Front Porch

Next up on our tour of Sister is the exterior renovation.

When our family first met Sister there was no denying her Traditional Colonial heritage. Her design DNA was evident throughout but was most pronounced on the exterior with her textbook Colonial 5 over 4 symmetrical window placement and her pediment and column flanked door at the center of her red brick boxed facade. 

Her grand, stoic appearance did not fit our family's personality but we loved her regardless and adopted her as our own in July 2009.  

I found these pictures on the Internet from the old real estate listing:

You can see Sister was raised in a formal environment that perfectly matched her traditional facade. I can only imagine what she must have been thinking as we moved our slip-covered hand-me-down furniture, upcycled garage sale decor, and 2 rowdy boys under her pristine roof. 

Yet despite her past, it only took a new coat of paint and a few weekend DIY projects for Sister to start loosening up. By the time we tackled our first major renovation in 2012 (major being defined as one where we called in the professionals) we had completed enough projects that Sister was clearly starting to identify as a cottage farmhouse.  

Remember the formal dining room of her past. Well, by 2012 she was holding her china in an old chicken coop.

And that red formal living room was converted into my office where I met with my nutrition clients. Complete with a barn door slider I could shut for privacy.

And nothing says Farmhouse quite like shiplap:

Although Sister seemed to be transitioning smoothly into a comfy cozy cottage, outwardly she was suffering an identity crises. Her inside no longer matched her outside. Despite the fact I hung a human size whimsical flower on her door she still left a formal traditional impression on those that drove by.  

So in 2013, I started my campaign to get Sister a facelift. I wanted Sister to be comfortable in her own skin but I pitched the exterior renovation from a different angle when approaching Rory with the idea (the boys in my family have never been fully on board with treating our house as a 3rd child). I told Rory that the secret to me being more laidback was a front porch.

Sidenote: I am a very high strung person. NOT high maintenance, mind you, but high strung- there is a difference. I have an inability to sit still, I tend to be very obsessive and my obsessions are spastic in nature; therefore, I can be exhausting to live with (although not near as exhaustive as if I were high maintenance, right?!?).  

Anyways, I told Rory, (and I truly believed this with all my heart) that if we put a front porch on Sister, I would sit on that porch every single day with a glass of lemonade and just be still and content with my life, thus bringing calm and serenity into our family life.  It would also make us better neighbors. If I had a front porch I would greet all my neighbors that walked by and invite them to come sit on our porch and drink lemonade with me. I might even learn to play the guitar so we could have Andy Griffith style neighborhood sing-alongs on our front porch. And think of the money we would save. Instead of date nights at expensive restaurants and hired babysitters we could just hold hands on our porch swing and have long deep meaningful conversations about all our hopes and dreams for the future, except those conversations wouldn't be too long because all my hopes and dreams would be fulfilled with my new front porch.  

And guess what?! On my 35th birthday, I came home from work to find all the landscape ripped out and the brick steps busted up to make way for our new front porch!  Isn't Rory the best?!?! 

The deck framing was complete within the first week of getting started and the stage was set for our new porch.  I mean literally, the front of our house looked like a giant stage.   

And then it sat....just like that... for the next 6 months. We hired the sweetest, most talented framer in the world to do the project but I'm thinking we were low on his priority list because it took FOREVER to get the thing built. But once the work was complete I couldn't have been more pleased.  

During the front porch addition, we dressed up the windows and hid the old keystones under the wood trim for a less formal feel.

We also replaced the old front door and transom with a new 8 foot 12 light door.  

If you look closely, you might recognize that old transom. 

Rory and I built the porch swing bed.

And my Dad built the table.

Interestingly, this was Dad's first build for me and was the launching point for our furniture business "The Painted Stache." 

Rory and I installed the Landscaping.  Not sure where my right side hostas are this year.  They usually sprout up a few weeks after the left side but so far there are no signs of them.  

Now Sister's exterior fits her interior personality and I still pinch myself when I drive up to the house. Although I absolutely love the porch I am sad to report that it did not change my life as much as I had hoped or promised.  I rarely (like never) sit outside and I don't even like lemonade.  I'm still a terrible neighbor and I'm pretty sure you need all your fingers to play the guitar BUT I still think Rory is the best for agreeing to this renovation and hope Sister's new family loves it as much as I do.  

And a little Caldwell update:

buyer we have had to make some tough decisions that affect the budget and end price point but we decided to go all in and close in the carport and replace all the old windows with new energy-efficient wood windows.  I also heard all you library lovers cries when I mentioned replacing the existing library with a fabulous master bathroom.  You will be happy to know I have figured out a way to give this house both a dreamy bathroom and a stately library!  Stay tuned!

Caldwell Reno Here We Come!!

