Sunday, August 13, 2006

Ta-DAH!

You know how a few pounds can sneak on every year until... well, you graduated high school weighing 115 pounds soaking wet and then 10 years later you realize that you've gained so much weight that the thought of running into a classmate has you "wearing sweatpants for all the right reasons". (I'd like to take credit for that, but it's a quote from King of the Hill.)

Yeah, so owning a home is sometimes like that. Especially when the home you own is older than you and your hubby's ages combined. Year by year, you let the little things slip by and you slap some pancake makeup on and you "make do" with what you've got. And you don't really notice. Especially things outside. The next thing you know, you're living in a house that looks bad. In fact, it looks like this:

house before


What can I say? It's Canada. We spend the majority of the year inside wearing touques, watching curling, and figure skating while we fight over who is going to put on their snowshoes and go to the store for a lottery ticket.

Painters were hired; scraping and painting was done and this is the result:

Painted!


We didn't realize what an eyesore the house had become until the painter and his crew told us that people were driving by, honking their horns and giving them the thumbs up!

It's hard to get a true representation of the colour. You'll just have to come visit.

Front doors


We're really pleased with the colour and are basking in the glowing compliments from all the neighbours.

Front door close up


Despite how good the house looks, we're still clinging to the last little bit of our slovenly lifestyle:

Slobs


That's the remnants of the tree we had "decapitated" after Hurricane Juan... and the last pieces of the shed... and the omnipresent trash cans.

Sigh. Baby steps.

11 comments:

  1. Anonymous2:47 p.m.

    I know exactly what you mean - you've been to our house.

    The new paint looks so fab!

    We'll probably just move eventually rather than paint (hell, that's what the previous owners did to us with the interior).

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  2. It's beautiful! Our house needs it too, but it's going to have to wait til hockey's over and the kids are grown and gone.

    Uh, that's still a ways away. Sigh.

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  3. Anonymous3:56 p.m.

    Beauty!

    I have such serious house lust at the moment, it's crazy...and this isn't helping! :) But I'm thrilled for your home makeover! It looks wonderful.

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  4. Those colours really are fabulous, it looks great!

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  5. Hi Steph,

    Don't know if you got my e-mail (maybe you thought it was more spam??) earlier this week.

    It's Julie (remember me??? Becca's former roommate and partner in crime?) I was talking to Becca earlier this week and she told me you have a blog...it's great, I've been skimming past posts in an effort to catch up with you!

    I learned to knit a few months ago, but since I haven't been diligent in practising, I am nowhere near as good as you are!

    Glad to see you are doing well, and just as crazy as ever (kidding!). Hey...at Becca's wedding, try and tell a funny story about her for me, will ya? :)

    Talk to you later,
    Julie (Todd) Chatten

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  6. Such a snazzy house. Beautiful.

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  7. Anonymous8:51 a.m.

    Great colours! I love the style of your house. What interesting windows on the upper left side. We are doing new siding as I type, going from a pale faded blue to a reddish brown with white trim. The roof will be done too before winter. Oh, the crows in the gutters... the crows come to mine and take a bath, if you happen to be sitting close to the house when they do this you my get an unexpected shower. I happen to like crows they make me laugh. BTW seeing two crows mean joy.

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  8. We had our house painted by a painter (not painters, just painter!). He did the WHOLE house (big South End Edwardian--not really mine, it's my IL's, but I like to pretend) with a ladder and a paintbrush. Three years later it still looks great. I have a lot of respect for house painters now Unless you had the guys that painted our neighbour's place--I listened to them arguing for days "you missed a bit" "no I didn't" "yes you did" "no" "okay then, I'll do it myself" (only with more expletives!).

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  9. I have house envy. And yard envy. I would so love to be able to toss my kids out in the yard to play, especially Cam. It's such a production just to get us to the playground at the end of the road, and he certainly can't go out unattended. Sigh. Someday, house and big fenced yard. Someday.
    BTW, love that colour, and too funny that your neighbours responded with such enthusiasm!

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  10. Your home is absolutely gorgeous!
    Great color.

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  11. Hmm, my place sort of looks like yours did before the paint job. But if in three years we still haven't fixed the dip in the dining room floor (caused by a CRACKED BEAM), it's doubtful we'll get to painting any time soon. Too bad, yours looks fantastic.

    Hon, I've been racking my brain to find reasons to come to Dartmouth. Checking out your paint job is a good one, but could we come up with some event that I could pass off as a "conference"? It worked to get out of writing an exam in order to go to Maryland Sheep and Wool. . .

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