I think today’s post of our empty home tour is my most requested ever and, for that reason, I have been putting off sharing it for the last several weeks. Let me explain why. We moved into a house that is very much a fixer upper and will continue to be a work in progress. We don’t often see works in progress online or on social media, rather we tend to celebrate only the beautiful end result of blood, sweat, tears, and cash. I was, admittedly, feeling a bit self-conscious about the state of our home when we took ownership.
When I browsed Instagram and Pinterest I felt like everybody but me had a picture-perfect kitchen with those super on trend blue cabinets, marble countertops, and brass fixtures. You know the kitchen I mean, right? Their master bedrooms aren’t missing nightstands because they just can’t find the perfect fit. Oh, and their front yards. Their front yards are perfectly manicured with uniform bordered flowerbeds, of course! I was being really hard on myself and on our adorable, wonderful just as it is house.
The front of our Little Blue House on the Prairie. All decisions on landscaping are on hold until we determine how soon we need to replace the failing retaining wall to the left of the driveway.
After a few weeks of this, I took a deep breath and had a chat with myself. I reminded myself that we packed up our lives and moved halfway across the country to a city where we didn’t know anyone a mere month ago. There were no awaiting jobs. There were no guarantees. Crazy? Perhaps to some, but we chose this path because it would be an adventure. That is the same reason we chose to buy a fixer upper in cash rather than move, get traditional jobs, get a mortgage, etc. It would be an adventure to jump into this with everything we had and figure out a way to make it our own. So, I am cutting myself some slack and sharing photos today of our house as it was on the day we took ownership.
Remember, we purchased this house sight unseen. In fact we purchased this little house before I had ever even set foot in Kansas City! This house, to us, represents a leap of faith. In essence, we bet on each other, our resilience, and our ability to create something great out of this together. You will see in the initial photos some very obvious issues – one of which involves the ugliest shade of green you’ve ever seen – but I am hoping you will look past them and be as won over by our little home’s charm as we were.
As the months go on, and time and budget permit, I will be sharing our home’s final interior tours room by room. In the meantime, here is a little sneak peek.
A view of our living room. The walls are in good shape, so we aren’t painting them for the time being. We plan on painting them slightly off white later in the year.
Here it is, our beautiful green kitchen! I kid, I kid. It was hideous. We had it painted a gorgeous blue gray on our second day in the house. We don’t love the finishes but aren’t going to commit to a full reno until we have been here for a year or two. The space itself is large for a house of this size and it gets great light!
Our (very short) hallway inexplicably has seven doors. Full disclosure: on our first day I opened the door to the basement rather than the closet and almost fell down the stairs.
This is bedroom number one which is used as my husband’s office. It has two closets which is an awesome feature. He has not decided on what he wants to do color-wise.
This is bedroom number two which is used as my office and also our main guest room. It has a large closet I am using as an accessory/prop closet. The room is now painted off white and is like a breath of fresh air!
If you thought the green ended in the kitchen, you thought wrong. Never fear, we had the bathroom painted the same color as the kitchen and have also removed that rusted shelving unit over the toilet. It was quite an undertaking and required completely removing the toilet from the wall. Three cheers for my husband for taking it on!
This is our master. It isn’t huge but is a decent size allowing for our king-sized bed. We didn’t like the tan walls, so we had the room painted off white on our second day in the house.
The best feature of our master is that it has two closets! Our marriage is thankful for that.
Well, there you have it, your first glance into our new home. There are many hours of manual labor ahead (and even more blood, sweat, and tears) but we already feel at home in our Little Blue House on the Prairie. I hope you enjoyed our empty home tour. Thank you for coming on this journey with us!