Honey, I’m Home

We bought a house! For the first time in my life, at the age of 35 (which I shall be in five days), I am officially a homeowner. I was a homeowner before by virtue of the fact that I am married to The Guy, I’m the one who banished The Pink Carpet of Our Discontent and Louisiana is a community-property state, but this time, my name is on the paperwork. I am, in equal measure, totally stoked and completely terrified by that fact.

Moving Day is 15 days from now, and there is an almost unbelievable amount of work to be done between now and then. But I’m so in love with this house, I kind of don’t care.

(This is, in fact, the house on which we made an offer that the owners, on the advice of their realtor, ignored. There’s a very entertaining conclusion to the tale, but just to be on the safe side, I’m going to wait until AFTER we close to tell it.)

(My attorney’s chest swelled with pride just then. He probably even has a tear in his eye. “My little walking libel suit is growing up,” he’s sniffing.)

Now let’s take a tour, shall we? With somebody else’s stuff everywhere? At least it’s somebody who has good taste.

The photos are unfortunately small, as I ganked them off a number of real estate websites before the listing was taken down, but they’ll at least give you the general idea.

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WELCOME!

You better believe I asked homegirl during the housing inspection where she bought every stick of her furniture.

They use this front room as a giant foyer, which is a great idea, but I’m not sure yet how we’re going to utilize the space.

The fireplace is gas. They have three small children, so they don’t use it, and we won’t either, I’m sure, but it’s nice to have a potential heat source if the power went out. Not that one is very likely to freeze to death in a Louisiana winter, but it can get mildly uncomfortable.

Exactly one year ago, after searching to the ends of the earth (or at least the Internet), we bought a sectional sofa…

…which is probably not going to fit in this room.

D’OH.

The color of this room is one of the first things I fell in love with about the house.

Needless to say, we’re not changing it.

The female half of the couple who live here spent pretty much all her time renovating this place largely by herself, and I know it sounds kind of corny, but her love for the house is obvious in every square inch of it.

They don’t show in the photos, but the house has several large skylights, including one in the kitchen, and they definitely contribute the open, airy feel.

STAMPED TIN BACKSPLASH STAMPED TIN BACKSPLASH ZOMG FAINT

“We can’t buy a house for its backsplash,” The Guy said.

OH YES WE CAN, DUDE. OH YES WE CAN.

You can also buy a house because it has a cute laundry room.

And because the backyard is already landscaped. HOLLA!

The husband planted several fruit trees, all of which are now mature and bear fruit. There are pomegranates, figs, oranges, kumquats and apricots. The fig tree is so huge that one of the first things I need to do after this year’s harvest (HARVEST! I am Ma Ingalls.) is prune that sucker, so if anybody has any advice about that, feel free to share.

Painted wood floors. I died. DIED!

We bought their bed. That probably sounds kind of creepy, but we love that bed, and buying theirs is a heck of a lot easier (and cheaper) than trying to find one on our own, and now they have one less thing to move. (We’re using our own mattresses, of course. I’m not THAT boundary-less, y’all.)

The downstairs bathroom is the only room in which we’ll attempt a large-scale renovation. It’s in fine shape now, and we love all the storage, but the tub, vanity and lighting situation are nothing to write home about.

Since it’s separated from the master by only a bathroom, this room will be the nursery. The Guy and I have agreed that we’ll transition Harper out of our bedroom after we move in. She probably won’t mind.

I’ll be a wreck.

This open area upstairs, which they use as a playroom, will function as my office.

This attic area will for now be our guest room, but one day, it’ll be the big-kid room (when we finally have some big kids). As you can see, it has its own attached bathroom, which contains two big closets.

I didn’t think about such a thing when we viewed the house, but during the inspection, we realized that the nook on the left underneath the skylight where they keep a small TV is actually an escape hatch onto the roof in case of a fire. Clever, huh? Actually, because all their children are so young, the couple have a lot of safety features built into the house, which is really nice for my peace of mind.

In addition to gorgeous paint colors and cute backsplashes and skylights out the wazoo, we have three friends who live on our street, sidewalks where Harper and the other small fries can ride their bikes and rollerskate and a neighborhood that has an annual block party.

There’s no place like home.

Your ecstatic
Kel