I feel like I’ve writing these house plans posts FOREVER and nothing much changes, but the plans we had for last year were de-railed when we had to pay for the whole house to be rewired – stealing our kitchen revamp funds. But this week the sale of Jim’s old house (the one we used to live in before here) went through which means that we can now be go go go on some of the plans we’ve been putting off since we moved in! And we have some big plans of what we want to change now we can think about it. So here are some of the changes we’re talking about making about the house over the next year!
- First off, to finish up the hallway. We’ve been working on it in bits and pieces for the longest time and it is so close to being finished (I’ll blog this soon because we’ve made some BIG changes) we just really need to get some flooring down. The stair carpets are ordered and the parquet for downstairs is underway too! What I really need to do is find some beautiful light fixtures to replace the paper ones we have up at the moment. Tell me everyone resorts to those paper student ones as place holders.
- Next we need to get the windows sorted. We have beautiful original sash windows across half the house and they really are nice but over the years they have been painted shut and don’t open anywhere but the spare bedroom, and they’re super old and draughty. Also at some point the old house owner replaced the bedroom windows with some crazy metal framed monstrosity. We’ve had a couple of quotes so now is the time to get them sorted! Winter seems the best time to get windows replaced, right?
- Once the windows are in we’ll be looking at replacing the kitchen. This has basically been Jim’s must do around the house since we moved in. The current kitchen has no cupboard space, missing cupboards after the boiler replacement, and we hardly have any counter top space and what it does have is tiled. Tiled. Who tiles their counter tops? I’ve handed over the control of the kitchen reno to Jim mostly, but I’m hoping I can have a little bit of an input into it. At the moment Jim’s just at the point of figuring out how the kitchen should be laid out, what it should contain and whether we should move the door.
- There is one room in our house that is permanently locked for ours and our guests safety, and it’s the shower room. When we first moved in we had the boiler replaced and it meant ripping out the shower cubicle in there as there were lead pipes involved. Then we had a bit of a leak and the roof above that room fell in a bit and made a huge mess. Ever since I keep the door locked from the outside as it’s an abomination. Jim wants to wet room it – just turn it into one big shower, but I think we might need to make sure it’s got other bathroom qualities to it, like a toilet and a sink! It’s a discussion we’ve been having for, well, months!
- We made some big changes to the garden last year – we ripped out loads of plants, made a big change by replacing the fence, and grew some grass, but in the next few months my dad and I are going to build a raised planter for veggies, and then as soon as it gets a little bit warmer, we need to rotovate the space where the dug up plants were, and throw down some grass seeds, then it’ll be a case of keeping our fingers crossed to see if it grows. That’s how this gardening stuff works right? (If it doesn’t we’ll be buying turf I think)
- And last on the list of things to accomplish around the house is doing something with our bedroom. The bedroom is a room we’re totally living with but both hate. It’s got 1970’s style built in wardrobes that are actually too small to fit our bed between, and there is matching window seat and dressing table to content with too. The walls are a yellow stripe and the carpet is green. It needs ripping out and everything needs starting again. EVERYTHING. But I think it’ll be the last on the list as the shower room, kitchen and windows are far more important and needed.
So, there you have it – our list of house changes for 2017. There’s not much to do, right? Are you planning any house changes this year? Got any tips for anything we’re planning?