House Tour

After dragging our poor realtor to visit over 30 houses, it was love at first sight when we found this little Cape Cod in the city (Richmond, VA that is). It had everything we were looking for – three plus bedrooms, two full baths, big back yard for Riley to run around, and a surprising amount of storage for an older house. The best part? Location, location, location! It’s within walking distance to a great area of the city called Carytown, which has unique shops and restaurants. Just a couple blocks away are two large parks, including hiking/biking trails, a dog park, and a mini zoo. The other bonus was that the house was a blank canvas – great wood floors, white paint throughout, and it was in good shape but with enough little projects that we could make it our own. Here’s are before and (some) after pics, and as always, it’s a work in progress….

I took this picture the day we moved in, check out Brian and Riley in the window -

Since then, we’ve torn out all of the bulky bushes in front of the house and planted some low-profile bushes. We also gave the lamp post a makeover.

The front door enters into the living room with the stairs to the second floor just to the right. We loved the arch detail that leads to the dining room -

We painted the walls a light khaki color (we used a color swatch from our friends house so unfortunately I don’t know the name of the color) and added bamboo shades. The fireplace got a makeover when we painted it white and stripped the paint on the hearth to reveal the original red slate tiles. We also made the wood frame on the mantel.

We installed a swing arm rod over the door that leads to our screened in side porch -

Since the living room is where we spend most of our time with Juice, we focused on kid-friendly pieces. The rug and couch are great at hiding stains and we built the baby gate leading to the second floor using an old door.

Another great arch leads to the dining room from the bedroom hallway -

The only “negative” part of the house was the kitchen, it’s a bit on the small size but was in good condition -

Down the hall from the dining room are three bedrooms. Bedroom #1 -

This room use to be our spare bedroom, but we moved our master from the 2nd floor loft to this room right before Juice was born so we could be closer to her room. A coat of paint, some IKEA dressers and a Crate & Barrel rug later, we were in business -

And bedroom #2 -

And bedroom #3 before -

Once we found out little Juice would be joining the family, this room went from an office/catch all room to her nursery. The room is on the smaller side so we did our best to maximize storage space and buy things that were multifunctional, like the white shelves and dresser from IKEA and the crib from Walmart. And Riley LOVES the rug we bought!

The final room on the first floor is a full bathroom -

The bathroom was in great shape when we bought the house so all we’ve had to do is add some accessories -

The icing on the cake…the second floor! It’s basically one big loft with a little side room that has a walk in closet and a full bath. Brian immediately called dibs on the loft being his man room, but I had a ginormous master bedroom in mind. Now that we moved our master downstairs, we’re thinking about turning the loft into a family room/playroom, with the side room as an office.

After a lot of “oh my gosh”, “holy crap”, and “love it”, we finally made it out to the back yard. Here’s the before picture, check out the cute outdoor fire place -