I'm excited to report that the historic commission passed our plans for the Caldwell renovation two weeks ago. Yippie!! Not only were the members of the board very kind and not scary at all, I was blown away at the kindness of our Caldwell neighbors who took time out of their night to come voice their support of the project. "Awesome Neighbors" will definitely make it on my future Zillow listing.

"So what now?" you ask. Well, with the historic commission's stamp of approval, the only thing that stood between me and progress on the Manor was a buyer orrrrr Rory changing his mind on the ol' "wait to renovate until we find a buyer" plan. Wellllll guess what?!?!! My scheme idea to convince Rory that we should move forward with the Caldwell renovation with the back-up plan to move into it ourselves if it doesn't sell worked! That's right!!!! The ban on the Caldwell reno has been lifted!! We are moving forward and boy oh boy have we been moving... in just 2 short weeks we (as in the professionals) added 13 new footings to help this 100-year-old home stand strong and firm for at least another 100 years; demolished lots of old stuff (Rory and I) and framed up some new areas (Professionals), cleaned out a mountain of racoon poop from the attic (Rory and I), and unleashed the plumbers to start ripping out ALL the old pipes to make way for new plumbing.  It feels soooo good to be working! And I'm predicting you might see some exterior changes on your drive by within the next few weeks.

But let's back up and revisit the "backup plan" for a bit.  So when I presented my idea that we could live in the English Manor if someone else doesn't fall in love with her, my thought was we would list both Caldwell and our house at the same time and then live in whichever one didn't sell.  Sounds reasonable, right?  Well, not to Rory- It still made him nervous to think that we might have 2 mortgages to pay.  But rather than rejecting my plan all together he countered with "move forward with reno (sans buyer) AFTER we sell our house". Honestly, I would have been happy with any deal that meant the end of my production strike but I pressed my luck and argued we should at least start the exterior renovation to help attract potential buyers. AND, while we're at it, we should probably go ahead and complete the demo, framing, and rough-ins on the interior so the house won't continue to scare away those that do express interest in the Manor. However, I pinky promised that once the drywall was up we would once again halt construction until we either found a buyer OR sold our house. Rory begrudgingly agreed, we sealed the deal with a kiss and that my friends, is where the Caldwell Saga sits today.

Ironically it wasn't until I was knee deep in raccoon poop that I came off of cloud 9 to realize this new revised plan:

A) does not account for where we will live during the time our house sells and we continue with the Caldwell renovation.  Hmmmm? and....

B) Oh my goodness! I'm selling Sister!!!!!

Yes friends, for those of you that never made it to the intro of this blog, I call my house Sister. You can read all about it here but basically, Sister was conceived from my need to squelch the baby bug.

When I finally realized there was no convincing Mr. Thompson of going for baby #3, I made peace with my circumstance by telling myself a story: My house could be my baby and all the energy and money I would have spent on a little girl I would just spend on dressing up my house instead!

And just like that, I cured my baby bug and two-story sister was born. Now I bet Rory wishes we would have just had that third baby instead of going on to adopt so many houses.....

Unfortunately, when I chose to personify my house so many years ago I did not think forward to what this would mean if we ever decided to move. Luckily, I was able to use the same strategy that got me into this mess to help me see my way out and once again be at peace in my world- I told myself another story: 

You see, over the last 8 years, we have poured our all into raising our little girl. We have cared for, corrected, molded, and above all loved her into the home she is today. Today she has an inner beauty that matches her exterior. But now that she is fully matured she is ready to fly the nest... or... she is ready for us to fly away, whatever. She is ready to settle down with a new family. 

See what I'm doing here- I'm convincing myself that I'm not really abandoning my house, Sister is simply getting married! It will be an arranged marriage of course; so I will be choosing her new family for her- which is perfectly normal and acceptable in American house marriages. Work with me here folks, this is what I have to tell myself to be able to sleep at night. Just remember the fate of Caldwell rides on my ability to let go of Sister. 

We have a little sprucing and touching up to do before Sister will be ready to entertain suitors (aka potential buyers) but we hope to have her ready by the first week in June. In the meantime, I thought I would use these next few weeks to share with you a few of Sister's biggest transformations.  

Besides a little paint and refinishing of the floors, the first major renovation project we completed on Sister was the kitchen- aka the heart of the home. It took me 3 years of cooking for families to save up enough money to redo this kitchen but, in that time, I figured out exactly how I wanted my kitchen to look and function AND to this day, 5 years later, I wouldn't change a thing. I blogged about the kitchen renovation here but neglected to mention how the 2-month process sent me to the emergency room with a panic attack from the stress of living thru the chaos of a renovation. I guess I wasn't into sharing my crazy in 2012- but since the crazy has become the bread and butter of this blog- I thought I'd share it now.  Living in a construction zone is nutso and I don't recommend it to anyone. I live, eat, and breath home renovation and dreamed of nothing else in the 3 years leading up to this kitchen reno and it still almost did me in. So my advice to anyone who will listen is to move out during a major reno OR renovate before you move in. That being said, you will see in the coming weeks that I neglected to heed this advice many more times while living at Sister but Rory and I have both said we will never live at another construction site again.  

