These are a few of my favorite things

It's all in the details, right? These are some of my favorite parts about the house.

 I just love this front entryway! Love the herringbone marble and exposed brick. And that little piece of marble that is on the wall between the floor and the baseboard is original. It had been covered up! And of course the brick wall is original too. Love it!

 

Other view of the front entryway. So pretty with the dark floors!

 



This light fixture from Arhaus. It has an Edison bulb in it, which just adds to the coolness.

 

The rooftop deck stairs. We had to sacrifice some space to get interior stairs to the roof top deck - like a double vanity in the master - but I think it's totally worth it. No need to go through a bedroom to get to the deck, and I love the look of the stairs anyway!

 

My walk in closet!!! Need I say more?

 

 
These amazing coffered ceilings! Mike and I got this idea from an open house that we went to in Canton. I think it just makes SUCH a difference when walking into a house! I really love them - and our contractor did an awesome job installing them and making them look right.

Our master bathroom faucet. I just love the style of this - I'm not sure even what to call it. Retro?

 The backsplash/cabinet/hardware/granite combo in the kitchen. I was a bit worried about how all the whites would look together, but I think it looks awesome.

The foot rest in the master shower. I kind of had to fight for it, but a girl's gotta shave her legs and wash her feet! This makes it much easier :)

Uplighting in our tray ceiling. Our contractor said "it's kinda cheesy", which I get where he's coming from, but I love it. It's not like it flashes or changes color or anything!

 

This isn't really a "detail"...it's more of "the reason we bought the house"...but I just LOVE LOVE LOVE the view from the rooftop deck!!! So excited that we got in this house in time to really enjoy it this summer!

Domino Sugars sign, Silo Point, work (ha!), and water!

 

Raven Stadium, Camden Yards, downtown, and more water!

Patterson Park, the Pagoda, and Johns Hopkins

Straight shot down Potomac to the water.

 

Past and Present

Well, we are 1+ week in and finally feeling *somewhat* settled. But we still need to buy a lot of things! The priorities are blinds and rugs...and then a new hutch/buffet, new TV for the main room, and furniture for the basement. So the "after" pictures will be the empty house...for now!

Before - walking in the front door. I already put this one in, but it's just so dramatic I had to show it again!

During - completely stripped down! No ceilings, stairs, walls - totally empty!

After - everything is new! Floors, stairs on the opposite side of the house, ceilings...EVERYTHING!

 

Exterior BEFORE

 

Exterior after! No more formstone, beautiful historic paint, new railing, new windows, and you can see the roof top deck peeking through :) The only thing that's the same are the brick and the marble stairs (but they are both much cleaner)

 

Before - back of house

During - back of house

 

After - back of house. The upstairs was extended about five feet, new windows, and fresh coat of paint. And we still have our parking pad which has been GLORIOUS!! We've been going to new restaurants that aren't in Canton or Fells, just because we can since we don't have to worry about looking for parking when we get home. YAY!!!!

 

Kitchen - before.
 

Oh kitchen, how I love you!! The door and window are in the same spot (but they are both new), other than that it is completely different! I absolutely love how this all turned out - the dark floors, white shaker-style cabinets, light granite with nice dark splashes, dark hardware, white subway tile backsplash with gray grout, under cabinet lighting, the island, the hood, the pantry..everything! We just ordered three stools for the island - can't wait for them to come for both functional reasons and for a splash of pretty green color :) Not pictured: the hidden microwave in the island and the 56-bottle wine fridge!!

 

Before - looking towards the front of the house from the kitchen

 

Sort of after - I wish I had a better / more recent picture of this! But you can see the amazing coffered ceilings, exposed brick, and giant window.

 

Before - upstairs back bedroom

 

After - upstairs back bedroom - with the 5' addition.

 

Before - master bedroom with bay window, radiator, and ridiculously dirty (and smelly) carpet.

 

After - same bay windows! But now with exposed brick, wood floors (that are covered in this picture), and an awesome tray ceiling!

 

Before - the only full bath in the house! Gasp!

 

After - our amazing master bath! We went a little nuts with the marble, but we love it. And Mike loves his rain shower! I am old school and prefer the one on the wall, so I'm glad we could get both in!

 

Upstairs guest room bath. Nothing too fancy, but I finally get my jacuzzi tub!! Yay!!

Before - basement looking towards the front of the house. Scary disgusting awful basement was only 6' tall - Mike had to duck to walk around!

 

Basement - close to after, but ignore the tools in the front. The basements is now a luxurious 8+' tall and this will be a great second family/TV room.

Scary disgusting awful 6' basement looking towards the back of the house

 Basement now looking towards the back of the house! Closest door is a full bath, then the washer/dryer room, and the third bedroom in the back.

 

Basement bedroom - love the huge window and the exterior entrance.

 

 

So I think that's about it!! Looks a little bit different, no? My next post will be all of my favorite things about the house - including the bad ass view from the roof top deck!

Moving Day!

Well, my loyal reader friends, the day finally came. Nine months of excitement, fear, doubt, joy, disappointment, anxiety, stress, happiness, learning, and 10,479 decisions...and we finally made it. MOVING DAY ARRIVED!

Mike was supposed to capture me actually jumping, but this will suffice :)

Good morning Optima Movers! Thanks for being amazing and working SO hard and fast, not breaking anything, and not being very expensive. Highly recommend!

Mike and the Moving Truck (a good band name??)

Le sigh. As excited as we are to move to this house that we've poured our hearts and souls into, we will miss our Glover Street house. A lot of fantastic memories from this place! Mike was living here when we fell in love, then I moved in after we got engaged. So many holidays, memories, and laughter were shared together here.

