Feathering the Nest: Part Deux

Many people we’ve run into in the last month or two have been asking about where we live as well as the home improvement projects we’ve been working on, so in case you’ve been wondering too, here’s the skinny: Ryan moved to Charleston just over 6 years ago following graduation from Virginia Tech and purchased a Mount Pleasant townhouse, dating circa 1970-something. The home’s interior was covered in layers upon layers of wallpaper; every wall had a minimum of 2-3 layers and the walls in the kitchen had something like 10 individual wallpapers that had to all be scraped off by hand. Ryan recalls even the dishwasher was covered at one point with, you guessed it, wallpaper!

As the story goes, he had done most of the work to the place prior to our meeting and it was one of the things I loved the most about him- I was very impressed! Fast forward to present and not only have I gotten to help and give an opinion with the last couple phases of the renos, but I have been given the opportunity to do so many things I never thought I’d do, like use a nail gun, measure materials out for important cuts, learned a little about rewiring outlets and switches, prepping and installing countertops, uninstalling disposals, hanging tile and so much more! It has been such a FUN adventure!

So the first wave of renos went a little something like this: scraped wallpaper, fresh coat of paint applied in each room, gutted all three bathrooms, re-tiled bathroom floors, installed and tiled a shower for the master (was a half bath), installed bead board in all three baths, chair rail put up along stairwell, and fully cleared out the backyard of all overgrowth-all before we even met!

Phase II continued after we started dating with a new tub for the upstairs hall bath, a new coat of grey paint for the downstairs, and the kitchen demo which began with ripping out all but three cabinets. Then we installed a new pantry, a new opening in the wall to create a better flow, a stacked washer and dryer, new microwave, and wall trim. Additionally, we put up a fresh coat of warm terra cotta paint on the kitchen walls, and cabinets were whitewashed. The most recent and anticipated addition has been the white subway tiles for our backsplash. Throughout these recent upgrades, I have been trying to remember to take before and after shots to help capture the process, so without further ado…

As a word of advice to anyone thinking about doing some of your own home improvements, the biggest lessons I’ve learned so far have been to always stay patient and remember that no job is ever really done, there’s always room for another feather in the nest!

Wink wink- {don’t look too closely at our white cabinets…they’ll be getting another coat of paint this coming weekend} -!

That’s about all for now, hope you have a great week!