Life Is What It Is: Our First Home

So we bought a house.. It has officially been a year! We bought it March 2015.
It is a tiny little thing, a little over 1,000 square feet built in the 1950s but for James and I, it is just the right size. I'll show you some before and after pictures, too! We did a LOT of work on it too, mostly cosmetic and some electrical, etc. It still needs work..

After we bought it, we discovered:

- the roof leaked near the AC unit
- all of the sprinklers were broken (and buried underground!)
- the thermostat was old (I'm talking it used mercury!) as was totally inaccurate
- all of the smoke detectors had no batteries
- the faucets leaked under the sink (all it took was to tighten the nozzle, why couldn't they have done that?!)
- all the electrical outlets were 2-prong
- the light fixtures were the 'nipple' lights (dome things with nipples on them.. That's how I describe them to everyone)
- light switches didn't work/went to nowhere land
- leaky toilet (turns out the tile was laid on top of the original floor and drain pipe, leaving a TWO INCH GAP where water was leaking into the floorboards...)
- only 1 fan in the house, and 1 light in the living room
- TV cables were wired in weird places THROUGH OUR WALLS (leaving gaping holes)
- we had WOOD FLOORS under the nasty carpet
- the walls were all blank neutral sand colored...
- oh, and we have gophers. (BTW, traps work best!)

The GOOD news is... We have awesome fruit trees in the backyard and most of the work we had done for free (thanks to my retired electrician daddy!) or we did ourselves. And according to my dad, we have what's called flex wiring, which makes rewiring the house a breeze! (Boy did it come in handy when an old wire blew as we were installing new lighting)

And the previous owners really did no maintenance on it whatsoever.
BEFORE....

Our Raider's grey exterior and dead bushes. I actually like the dark grey, but it needs a little pop of color... More on that later....(SCROLL DOWN!)

This is what the inside looked like when the previous owners listed it. Notice the plain, ugly sand wall color? They used a flat paint, so it was dull and all scuff marks stayed on the walls.

1950's original kitchen. You can see the nipple light at the top of the picture. The kitchen is dark green edges with nasty yellow tiles. Yuck. Also, the white kitchen was not white.. The color WAS papyrus something, but it had yellowed and was no longer clean, pretty white. Also, you can't see it here, but the ceiling was stained with grease. EW.

And 1950s bathroom in pink and dark red. Meh. (We replaced the toilet and discovered it had been LEAKING for years underneath)

During....

Found under carpet! Whattttt?

Kitchen in progress.

Painting.

Old wall color.

Putting in the new toilet.

Puke yellow.

After paint!

Pulled up the carpet... And wood floors underneath! We didn't refinish them, but plan on it in the future.

New carpet and new paint in the master bedroom.

New shower head.

Living Spaces bed and IKEA mattress.

Welcome to our front porch! :P

Added shelves to the pantry (they were painted white later). How did the previous owners function before?!

Painting the puke yellow walls in the office.

After!

New office! Galaxy Space Grey. Like Battlestar Galactica and Star Wars mixed into one!

Updated wall color and new couch from Living Spaces!

Target bookshelves.

We built these floating shelves with plans from Shanty-2-Chic in the kitchen. Click here for the process!

New lights courtesy of IKEA, new curtains (Target).

New front door and a DIY holiday wreath. All the old doors in the house had a 1/2 inch gap between the frame and the door. So bugs and air came in. ALL. THE. TIME.