the beginning of home improvements

we started our home improvements! it's so exciting (and hard work and expensive and frustrating at times!)

here's our first campfire. we will make a bigger, more permanent circle this spring.

i caught a little snake. yep! that's right! i caught the snake!

do you see how long this hedge is?!?! our driveway is past the white sign sticking out all the way down! luckily, we had some help in trimming it! it had been neglected for a few years!

our first load of wood in the new house! this winter has been so weird (and the wood fireplace damper broke) so we really haven't had many fires.

this is the lovely wallpaper that i pulled down from the main hallway and up the stair well. at least it was so old that it came off pretty well. but because it was so old, there was just plaster and exposed drywall in some places! now its a brown-ish-sandy color. SO MUCH BETTER!!

this is the den-type room off the kitchen. it's an awkward room, size wise and usefulness, but it's a passthrough from the driveway to the kitchen. this is the same sandy-brown color as the hallway. we put up a bunch of joe's cool sports collectible things. the one picture along the bottom got straightened- fyi.

here is the front door/ entry into the living room. i love this brown color! now on the wall is a wall sticker that says 'home- can be a heaven on earth'. the living room will be a blue-ish color. not a bright blue, but not an antique blue either. that has yet to get painted!

these are the built-in bookcases in the living room. the backs are a great grey color, that really accents the off-white walls and the buttercream trim. BLAH BLAH BLAH!!!

and now there is color! again, the walls are going to be blue-ish.

this is a small guest bath off the den. it was so ugly! had textured cream wallpaper and a leaky toilet and really old built in sink. so, i got a little carried away and ripped everything out! as of today (2.26.12) it's still not put back together! but we are getting close! it's been painted (same as the den) and we bought the toilet, vanity and mirror (though not installed yet) and laid really pretty ceramic tile. pictures will come when it's finished!

AFTER!!! pretty great looking!  and much more enjoyable!  we aren't 100% done, we haven't decided what to do on the walls around the tub and shower.  but that can wait since we don't use that tub anyway.  and it needs a few decorations, but that will come with time as well...

everything in the house was white!! off white, shades of white, variations of white, and plain old white! it was driving me NUTS!!!! the first room to be painted was the dining room. it's a great pumpkin-y color with a slightly lighter shade along the soffet.

before- white! white! white!

after! i just love how it turned out! it is perfect! and the maple tree just outside the window was turning colors at the same time, and it matched perfectly! so, it was meant to be! ;

here's the finished product. still no real furniture, but that's ok!

and another improvement, more important, but not as much fun- replacing the 52 year old boiler! it was a dinosaur in the industry, and we decided that since it was hardly working, replace it and save some money in heating costs! it was quite a project getting it out, since the whole unit together weighed about the same as a small car! but the new one is really small and WAY more efficient!

the new one! much better!!