Guest Blogger: A Home In The Making

Today we have Jenn with us, from A Home In The Making. I absolutely love Jenn’s house! Not only is she not afraid to use some color in her house, but she comes up with some pretty creative storage solutions and has an eye for putting together gorgeous spaces. Lucky for y’all, she is sharing a little tour of her home with us today. Eat your hearts people!  If I’m lucky, I’ll be rooming with this lovely lady and Jane, from our post last week, at the Haven Conference next June! Take it away Jenn!

————————————————————————————————————————————————

Hello Two Become One readers! My name is Jenn, and I live over at A Home in the Making. I am so excited to be sharing my home with you while Sam is enjoying some much-deserved time away from Texas .

Today I’m going to give you a tour of my abode because exactly three years ago – next week – I *officially* moved into my husband’s house. We were so excited to start our new life together, but once the wedding excitement has worn off we were faced with reality: our house needed a LOT of work. And it wasn’t the type of work that we could get around to. It was actually depressing to live in this house that was so unloved. On top of that, I have always needed to have a concrete sense of *home* because I somehow equate a comfortable home with a good foundation for a marriage and a family. But this house felt like the furthest thing from home. Which meant, things needed to change. Immediately.

Here are the highlights of our house three years ago:

Our house is an adorable 1928 bungalow. My husband bought it a couple years before he met me and intended it to be a *fixer-upper*. He did a HUGE amount of work to the house before we ever met: installed a new roof, upgraded the electrical, re-plumbed the entire house, painted the outside, tore up the majority of the carpet and refinished the hardwoods. Was the state of the house horrible when I moved in? NO. Was it home? No. no. no. The majority was painted a sad, lifeless shade of primer white. The rooms that were painted were a mish-mash of horrible colors. I couldn’t handle it, but yet there was so much to do that I didn’t even know where to begin. So, for the past three years we’ve been taking baby steps.

First we painted the kitchen and the nook.

I couldn’t handle the green cabinets. So, the cabinets were painted with a nice soft cream and the walls were painted a cheery yellow.

We gave the nook the same paint treatment, bought a new table, and made curtains and a light fixture.

Next, we tackled the living room.

At first, we just painted. And paint alone was such a HUGE upgrade from the white walls that I didn’t hang anything on the walls for a YEAR.

That has clearly changed. This room is the biggest work in progress though. I can’t seem to just give it a over haul. I chip away at it in small chunks.

The fireplace also received a coat of white paint. Never be afraid to paint brick if you’re unhappy with the existing brick. This project was the single most transforming thing we did to the living room.

After the living room, we moved the the front of the house.

Originally, we had wanted to sell the house this past spring, so curb appeal was at the forefront of our minds and our to-do list. We aren’t selling, for now, but I’m so glad we squeezed this project in.

And this spring, we tackled our back entry.

While not the main house entry, it was a priority because a.) it disgustingly shabby and dirty and b.) anyone who walks into the kitchen could see it. It was by far the biggest project we’ve tackled, construction-wise, but it was so worth it.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little tour of our house! We’ve done some great things in other rooms of our house as well and you can check out ALL the before and afters here, and you can check out the projects we’ve tackled here. If you stop by, make sure to say hi!