House Transformation Remodel DIY - Part 3

Part 1
Part 2

When we moved into the house, the existing porch was an aluminum screened porch, not too big, but big enough.

My darling husband poured a small slab and made an outer patio area...he also built these wonderful herb boxes for me.  We then added a simple wood trellis roof with clear plastic roofing.

The dream was for the porch to be bigger...the eventual dream was to add on to the house (happening now!).  Here we have our incredible friends and family helping as we pour a new slab extending out in both length and width.  Down came the aluminum porch...

 Here the slab is formed out to go all the way to the end of the house and out a foot or so toward the yard.

We have a pecan tree in our yard.  Here it is when we moved in... looking at it now (I'll post a more current full pic soon), it is incredible how much it's grown...it's really HUGE.  There was no fence between us and the neighbor (shown in pic).  

We built a fence for privacy and began work on a major swingset/tree fort for our son.  I have to say my husband really went over the top on this, it was such an awesome retreat! 

Come back soon for more updates...I'm basically catching up on all the old stuff before I get current. :)

House Transformation Remodel DIY - Part 2

If you didn't get to read Part 1 - stop in HERE to see pics of our house before we started working on it...

This was the kitchen right after we moved in.  
*The countertops were actually kind of cute, they were white with a little yellow decor in them.  
*The wallpaper?  Um, NO!  It absolutely HAD. TO. GO. period.  
*The Roper stove from 1973 was still in working order and we are all about keeping things till they die... it luckily died soon thereafter. :)  As a matter of fact, there was smoke coming from a wire in the back...not purty.

Just in case you didn't get enough of the horrid wallpaper... wow.... and the floor...let's not forget the floor.

Well, this was still the "90's" people, so bare with me while I show you where we went with the whole kitchen look next...

After tiling the entire house with a basic white tile, we decided on some paint.  I went with this bluish/greenish/teal kind of situation.  I am not entirely sure why, but I do remember liking it at the time. :)  And as you can see we "updated" the light fixture...sigh.

 The rest of the house was painted this taupe color, Ceylon Ivory to be exact.  I liked that color, it was nice and neutral and we had it that way for a LONG time.  Yes, we had our computer in the dining room.

 
The kitchen after we removed the big blue flowers... I went with big purple grapes instead...?  No worries there are more updates and transformations ahead for this kitchen...some are done and you will see them soon, some are still to be done...

House Transformation Remodel DIY - Part 1

So, in case you didn't  know, we are transforming our home! Well, we've been transforming it since we moved in, but we did take a long break after doing the major "first stuff", and a few changes of paint here and there.  It's an evolving kind of style I suppose. 

When I say "we", I mean "we".  The Cop and the Housewife at your service! :)  We have had some help friend friends and family when needed, but pretty much everything is done by us.  We really enjoy working together, it's not always easy, but it's worth it. 

The current (and biggest) project we are working on is closing in the back porch.  Essentially, we are adding on one average sized room (my new craft room!) and one large room (aka Florida Room/Family Room/Den).

We will also be opening up part of the wall in our kitchen to allow the view of the backyard to be broader, and allow the A/C to flow more freely through the house.  All this will be coming in later posts...

For now, I'll leave you with some photos of what we have done since the "beginning".

When we moved in...

Front of house, plain jane, but cute.

Dining room and Kitchen (Realtor photo), as well as the existing aluminum framed screened porch.  Don't you love that light fixture?

All the carpet was deep blue...groovy!

Dining area (Realtor photo).  I'm totally diggin the panel wall and macrame... :)

From the  backyard looking toward the screen porch.  Wow, our Pecan tree looks so small there!

What we loved about our house when we bought it was the cute little neighborhood it sits in, the house had good "bones", and didn't "need" any repairs.  We had a lot that we wanted to do, but it was all cosmetic.  So we began... come back soon for some transformation photos. :)