So you may have heard… we’re having a baby AND we’re tackling our very first home reno. Are we nuts or what!?

Ok ok… we’re not literally doing everything by hand. We’ve got a great group of contractors from Foxwood Custom Carpentry and we’re trusting them with our project. They claim they can get everything done in just two months. I can’t believe it, can you? Lucky for us, that’s when our house closes and we’ll have to move in so lets hope everything stays on track. We’ve all heard the horror stories. I think our parents are ready for us to move in if we have to. Thankfully this is all expected to happen well before the baby arrives.
Are you ready to see it!? You may be shocked that this is all happening in just two months time. Scroll down to check out our beast on a beauty of a budget (I’m talking… a tight tight budget. Thankfully, we’ve got a bunch of collaborations in the works).

If you’re like me, you need pictures to really envision a project. I can’t tell you how many hours I’ve spent on Pinterest preparing for this one. They always say that making decor decisions for your own home is SO SO SO much harder than making decisions for your clients. They’re right! We’ve got lots of decisions to make and very little time. Things need to be ordered and ready for our contractors to do what they need to do.

You can see that we have a galley style kitchen. This will change in just a few weeks. In fact, just this past weekend we had some family help us expose the walls and rip up the floors to prep for our new support beam. The stove that you’re seeing in the picture above is actually where our new 10 ft island will be. I literally can NOT wait.

In the kitchen, you can see that we have an area for a kitchen table. Instead, we’d rather have a huge island that everyone can sit at and enjoy. Great for entertaining and I think it’s going to be great for kids. Can you see the vision coming together yet? 
The pantry that you see on the left of the photo above will be very different in our new kitchen. Our fridge will be going there and we’ll have to build the pantry unit out to align with it. I have NO problem with that. Means more pantry storage because it will have to be deeper:). Also keep in mind…. that kitchen wall is gonezo.
Our dining room is pretty quaint. The owner of our home REALLY took care of the place. Even the furniture is in immaculate condition. The carpet your seeing actually had hardwood underneath that was in amazing shape as well. We ripped it all up last weekend. The carpet AND the hardwood. I truly believe that having the flooring completely the same throughout the entire house will only help to make it feel a bit bigger. It’s a smaller home than we have now so we’ll take all the magic illusions we can get. 
The sliding doors open to our side yard. Honestly, that part is a bonus because the yard we have now is about the same size. The best part about the backyard!? We’ve got a pool! Man they’re expensive though. If you’re looking to buy a home with a pool keep in mind that your home insurance will definitely go up. Ours more than doubled! It’s also quite costly to get it started in the very first year because you need to buy a lot to keep it running smoothly and then of course the cost of entertaining. We’re looking forward to it though… just not the bill.
Our living room has the most amazing bay window at the front of the house. I’m absolutely in love with all of the natural light it provides. We’ll be replacing the draperies and opening up the walls in this room to make the entire floor completely open concept. I’m still debating whether or not we’ll be adding california shutters.
So that’s our new main floor! Renos area already underway and I can’t wait to share the progress with you. As I had mentioned, the floors are up, walls are exposed and we’ve just got a few more staples to take out before our contractors get started next week. I’ll be posting updates every Monday right here on the blog so stay tuned for pictures. My first reno video is going live this Friday! I’ll be posting that on Facebook if you want the true virtual tour.

Thanks so much for following along. This is only the beginning and we couldn’t be more excited!
Jackie xo