Welcome ReHome friends to Two Story Sister (2SS). This is my poor neglected little blog that I originally created to share about my home. Sadly, 2SS is the second abandoned blog I started in my lifetime; therefore, I felt it would be irresponsible to open up yet another blogspot to post about our ReHome projects. Sooo, I decided I would just hijack this www space when I wanted to write more than a little FB blurb about our ReHome projects. Does that work for you? Good.
Anyways, I have had a few requests to see some before and after shots of our past projects, and because this weekend we are hosting an open house at Irby Drive; I thought I would take this time to show you a few pre and post renovation pictures from that project.
I just want you to know that I had to teach myself how to make a collage for this post, so I'd appreciate it if you would be very impressed by my side by side comparisons. And feel free to gasp when you see the arrows I added to a couple of the pictures.
First up, the exterior:
It's funny, I had probably run past this house a gazillion times but never knew it existed because it sits low on the property and was hidden by the plant overgrowth. In addition to clearing out the jungle and starting from scratch with new landscaping, we also added the cedar lined concrete steps that lead up to the mailbox from the front door. These pictures also highlight the new roof, gutters, exterior trim, paint, and door.
This next grouping gives you an idea of what the semi-private patio off the master bedroom once looked like. We enclosed that extra bay with new cinderblock and trimmed out the existing french doors to ensure the exterior looked purposefully designed vs cheaply bandaged. And can I just say, I love those party lights. It is amazing how much those little twinkles light up the space at night.
And then there's the back deck. Props to Richard of Kendrick Fencing- the man knows how to build a deck. In fact, all the other subs commented on how well that deck was built when they came to work on the house. Richard earned himself a spot on the ReHome dream team after this project. He not only rocked out the deck but also the cedar wall and steps in the front.
The original deck was not only falling in, it also extended only a few feet past the door. But as you can see we took this puppy clear across the length of the house to give the future home owner a great space to lounge and entertain.
Shall we move on inside?
I wish I had taken better pictures to really illustrate the original layout of the home. I'll do my best to walk you thru it.
The original galley style kitchen was closed off from the living room and dining room in a little nook off the backdoor entry. We reworked the entry, to be captured in part by the new laundry room, master bathroom, and office nook; and tucked a huge beam in the ceiling that runs from the new entry wall all the way to the new column that now separates the kitchen from dining area, to open up the entire area. ("We" meaning the framing crew, don't go trying to give me any credit for that undertaking.)
The dining area is one of my favorite features of this home. Once we decided this home was destined to be industrial modern we knew this house would be perfect for a glass roll-up door. It was a budget buster for sure, but man oh man I think it was worth it. It's almost like the back deck becomes an extension of the living area when the door is rolled open. So perfect for entertaining.
Oh! and there is the first one of my fancy arrows. I'm trying to show you how you got to the dining room from the kitchen in the old layout.
Not the best pictures of the living room, but in the top left corner you can see that there was a wall that separated the front door from the rest of the living room. Then the other before shows you the other side of the room. Don't get too excited about that brick in the corner, it was faux, trust me your glad it came down. This room also got new sheet rock from top to bottom.
Ok here is where the major layout changes took place. We reworked the once garage (or at least I think it use to be the garage, although I have no idea how a car could get inside the space due to the odd topography of the home), laundry room, and back entry into the new laundry, office nook, master bedroom and bath. This was a fun one. We had to trench into the concrete to run new plumbing lines and bust thru the cinderblock to create new openings. Me and my concrete team, Benny and Martin, became quite good friends on this job. I'm not really sure which one was Benny and which one was Martin but super nice men that came to my rescue time and time again while working on this concrete fortress. They too earned their spot on the dream team.
My arrow below is trying to show you where the new office is. And the bottom shot gives you a taste of the trenching. I think I show you that arrow picture again as a reference point for the new master bathroom in just a minute.
This next grouping shows you what the master bedroom and closet area once looked like.
And now the bathroom. Yep there's that same picture.
Before the home had just one full bath and then a potty and sink where the now laundry room resides. Here is the before and afters of the original bath:
So there you have it. Those are the highlights of the Irby project. And those are just the fun things. Mr Thompson made sure that the mechanics of the home where just as new and shiny as the visible finishes with new electric, plumbing, HVAC, and insulation.
This project took extremely too long to finish, went way over budget, and I cried more on this project than ever before (James 1:2-4 became my life verse during this project) BUT I feel so blessed to have had the opportunity to ReHome this house for the future home owner.
Before I let you go, I need to give a shout out to some other members of the crew that worked on this project:
Nicholas the Painter: He is the captain of our ReHome dream team. He has been with us the longest and is soooo patient with me and all my changes and touch-ups and has NEVER let us down. The project does not truly come together until we turn the keys over to Nicholas and his team.
Marcos the Tile man: Another dream team member. He does a fantastic job and is also extremely dependable- which is HUGE in my book and critical for making the dream team. What I love about Marcos is if we don't like something he is quick to do what ever it takes to make it right.
Travis the overall handyman and landscaper. Travis is our go to guy for all our landscaping but has also been a blessing to us to help with odd jobs around the projects. What I love about Travis is not only is he a hard worker that never complains but he is mindful of our budget and tries to think of ways to save us money.
Danny Harbison "Harbo" is the man to thank for the beautiful cabinetry. This is the 3rd project he has worked on for us and is truly a jack of all trades.
Thank you to Rex and Greg for the framing, custom trim, door instillation, and other odds and ends. Couldn't have completed it without you guys.
Hall Electric and Shearer Plumbing and Maulding Heat and Air were Johnny on the Spot. So nice to have subs that show up when they say they will. Thanks so much for your Service.
Huge thank you to my husband, Rory Thompson the other part of the "we" in this business and blog post. It means the world to me that you support me in this new career path and that you dedicate one day a week (Work With Yo Women Wednesday) to work beside me on these projects.
And finally thank you to spell check for lighting up my post with red squiggly lines before I hit publish so that I could make necessary changes that would enable my reader(s) to decipher thru this marathon post. I must apologize to those of you who are grammerphobes, you know the ones who post on FB how much they cringe when people use then/than, affect/effect, etc wrong; this post must have been painful for you. But if there is ever a hope that I will be a regular blogger, we are going to just have to let the grammer and correct punctuation go. Deal?
Hope to see you this Sunday from 2-4 at the Open House!
Niki
