The BIG House Reno's

We bought the house we are in now, 5 years ago. It was a bit of a panic buy and also a big "why on earth did we do that" buy unfortunately! However, we had rented for years and years, moving from country to country and house to house and we felt more than ready to settle.

We did buy a house back in the UK and loved it. It was in a beautiful village called Hale and it was just perfect. We tried our hardest to settle, got a mortgage, had a baby, tarted the house up a bit....but after a couple of years, our gypsy tendencies took hold once again and we had upped and moved to Australia!!

We rented again for 3 years and when our rental agreement was up, we decided it was now or never, we had to stop our gypsy tendencies and settle once and for all. For the childrens sake if not our own! So within a month we had bought the biggest and ugliest house you had ever seen. However, for the area we had chose it was darn cheap! YES, we'd bought a right old donkey of a house!

On first viewing I had said NO WAY. Too big, too much work to be done etc. But hubby had other ideas. Lets do it up, make some money and move on. So with this in mind, a 4 and 1 year old in tow and a desperate need and yearning to finally settle down, we bought the house.

TA DA!!!!!!!!!

BEFORE !!

BEFORE - This is my work room. It's two small rooms with a door (we took off) in the middle. So I use one to create and the other to compute!

AFTER - Not quite after, but this is with the wall knocked down. Once the girls want their own bedrooms (they share quite happily at the moment) we will have to move into this one, but for now this will be my studio :) 

I never loved the house and in the back of my mind it was never "ours" It still felt like we were renting. It was just somewhere to do up and move on. So we went all out to do it up. You know what it's like when you first move in somewhere, you just want to paint, hammer, and buy!! But after a year of trying to do stuff around children we started to lose hope. Our heart just wasn't in it as we both didn't love or even like the house any more. A couple of years ago we got a second wind and we started on the bathrooms. It was such hard work and trying to keep the kids occupied whilst getting work done was frustrating and the guilt factor was huge. We knew we were renovating to sell and all the choices of colour and appliances were chosen with this in mind.

BEFORE !!

 BEFORE !!

BEFORE

BEFORE 

AFTER

AFTER

AFTER

AFTER

Not quite there yet. New steps and render to be done yet....

So Jan last year we decided we'd had enough of renovating (ourselves) and wanted to just sell the damn thing! We didn't care that it was unfinished, we just wanted rid and to buy somewhere we truly loved, so we could put our stamp on it and decorate it how we wanted, not for selling purposes. So we called the estate agents, had appraisals done and went to visit other houses on the market. How depressing. We found the house wasn't worth diddly, other houses in the area weren't going for what they really should be going for and if we moved it would cost us a fortune. Having made the big decision to move on and after looking at lovely, sparkly new houses, we were devastated that we would in fact be staying put in a house we hated

BEFORE

BEFORE

BEFORE

BEFORE - This is the kitchen/family/dining/lounge. A huge room but we really needed a separate lounge, so that if the kitchen was a mess (always) we didn't have to look at it 24/7!

AFTER - New hallway. A new wall was put in, which not only made the kitchen/family area smaller and cosier, but also gave us a big hallway.

 AFTER - This is the separate lounge that was created. It used to be a massive bedroom that we never used. It also had a third bathroom in there and a walk in robe which we have knocked out and made into a pretty big study.

AFTER - The smaller family room with brighter colours added :)

After a few months of going round and round in circles I finally got a builder around to give us ideas as to how we could change what we had and I was surprised that we could actually move walls/rooms around, creating the oh so needed garden space that we had craved for 5 years and make the house basically more usable.....all for not much more than the stamp duty we would have had to pay!!

BEFORE

BEFORE

BEFORE - This was the front/spare bedroom that we never used as it was too big and cold and had an awful view. Dave used it as his "painting" room!

AFTER - So this is the "adult" front lounge. The door to the left was my ingenious idea. It's where the old bathroom/walk in robe used to be but now its a sliding door into our study with tonnes of storage space. I can be on the computer and keep an eye on the kids now!

AFTER

AFTER - The sliding door going into the new study

AFTER - Nearly after - the new study

Well that did it for me and we started work in September 2013. We are nowhere near there yet, but the girls have now got a garden, the house has rooms we "use". We used to have rooms that we didn't even go in before. With a little re jigging of walls, it's amazing what you can achieve and now we will really use all of the space we have in the house. Dare I say it's becoming our dream home and with it being so big, we won't ever have to move again!!

Before and After Pics

The girls room

Most of all, I love the fact that now I can buy "stuff". When you have been used to renting for so long (especially when you move countries), you don't tend to buy "stuff" Now I can buy as much stuff as I like and not in boring browns and beige that would suit the masses, but bright, colourful and highly patterned throws and cushions/ornaments. Stuff that makes my heart sing and makes ME happy!!

Heres to happy times in our old/new home and I promise to keep you updated with the finished thing....whenever that may be!! :)

P.S - I made the coat hook :)