity on turned feet and finished the edge with some molding. Repainted it and replaced the hardware, countertops, sinks & fixtures. The center also used to be 3 drawers, but Kennedy turned it into a shelf and I put baskets full of JUNK in there instead. Yay Junk!

A reallllly artsy (hah) shot of the bathroom floor and our refinished antique claw foot tub.

Another shot of that big, beautiful vanity. It ended up being raised about 9 inches. Before, my 5'5" self had to lean over the counter to brush my teeth. Poor Kennedy was practically brushing his teeth while sitting Indian style. It's much more comfortable to use now, and also proved my theory that there would be fewer toothpaste splatters on the mirror.

Oh, also, we installed those oval swivel mount mirrors and two wall sconces to match the hardware & grey slate.

This is what it feels like to take a shower in here. Minus the soap and water.

This is what it feels like to...well, this is the view from the toilet. It's kind of peeking in here, but we installed a huge window above the claw foot tub. This is where the vanity and giant mirror wall used to be. I still can't believe we cut a hole in the side of our house.

Boring picture looking out into the bedroom. I had originally planned to find a cool, un-matchy sit-down vanity for the left-hand corner. That's why there are two random outlets there. Now the new owners can find one. Or leave it open. It doesn't feel that weird to have open space.

I freakin' love that bathroom.

And here's the closet. We did nothing to it, except put rolling clothes racks in there. We were going to eventually install built-ins, but never got around to it. So that should be fun for the new owners.

Looking in. Don't know why everything looks so orange. Oh, because I don't understand how to use my camera.

Facing a little window area.

I staged this as a little office-type place for showings, thanks to our wonderful realtor, Becky, for that advice. If you are looking to buy or sell in the DFW area, let me know, and I'll send you to Becky! She's great!

View looking out, with a huge carpet remnant left over from when we installed carpet last Thanksgiving.

And there you have it! Now what I'm going to do is go lay on the floor in my master suite and whisper good-bye to it while I cry. Or go to the pool. I'll let you know what I decide.


1 comment:

Courtney said...

That bathroom looks like something out of HGTV. I can not believe you guys did that. I'm sad for you that you don't get much time to enjoy it.

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