Some celebratory Veuve on the rooftop deck, compliments of my awesome, thoughtful friend Pam. Thanks!

I am SO excited for my next post - a whole before-and-after spread! It will take me a while to go back and figure all of that out, and since we don't have internet at the house yet, it might be a few more days. Hold on tight! I'll leave you with a sneak peak to leave you wanting more :)

 

Walking in the front door...BEFORE

 

Walking in the front door...AFTER. Not one thing is the same - stairs moved to the other side of the house, open floor plan, all new walls and floors and ceilings and lights and cabinets and appliances and cable and speakers and countertops...



 

Clink!

It finally happened! Mike and I were FINALLY able to enjoy our first glass of wine on the new deck. The deck was one of the first things on the house to be built, so it's been there since about September. But the tricky contractors never put in steps, so it was a bit tumultuous to get up there. It was certainly not possible to finagle a bottle of wine up there without serious risk! And last weekend, the torrential rain prohibited us from going up there. But finally...here it is!

CHEERS!!! We still used plastic wine glasses...just to be sure :)


Other than that, there isn't TOO much to report. The biggest news is that we have our final walk-through on Saturday! Good thing too, since we still have movers lined up to move us the following Saturday. We also have electricity, so it's nice to finally see the bathrooms in real light, instead of just our cell phone flashlights. Some other updates...

Pendant lights are hung in the kitchen! If you've read previous entries of the blog, you know they aren't our first choice, but they are fine. 

Hardwood floors are STILL covered up and remain a mystery, but we did pull back some paper to get a glimpse. They are lookin' good! And our contractor, who is great but not what I would call "enthusiastic", said that they look really good. Yay!

 

 

We still have had little decisions here and there to make, such as picking out a mailbox! We are so ready to not make so many little decisions (most of which we don't care too much about) every day. It'll be nice!

 

The main things that still need to get done (that I can tell) are all in the kitchen: the backsplash, the hood, and the decorative pieces for the cabinets. I know that they'll at least by done by Saturday - can't wait to see how it all looks!!

ThisClose

We are thisclose to being finished with the house! We have made our final big decisions, and now it's just a matter of a few things finishing up - installing the appliances, finish staining the railings, laying the backsplash tile, and putting in the rest of the lights, outlets, and bathroom accessories. That's pretty much it! We even already have running water!

One big thing that was finally completed was steps to our rooftop deck! The actual deck has been there since early on, but there were never steps installed so it was a bit challenging to get up there. Mike and I had big plans last Friday night to grab some wine and have a glass on our new roof top deck before going out to dinner, but the torrential rainstorm that came through that night derailed those plans. I was excited to post a nice picture of us gazing over the water, clinking glasses....oh well. Some other time :)

Other pictures that I did take....

Stained railing and practically finished kitchen! And yes, it's still TORTURE that we haven't see the floors yet! So excited for the big reveal.

 

Vanity and lights are installed in the master! They still need to hang up the mirror (I should have taken a picture of it with the faucet on so we can all be in awe of running water).

Love these sconces that we picked for the basement! (notice railing needs to still be stained)

Fancy remote-controlled fan in the light-soaked master bedroom.

Vanity and lights in the second upstairs bathroom (still needs mirror to be hung)

Fan in the back bedroom

Railings in the basement.




The amount of house-based decisions we've made in the last few weeks is astounding. And it's mostly things I've never noticed or cared much about - fans, lighting fixtures, doorknobs, toliet paper holders, towel racks, faucets, etc. One lighting fixture that I'm really disappointed about is our pendant lights in our kitchen. We were excited to go with some super colorful, bold, fun lights...and as I mentioned in my last post, I was excited to find these:

This is what we ordered. So pretty! Nice deep reds, kelly greens, and bright yellows.

This is what we received. Heinous turquois, pukey green, pale lavender, and sickly peach. And poor craftsmanship. And these lights were $119 each, so it's not like I was ordering some po-dunk lights! These clearly had to be returned.

 

Clearly we were VERY disappointed. What made it worse is that the pendants HAD to be on-site, so we didn't have time to order anything else online. I went to several stores on Sunday (Mike was out of town for work, so I was on my own), and finally settled on these. I use the term "settled" on purpose - we don't LOVE them, but they aren't offensive either. They are just fine...they don't make the fun, colorful statement that we were hoping the pendant lights would make. My next career is starting a fun pendant light store - clearly there is a gap in the market for these!

 

Our inoffensive pendant lights. Sigh.

 

Here is a picture of most of our purchased items after a loooooong day of shopping:

So.much.stuff - all labeled and ready-to-go!

 

I'm sure that you've all been dying to hear what we picked for bathroom accessories and doorknobs. I mean, who care about granite choices and paint colors when you can find out if we went with rubbed bronze, chrome, or brushed nickel for the doorknobs and accessories?!?! Here are our THRILLING choices!

 

 

Oh my gosh! Rubbed bronze it is for the doorknob suite! Super-duper exciting.

 

Could you have POSSIBLY predicted Moen Kingsley as our bathroom accessory set? We went with Chrome for the master, and brushed nickel for the other two bathrooms. It is non-stop exciting facts on this blog!!!

 

We have pretty much everything lined up to go, so hopefully everything stays on-schedule. Movers are scheduled to come May 11 (we are so grown-up to hire real movers instead of luring our friends into helping us with promises of pizza and beer!). New tenants move into our house May 15, so we gotta meet that date! I can't really foresee anything that would delay us now, but never say never...