A Renovation Roller-Coaster

Over the past few weeks, since we've closed on our new house my husband and I have begun a small reno. The kitchen floors needed to be brought into the 21st century and the stain on the living and dining room hardwoods was begging for a change too. With that, we'd be painting most of the rooms as well- trying to get as much done before we move in as possible. 

To say its been a bit of a roller coaster of emotions is definitely fair. Having parents who've built two houses and in-laws who are pros at renovations, I have certainly witnessed how involved the whole process is. 

Not to mention, this is kinda my job too. 

After a little flooring snafu, we're on track now and I wanted to show you a peek into our progress.

We decided to stick with a pretty neutral color palette - I wanted it all to feel light and really play up the awesome views of the lake. It kinda feels like we're in the tree tops! 

This is our keeping room, where we'll probably hang out and spend most of our time. The floors were in good shape, just not our style - so we decided to take them up and hopefully replace them with hardwoods to match the other living areas of the house.
**BTW, this room is going to be a soft gray, but the doors will be painted black - I am super pumped for this touch of chic. **

Here's a MAJA before pic. While I am an Italophile, I didn't think we needed to be reminded of it all the time by seeing this odd mural every day. I think it reads "Fine wine, Good friends, Great food, and the Celebration of life." Needless to say, it's getting painted over.
And the built-in desk came out too. Its currently for sale on CraigsList - if you're interested! ;)

This is the entry, living room, and dining room. The 1/3 wall on the left needed to come down - it made no sense to stop the flow there. And the ledge wall on the right leads to the stairs to the basement. The hardwood floors were in great shape, but we knew we'd like a bit of a darker stain. And paint for sure.
I know, I know, it's hard to believe that I want to paint over those green accent walls.

Now you see it....

....Now you don't.
MAJA improvement. My awesome hubs and awesome brother got this guy out no prob.

Now, we've just got one air vent in the floor. Easy peasy.

We also spent some time taking out the carpet and carpet nails on the stairs. That was way less fun for me than watching them demo the 1/3 wall.

Here's the new hardwood stain in progress.....looking good! 

After being gone for the weekend, we came home to discover an earthquake had hit the kitchen. J/K. But it did look awful. We knew there was 3" of concrete under the tile (why? we don't know), and in order to make new floors flush with the existing ones, it had to come out. It was a slow moving job, but now, the construction crew has it under control.

The cabinets were getting prepped for a paint job!

David's assessing the sitch.

After the floors were finished! YAY!!!

In addition to the floors and kitchen being spruced up this week, our mighty dog, Baxter got a snazzy underground fence. He's loved going over to the new house in the evenings and "getting trained". Really though, he's so smart, he's already got it figured out. He doesn't stray too far from mom and dad now anyway.

Rubble from the kitchen required a dumpster. 

Primer!!!!

Can you believe it?!?! All the concrete and tile came out and the subfloor was in great shape. 

It's getting there!
The two doors on the right lead to the living and dining area - the house has a great flow. You can see the Italianate mural is no longer there either. The wall cabinets will be painted a pretty off-white, and the island is getting a coat of black paint. Eventually we'll replace countertops and backsplash, but that's Phase 1,257 as of right now.
And someday we're planning to fill in with additional cabinetry above the existing too.

Here's Bax and David on a training walk!

One coat on!!! HUGE difference!

And here's the paint going up on the walls! We are so excited to go over there in the evenings and check the progress. And our sweet painter, Bless His Heart, he calls me several times a day to confirm colors - he wants to make sure it's all perfect!
I know it doesn't seem possible, but we'll be moving most of our things in on Saturday - stay tuned to more updates next week!