Finally.

I finally took pictures of the inside of my house so I have a "before and after" set.  This morning, I had to get up bright and early at 6a to head to Citizens Bank Park for the Phillies 5k walk/run.  Let me tell you something - it should be against every law to have to be up that early on the weekend.  Especially when it's the end of March and it was 21 degrees when I left my house.  I am so ready for warmer weather, it's not even funny.   I actually thought about not going, but went anyway.  It did feel good to get out and walk, even though it was at the expense of my hands going completely numb and I had gloves on.  At the end of the walk it was all worth it, since I got this poster (which I'm pretty sure all my Phils Phans will be jealous of)

and this t-shirt (which I got yesterday in time for the race).

Now for the part you've all been waiting for...the pictures of my house!  We'll start first in the kitchen, since it needs zero work done to it. It was recently remodeled, and is pretty awesome.  Tons of counter space and a great stovetop oven which will make my baking life a whole lot easier!  Don't mind all the stuff I have all over the countertops already.  I'm still in the process of bringing stuff from my apartment and finding homes for it in the house.  Cool, huh??  I think the black trimwork and the orangy color of the walls is pretty cool, so I'll stick with it for now.

Next up is the dining room.  This room will be painted a light green color.  You can probably see my abstract squares and rectangles all over, since I was testing out some paint samples that I got at Home Depot to see how I liked them on the walls.

 

This is the view of the dining room from the foyer/dining room entryway.

This is the view to the dining room from the kitchen, and all the way through the foyer and living room.

Just a wider (and darker...sorry) picture of the dining room into the kitchen.  The light fixture and sconces are pretty cool!

Next up...the foyer.  All the floors are hardwood, with the exception of the third floor.  As you can see, the steps go up some, land, and then up again.  The banister is short, but will have garland on it for sure come Christmastime!! :-)

And for my HP fans...

...yes, that's a cupboard under the stairs ;-)

Next up...the living room...

This is the view from the foyer.  The French doors lead to a den, but, since it doesn't have any heating since it was originally a porch, I closed the doors because it is just downright freezing outside, and I don't need that forcing the radiators to work overtime.



This is the other wall of the living room.  That fireplace is great.  I love the built-in bookshelves!  Those boxes have all of my books inside, ready to be put in their place on the shelves!

Next up...the second floor.  This is the hallway at the top of the stairs.  If you can click and enlarge the picture, you'll see that the hallway wall on the right is actually CURVED.  How awesome is that?!  This green must've been someone's favorite color, because it's all over the house.  I'm not a big fan of it...hence the need for me to repaint literally everything in the house.  Except the kitchen.  And the basement (it's been totally refinished, but I forgot to take pictures.  Oops.).  I mean, they even did the bottom panel of all the doors with this green!  Ridiculous.  Anyways. This is the hallway.  Just off to the left is the bathroom, which I didn't bother to take pictures of.  No reason, just didn't.

Moving on...

The master bedroom.  There's an alcove in this wall just as you walk in, which is kinda crazy.  I feel like I should have antique pottery or something to display up there.  Ha!  There are two good sized closets on either side of said alcove (good sized ones for the 1920's anyway, which is around when this house was built), which is fantabulous since I have way too many clothes.  Way too many.  If you look closely, you'll see that all the doors on the second floor have the original crystal doorknobs.  If you love old houses like I do, you'll really appreciate that little factor.  I wish they'd kept the original doorknobs on the French doors in the living room, but oh well.  Note the hideous green on the bottom of the bedroom door.  Just because the bottom of the chair rail was this color, doesn't mean you do all the doors, etc. this color, too.  Ick.

There are two other bedrooms on the second floor, but they're not all that interesting.  Just bedrooms.  The smaller of the two will become my office.  The other bedroom will be used as an actual spare bedroom.  I'll post pictures when the transformation is complete.

Now...you really, really, really, need to brace yourselves for what comes next.  We're moving onto the third floor (yes, the third floor).  Please keep in mind that the third floor was divided and used as two kids' rooms.  However, that cannot even begin to brace you for what accosts your eyes at the top of the stairs.

The picture on the left is what greets you as you look upward to the third floor - purple.  Blinding, bold PURPLE.  Now, don't get me wrong, I love purple - it's my favorite color - but there is a time and a place for it, and this is neither.  Great googly moogly this hurts my whole face.  The picture on the right shows the opposite side of the room.  The giant purple rectangle is the door for storage crawl space.  Click on the picture to enlarge it, and you'll note the haphazard rag splotching that they did on the white walls.  No words.

Now, as if that wasn't enough, let's jump on over to the other room on the third floor.  This room is slightly bigger, although the ceiling is steeper, thanks to the roof.

Ahem.

 YELLOW.  I am NOT a fan of yellow, and this just burns my eyes.  This is awful.  Now, they did this artistically pleasing to the eye...so to speak...by having the dark walls on the right follow your line of sight to the front window, with the white on the walls on the left.  Let's take a closer look, shall we?

This is the wall that you see on the right in the above picture.  I cannot explain to you how hideous this is in person.  I mean, WTH are those splotches??  Not cute, my friends, not cute.  Or pretty.  Or anything.

I wish you could have seen the look on Rachel's and Maggie's faces when they saw the third floor, which was the last stop on their tour of the house.  Astonishment and disgust I think were mixed in there somewhere.  Haha!

Now, I know you're wondering when this wretchedness will cease, but I have to leave you with one final shot: the stairway leading from the second floor to the third:



I guess they figured they'd tie in the colors from both rooms right here in the stairway.  Note the purple banister and the yellow quarter round.

On that happy purple and yellow Easter-y note, I need to go stitch or do some scrapbooking or something to rid my memory of these colors...until I bring more stuff to the house next weekend.  Ha!

PS - pictures of the transformed rooms will be posted once they're done -- no "in progress" pics will be posted, so stay patient and keep an eye out! :-)