Here are some updates on our home renovation that is starting around March 1!
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I am very much looking forward to writing about our home renovation this year!
First off, my life has been somewhat boring the past few years with the pandemic and not having anything super exciting happening. It’s probably why travel posts are my favorite to write – they are so easy and I always have a lot of photos to share.
I will have LOTS of photos to share as we bring down a wall and re-do the inside of 2/3 of our house!
I LOVE following along in other people’s home building / reno stories, so I hope this will be fun for you guys too.
We decided to remove an upper cabinet so we could add open shelves! I made this little design in Canva to get an idea of what they would look like. Here begins my career as an interior designer (KIDDING!)
Note our windows will be black, hardware black, counters, tile, and walls white!
Here are a few renovation updates!
Budget + Timing Changes
You know how renovations always end up being more expensive and taking longer than planned? That has already happened to us, and we haven’t even started!
I suppose this is a good thing because it’s better to be prepared before you swing a sledgehammer into your walls, but I’m already feeling a bit stressed. Thomas and I are having a lot of “if we’re doing this now we might as well do XY and Z too” thoughts.
I had hoped we’d use only what we pulled out of the home equity for our budget, but it looks like we’ll need to add more savings to that too. But it will be worth it, right?!
Thomas also told me he doesn’t think we’ll be done in the “5-6 months” he had originally said. It’s feeling more like 6-7 to him. So we’re already thinking we might need to extend our rental a month or come up with a plan B for the last bit.
We had originally planned to spend the month of August homeless and travel down for a long visit with my parents (while also saving money on summer camps!) and then maybe hanging at Thomas’s parents house for a short bit. But I don’t want this to turn into 2 months of living out of suitcases, so we’re currently problem solving that.
It’s interesting being married to the builder because he’s been extra precise on the budget and timing (for clients he might pad that a bit so expectations aren’t disappointed) but he can be more honest with me. But I’m not the most flexible person, so maybe I should just pretend to be his client : )
Our Rental
We rented the house sight unseen aside from some photos and finally got to go in for a visit!
Our Room:
It’s SO CUTE and very English countryside.
The whole house is stocked like an Airbnb since it’s a short-term rental so there is everything from towels and linens to dishes and appliances to ziplock bags and spices (which we will replace as we use). It’s so great that we won’t have to move any furniture over and can really just bring our clothes, toys, and personal items.
Dining Room
Going in made me super excited for the adventure of living there. It’s a small cottage, but there was more storage than I was anticipating so that was good to see!
Kitchen (which Mazen says is “super modern!”)
Quartz Countertops
It’s been fun meeting the subs with Thomas. He works with them all the time but not for his personal home (obviously).
We chose our Quartz countertops over Christmas. The request: white with light gray marbling. Quartz is the only way to go for counters since it’s the most durable (I know this from my last kitchen renovation)!
They are made by Spectrum Quartz and the color is Intrepid (Design Number: 0118L).
As a reminder, we have granite right now and I haven’t really liked the pattern since I moved in :/ I’ll be so glad to get brighter counters (and a single basin sink!!!)
Primary Bedroom Carpet
Upstairs in our bedroom we have the most basic carpet a person can buy. Our house was a flip, so pretty much every single finish is of the cheapest quality. (I didn’t know this when I bought the house, lol. It all just looked new to me!)
(Also note that the whole back wall of our bedroom will have windows. I cannot wait!)
So we headed to the carpet store to pick out something for a July install. Birch had lots of fun!
There were SO many styles to choose from, but we were able to eliminate most of them rather quickly since we knew we wanted something neutral with a minimal pattern.
We chose these two patterns by Karastan to bring home.
The final decision is Karastan’s Graceful Transition style in the color Boulevard, which is a light gray. Our walls will be crisp white so we’re going with the gray on the floor instead of dark gray walls and light carpet.
It’s time to get the packing started!
Here’s my moving process:
- Take down art
- Take down breakable decor that we don’t use
- Take things out of cabinets until they are empty
- Pack things we use daily last
I am going to write a post about moving because it can be so overwhelming! Luckily our basement level, which is where a lot of our storage-y stuff is, is staying, so I’ll just be going up and down the stairs 1,000 times instead of having to put every single thing in a box to move.