Because this blog already has a detailed description of the full reno here I'm just going to give you a few before and after photos to summarize.

The Befores:

And the Afters:

During the Kitchen remodel we also added built-ins to our office.  Can't seem to find any before pics  so just imagine a plain, cranberry red room.

And now: (will show you the rest of the office another time when I've had time to clean it.)

Well, there you go, the first of several blog post dedicated to Sister.  Tune in next week for more updates on Caldwell and for the scoop on Sister's exterior facelift.  

The storybook team

While I am on a forced project strike, I thought I might take this time to introduce you to 3 members of our Storybook team that we literally could not go anywhere without.

First up- Rusty.

You first met Rusty during my 2017 New Years post. Rusty is the "before" mascot of Storybook homes. He is a 1998 Chevrolet but has only been with us for the last 13 or so years. Before the odometer light burned out he was running around 230,000 miles (that was in March 2016).

Y'all, the only reason I am going to confess what I'm about to tell you is because I think it clearly demonstrates how much I NEED a project and should not be left alone with free time- I totally went driving around Conway looking for a field of daisies in which to photograph Rusty just for this post. Seriously?!?! In what Universe is that a worthwhile use of time or gas?!?! Thank goodness we don't have any daisy fields because the second part of my plan was to pose all sports-car pin-up style in my Carharrt overalls on Rusty's hood. Luckily the field of weeds I settled on snapped me back into reality.  But not before I took these glamor shots of Rusty:

Before I continue, I would just like to go on record that I am responsible for ZERO of those dents or scratches, thank you very much.

I'm convinced Rusty is a distant cousin of Herbie the slug bug because he truly has a mind of his own. He is constantly coming up with new tricks to ensure my driving experience is never boring. For example, for the past 14 or so months he will randomly throw open the driver's side door while I am driving. The first time it happened I was in the middle of a week-long "While You Where Out" surprise bathroom renovation for Rory while he was away on a mission trip. I had crews working inside my master bathroom from 6 am in the morning until after midnight for 6 days in a row so I thought I was just sleep deprived and forgot to shut the door. It wasn't until it happened again when I was fully alert that I realized it was Rusty's doing and no fault of mine. It has since happened enough times that I have trained myself to drive with 1 hand on the steering wheel and the other hand gripping the window seal to hold it shut (I can't hold on to the door handle because it has started to detach itself from the body of the truck so should the door fly open when moving greater than 10 mph I fear it would rip right off).

He loves an audience. Somehow the ignition always seems to stick in the Home Depot parking lot when we are parked next to a work truck full of men. Rusty knows the only way I can make the key turn over is if I do a little shaking and dancing in the driver's seat or straight up body slam into the steering wheel. I'm not sure who enjoys the performance more, Rusty or the men watching from their vehicles.

He is also quite the host. Each Spring he welcomes a colony of ants to take up residence in the passenger side floorboard and last week he extended the invitation to a family of wasps.

The good news is when you drive a vehicle like Rusty you don't have to worry about anyone trying to steal him. In fact, the only time I have experienced any suspicious activity around Rusty was the time I came outside of an equipment rental dealership and found a man underneath my driver side tire.

Turns out he wasn't lying in wait to steal Rusty or me he was simply zip tying Rusty's front bumper back on. Who knew a simple zip tie could fix a bumper that had been hanging down for over three years?! AND he even gave me a package of zip ties just in case anything else fell off.  Modern day good Samaritan right there folks.  

But my all time favorite memory of Rusty was the time he grew a tomato plant in his bed.  I think he did it just to show me up because that was the year I couldn't get a thing to grow in our real garden.

Next up we have Wonda the Honda.

She is practically a baby at only 184,000 miles.

Wanda is my go to errand car when I don't need to haul tools or my errands take me on the interstate where I'm a little terrified to drive Rusty with the whole door flying open trick. She isn't all that fancy but she gets the job done. Unfortunately, when I am knee deep in a project she gets a lot of Rusty's overflow junk so it's not uncommon for my kids to be seatbelted in on top of leftover tile or riding with a light fixture in their lap. You know it's bad when your youngest kid asks you to drop him off before you get to the official drop off spot so teachers can't see inside your car. 

Until recently Wonda has been a pretty drama free vehicle but I'm thinking Rusty might be rubbing off on her because for the past month or so her trunk won't latch.  I really didn't think much of it until I walked out of Sams on a windy day and was greeted by this:

There was Wanda with her trunk wide open all Loud and Proud for all the shoppers to see. Rory has begged me to take her in to get fixed but I figure I've got better things to do with my time and money so I fixed her myself!

