UncategorizedThe New Cottage February 15, 2013Happy Friday, y’all! You guys have blown me away with your kindness, encouragement, and acceptance of this life change for us. The last two day’s worth of comments and e-mails have really brought me so much joy. Y’all don’t know what an impact you have on me!!! I am soooo giddy for today’s post. I’ve been DYING to share the new house and start sharing all of our plans for it. We have kind of a lot of plans already! I wanted to wait until it was very definite that this would be our house, which to me, meant closing on it. Well, we don’t close until February 28th. But…now that our other house has closed, the seller of this home has been so gracious to let us rent until closing and there is nothing else standing in the way, so it is a pretty done deal. And I just can’t wait anymore! If something were to fall through, we’ll just pick ourselves up, find another one, and move on, but I’m sure hoping we don’t. Especially since we are already moved into this little baby. You’ll notice I said cottage in the title. I just love that term as opposed to just house. It’s very much my style. I kept calling our last home a cottage, but let’s face it…it was a house. A long ranch house. This one, however, is a cottage through and through. And I love that!!! Right now, it reminds me of those dogs that you say, “Wow, it’s so ugly that it’s cute!” Know what I mean? Some of it has been updated. It was a rental for a while and let’s just say, the updates were not what I would have chosen. No offense to the former owners whatsoever, but for our style, there were some interesting choices made. I think you’ll see what I mean from the picture (a.k.a. window placement). Without further ado, here’s our cute/ugly baby cottage that is just screaming, “Make me pretty again!!!” Before I get to our plans, here’s some basic info on the house: It looks sooo tiny from the outside and it is tiny: 1100 square feet. Our last home was 1800 square feet (upstairs, finished, livable space). It is currently considered three bed, one bath, but all of that is about to change!!! It has a big fenced in back yard with beautiful trees that make the yard very private and feel like you’re out by yourself somewhere. Love. it. We have so many plans for this little place and I will be sharing those in more detail for a while, but today I do want to share some general updates that we know we will be making so that you know what we’re in for (and what you’ll be seeing a lot of around here in the next six months or so). For the outside, we will be redoing the entire portico area, putting in a new front door, majorly changing up the windows (taking some away, adding some, making some bigger), adding craftsman style shutters and window boxes, adding some industrial/barn lighting, and can you say landscaping??? Whew, I’m out of breath just typing all that! Here’s a little sketch I drew of how I imagine the outside: Keep in mind, I am no artist. I just like to play around. Nothing is to scale or anything, but you get the idea! For some reason, I love seeing what’s in my head on paper, even if the drawing isn’t very good. As for the rest of the house, we’ll be gutting a lot. 1.) Kitchen – We’ll be gutting the current kitchen and then expanding it to make it much larger (and prettier). 2.) We’ll be gutting the existing bathroom and updating it. 3.) We’ll be tearing down lots and lots of walls to open up the living space and create an open concept. 4.) We’ll be turning what’s currently a bedroom into the dining room. 5.) Outdoor Living Space – We’ll be adding some fun outdoor living space for dining and lounging. 6.) Addition – So excited about this part!!! We’ll be adding a master suite to the back. Wahoo! So, when we’re finished, the 1100 square feet will turn into something like 1400 – 1500. Still much smaller, but it works for us. It actually feels much bigger than that inside and I can’t imagine how it’ll feel when we open up all of the walls! We’ll be starting as soon as we close on the 28th. That very day, walls will be removed – yay! So, we’re looking forward to the spring of renovations and then the summer of decorating for me. Now that part is seriously fun! Hope y’all have a great weekend!!! I’ll be back next week with more to share on the new house. I’m working on a before and after of the floor plan now, so that you can see the current layout and how it will be when we’re finished. Can’t wait to go on this journey with y’all by our side!
Stuart Goetke says February 15, 2013 at 2:13 pm Hey Lindsay, I’m so excited about your sweet little cottage. I can’t wait to see your plans to fix it up! I also read your post about why you sold. Matt and I moved after the first 5 months of marriage. We moved from a two-bedroom, fancy, luxury apt to a one-bedroom, simple (zero amenities), old apt. We cut our rent in half and it feels so much more like home! Thank you for sharing your story! Reply
Kristina says February 15, 2013 at 2:35 pm I am officially jealous! What a cute house and a whole 1100 square feet of fun! Ahhh! It’s adorable and I love your plans for the outside. Can’t wait to see it all! I love the idea of renting till you can close. That’s a good idea for the future (though probably not with our next house, since we plan on keeping this one and renting it when we move). Reply
Jennifer Dudley says February 16, 2013 at 2:40 pm I am so stinkin’ in love with your new house!!!! I LOVE it…even from the outside! When we bought our house it was THE house in the neighborhood that was sad, pitiful and needed some serious loving. I knew it was ours, God confirmed it and we bought it. Different flowered wallpaper adorned each room. Each room had a theme….. Outside, new shutters, plants, painted the maroon porch railing white. Removed the lamp with a light bulb (that they were using as a porch light) removed fake plants, fake flowers, a fence, and used up lots of SWEAT and I am SURE I cried a few times. The result was a beautiful wide porch with a red swing and a few white rockers, and neighbors that would stop by all the time to see what we were doing. There were and STILL are nearly 5 years later people who live in the neighborhood who stop by if we are outside and tell us they love how the house looks now. We have even been “hollered” at from a moving car a few times of welcome to the neighborhood we love what your doing! We did it all on a MAJOR budget. I LOVE this house. It isn’t huge but it is big enough. I can’t wait to see what you have up your sleeves for yours!! Hugs. Reply
Jennifer says February 21, 2013 at 12:24 pm I love it in a kind of it’s-already-cute-by-my-books kinda way! I’m excited for you guys. Can’t wait to see what you transform it into. Reply
Kelly - Talk of the House says February 24, 2013 at 10:23 pm I love your little drawing! You should keep it, and frame it to remember the “baby stage” of your new home. Reply
Kristina says February 27, 2013 at 2:45 pm Ummm, I had a thought last night as I browsed Houzz: are you planning on replacing the siding with shake shingles? Oh dur, you’re probably going to do board and batten. I know you love that (and shake shingles too) and either one would be super cottagey and uber cute. Okay that’s all. Reply