Halloween Decor

Porch Railing!!!

Well, what can I say...we've got a porch railing. I love it!

We picked green....

The husband vetoed the red (for athletic-loyalty reasons) ----also, we thought perhaps it was a little too traditional for us, so we went with the green. I found some great black/white fabric and made a couple pillows. Now, I really want a porch railing.

Chairs....

I'm trying to pick which chairs to buy for our front porch. Will you help?

It's between the green and the red.

My thoughts are that the red is traditional, and the green is a little edgier (funky)?? I like them both, but I'm not sure which I like best.

Which do you like better?

BTW, I'm thinking of added a black and white pillow to each chair, to bring back the black from the door and shutters.

Snow

Well, we've had our official first real snow "storm" here in our new house. Isn't it pretty.

By the way, have you seen how long and slopey our driveway is?

Christmas Lights

Just a little something.

Shutters!

We knew, the first time we saw this house, that we would someday want to replace the white shutters with black shutters. When we got our deposit back from our last place, and were surprised to see that it was more than we expected, we decided we should just go ahead and do it now.

We love how it turned out. It just took a lot of effort (obviously, mostly on DJ's part)

Half-way done.

The best thing of all is being able to look at the Before & After pictures.

Shrubbery

Our first round of planting.

Dwarf English Boxwoods on the right; Golden Euonymus on the left.

They are little now (you may need to click on the images to see them in the larger version), but they will grow. :)

Mulch!!

We spent most of the day on Wednesday loading up compost/mulch (Thanks, Ed, for letting us use your truck...and wheelbarrow, and tarp) and dumping it in the curbed out landscaping areas. It was quite a job, but is a great improvement. Just another step in our landscaping plan. Someday we'll add flowers, bushes, trees, and such. :)

Goodbye Swingset

The previous owners left their swingset behind. The truth is that our kids really are too big for it anyway. (Kylie could probably get a year of play in, but Connor's definitely too big)

Before & After

Our plan is to build some garden boxes in this area and then do some pea gravel around them....and possibly a pear tree. :)

The Fence

Shortly before we moved in, our neighbor came to introduce herself. She also said she was putting in a fence between our yards. (I guess they had already decided they didn't like us....just kidding) It's amazing how different it makes our yard feel, just by defining it a little.

Before & During

After

After

Clean Slate

Before & After (the weeding):



It's a clean slate. Now we just have to figure out what to do with it. Any suggestions?

Snails

They are lurking.... they are hiding....
I'm completely obsessed with defeating each and everyone of them. (and there are hundreds)


Do you see them, mocking me by hiding below my siding.



Look closer...

The House - The Lawn

There's so much to do with this lawn, so many weeds to defeat. Here it is after its first mowing...and some more weeding.

Don't laugh at our mower, we love it. :)

The House - Day 2

The House - At the beginning of Day 2.

Can you see what's different??

-The front door is black

-The front door knob and lock are new. (Satin Nickel...with brand new locks and keys)

-Some weeding got done (thanks Mom & Dad)...can't you see that spot just to the left of the front door??

The House

So, you may already know that we just bought a house. We closed on Monday and now the work is beginning. For the next little while, our blog will be a way to document all the "great" changes we'll be making...with before & after pics.



So, here's the before pic of the front of the house. This is from Day 1, before any work.



As you can see, there's plenty of work to do just on the outside. (can you say weeding?)