I thought the bungee cord was so much more classy than duck tape. Only problem is, now when I go over a speed bump and the trunk pops open the force of the bungee cord is so powerful it sounds like a cannon is going off from my car.  I am sure the people of Smoking Oaks would really appreciate it if I would go ahead and get her fixed or at the very least find another route home.  

And finally, there is the jeep aka Rory's mid life crisis purchase.    

He's a stud huh? Rhino Lined with a luggage rack and a cool red hook thingy.  We like to refer to him as the "after" mascot for Storybook Homes.  

Now before any of you start thinking "Why does Rory get the nice vehicle while Niki drives the clunkers?" you should know that prior to the Jeep Rory drove Rusty then Wonda while I had the nice ride.  This is the first nice vehicle Rory has ever bought for himself. And he deserves it!  Unlike my job, his job actually brings home a paycheck. 

Honestly, I wouldn't want the thing. Oh sure it's fun to ride around with the top down listening to Florida Georgia Line's "Cruise" cranked way up but I could not handle the added responsibility that comes with driving a jeep. I'm not sure if you know this or not but there is an unspoken pact between all jeep owners that when you pass another jeep on the road your suppose to do this subtle finger wave from your steering wheel. It's kinda like a secret handshake or something and they ALL do it! Well, I gotta tell ya, it stresses me out. I am the most oblivious driver on the planet and am NEVER aware of anything going on around me (half the time I don't even remember how I got to a destination) so I have no doubt I pass other jeeps all the time and don't return the obligatory wave which I'm pretty sure in jeep world is the equivalent of giving someone the finger.  Which I would NEVER knowingly do, although I'm quite confident my driving has been the recipient of a few birds over the years- but hey I wouldn't know because I don't PAY ATTENTION.

Plus when you drive such a spiffy vehicle you tend to draw attention to yourself and not just from other jeep drivers.  I forgot about this side effect last week when Rory and I switched vehicles for the day and I took Cohen to school in my polka dot pajamas.  Yep, couldn't help but notice those stares.  

So there you have it, consider yourself formally introduced.  

I hope to be back to blogging about houses real soon!

Too much free time.

tick. tock. tick. tock.

Guys I'm going a little nutso not having a project to work on! I do not do well with stillness. Thank goodness last week was the annual Ranch Hands Gal Corral where I was able to exert a little bit of creative energy toward helping my fellow Ranch Hands convert First Baptist Church's gymnasium into an old-timey movie theater.

Also, last week we (as in the tree company- I was nowhere near the job) took down the ivy infested tree and guess what we found?!?!  There was a HOUSE behind the tree!

Before:

After:

Ta-dah! Don't worry the Magnolia is still there. Her skirt did get a little lifted but she is still standing high and mighty.

That was all last week; this week I am back to pacing the floors. Sooooo, I have decided to use my currently unoccupied renovating brain space to think up a plan to convince Rory that we should go ahead and go forward with the Caldwell renovation without a buyer- all while making him believe it is his idea. Here is what I have come up with so far:

1. I could go all "Field of Dreams" on him. After he falls asleep at night, gently whisper in his ear "If we build it they will come" in a British accent. The British accent is critical to the success of the plan to ensure that he associates the subliminal message with the English Manor; otherwise, I fear, we might end up with a baseball field in our back yard. The only problem is when I practice whispering the message it comes out more like a cross between the Lucky Charms Leprechaun and a Pirate instead of British. So I'm a little nervous about what we might end up with.

2. I could offer to cash in all my Christmas, birthday, and anniversary gifts for the next 50 years in exchange for the project.  My hope is that such a grand and selfless gesture will so demonstrate my extreme love and devotion to the project that Rory will be like "Oh Babe, you must REALLY want to go forward with this renovation that you would sacrifice all your gifts for the next 50 years. I can not bare to punish such love and devotion with no gifts.  Not only are we going to get started on the renovation this minute here is a gift just for being so thoughtful and selfless."  

3. Or I could convince him that WE should move into Caldwell! Or, at the very least, list our house at the same time as we list Caldwell and see which one sells first. I think this makes the most financial sense. And oh my goodness, I would LOVE to live at the Manor! I think I'll lead with this plan.

In all seriousness, this decision to wait or move forward with the renovation is a BIG one and we would greatly appreciate your prayers for wisdom in this matter. AND while you're on the subject of Caldwell, if you don't mind lifting up our upcoming design review meeting with the historic district commission next week! I feel like our proposed changes are very respectful and historically appropriate but until we get the thumbs up from the board we couldn't continue with the renovation even if we were ready. So there's that.  

Thanks for checking in! Hope to know more next time we visit.