Master Bedroom Before and After

The room we choose for our master is on the second floor. We have two bedrooms on the second floor and one on the first. With plans to use the first floor one as an office, we went to work on the upstairs bedroom. The major problem with this room was that it seemed small and it was very dark. It measures 13 by 14 and fits our queen bed so we figured it would work until we had funds for adding on a garage with a master suite above it. This bedroom was painted baby blue with navy blue on the bottom and had a wallpaper boarder for the North Carolina Tarheels. Not quite our style. We pulled it down and spent hours filling pinholes in the wall. We choose a purple grey color from Sherwin Williams called Daydream, and accented with silver curtains and crisp white bedding. We also  lined a wall with espresso closetmaid modulars. Let me just say, I love these things. When we lived in a tiny apartment we gave up our bedroom set (which was a hand-me-down) and purchased a bunch of the closetmaid modulars so we could take advantage of the height without taking up much floor space. Through two moves these things have never been in the same configuration, but that's what I love about them. They are so versatile we use them in the office as bookshelves, in the living room as a media console and as end tables, even in the bathroom in place of a linen closet, and we also have them in closets. The espresso ones have a nice finish to them and we jazzed ours up with real hardware instead of the plastic ones that they come with. I also added some cute bins and baskets, and voila! Tons of storage that is flexible to your needs, easy to move and you only give up a foot of floor space along a wall. The major improvement to our bedroom makeover was the installation of a new huge window. This opened the room up immensely. It was probably our best money spent on this house so far.  Now I want to add windows everywhere.

Bathroom Before and After

Our second most important room after the kitchen, was a big priority prior to having company over to the house. We only have one bathroom (this was the biggest compromise aside from increasing our house shopping budget by $40,000) but we have plans to add another one or two in the future. This bathroom was victim to some inexperienced DIY-ers. The first thing you would've noticed was the color of the walls being a turd brown...ick! Then you probably would've noticed the outdated sink with a vanity that appeared to have been chewed on with a corner nearly missing. As you looked down, you would see the attempt of retiling the bathroom floor, with crooked tiles, cracked tiles, disintergrating grout lines and a stack of tiles to finish the floor stacked in a corner.  This bathroom is also home to the washer and dryer closet.

 We began by removing the sink and vanity, then we went after the floor. My dad helped us pull up the tiles, and we found a concrete board underneath it. We began replacing the floor with new tiles only to realize that the subfloor was a little too high and not even enough. So we had to rip up the floor again. This time we noticed that the concrete board was not the subfloor but an additional subfloor covering plywood that had tile adhesive all over it. To do it right, we ripped up both (backbreaking work for sure) and laid a new subfloor. This made the bathroom floor level with the tile floor in the hallway/kitchen area. It turned out nicely but was a lot of work. After choosing a vanity/sink combo and new light fixtures, we got to painting the walls. All the trim was painted a crisp with with the was being a bright blue. We painted the laundry closet a slate blue, and removed the cumbersome folding doors to make way for our fancy high-tech front load washer and dryer. My dad thinks you need a degree to wash laundry with these babies. While we didn't have funds to replace the tub or toilet, we freshened things up with a new curved double curtain rod, and a new faucet and shower head in the bathroom. The faucet wasn't planned, but when we went to repair the faucet that existed and it snapped off of the plumbing in the wall we had to open the wall and re-plumb the shower, which turned out to be a surprise $300 expenditure for parts. One of the joys of being a homeowner.  We added a new mirror and some shelving to make up for the fact that we do not have a linen closet, and overall it came out well. We aren't completely finished with the bathroom, we still need to add some lighting in the laundry closet and replace the toilet and tub, but it looks a lot better than it did.

More animal sightings

Driving home from a late night movie this past Wednesday, just yards from our driveway we spotted our first buck. A beautiful and large white-tail deer was quietly standing in the shadows along the side of the road. He was bothered by the sight of our car either. I couldn't snap a picture because it was a) very dark and b) unexpected, but he looked similar to this one:

Also this week, my husband who is an amphibian fanatic, found several specimen hopping/crawling along in the yard. He found a wood toad, a red newt, a spotted salamander, a green frog, and a bullfrog. This makes our property an unexpected delight for him because he has always loved catching and releasing these kinds of critters ever since he was a child. The bullfrog was actually screaming, but when we tried to take a video of it, it wouldn't make a peep.

An unexpected animal sighting

This morning at 9:30am I noticed a few birds/crows sounding the alarm so to speak. I quickly looked out the window to see a wolf trot along our edge of our yard and into the woods. This was incredible for a few reasons a) it was believed until recently that NH no longer had a wolf population (there hadn't been wolf sightings in decades), b) we live just feet away from NH largest city (manchester is home to 3 public highschools each with about 2000 students, plus 2 private highschools), and c) we have a cat and a Chihuahua-mix who frequently play in the back yard. Needless to say it was impressive but a bit unnerving also. Now the pets are going to be on a short leash so they don't become a bite-sized snack.