The 12 Days of Rehab

I can't believe we settled on our property less than two weeks ago--sometimes it seems like it was two days ago, and sometimes it feels more like two years.

After the first few days of dumpster filling, we got to work rebuilding.  At some point, I will post an entire entry with befores and afters of all of our rooms, but for now, I just want to focus on the fresh and new (and shove the old and dirty back into the dumpster where it belongs).

So after several buckets of primer and paint, some new trim, and our stuff moved in, here are the three rooms we have finished.

The living room:

We already owned the couch, the rug, and the two wicker chairs (they got a new coat of slate blue paint--in their previous lives, one was a vintage white chair, and the other was a new brown one). The bookcase, the lamps, and the little blue table in front of the window were donated by our friends Martin and Jennie.  I got the military trunk on Craigslist for $50. We splurged on the framed Life magazine cover ($70) and the two chippy chairs ($30 each).  The blinds cost a total of $120 for six windows at Home Depot. All of the accessories (pillows, quilts, books, etc.) were culled from collections in our house, including framed photos by Doug. The floats hanging in the corner were $2 at a yard sale.

The dining room:

Doug got these shots of me posing with my adorable 22-year-old daughter Christine, who came down for the day to provide entertainment while we assembled a futon.  She also brought along the muscle to help Doug move in the boxes, which were pretty heavy.

The cottage-style futon was our huge splurge in this room.  It sells for $799 at LL Bean, which I brought down to $399 with rewards cards and coupons.  The slipcover and bolster pillows were another $250.  I already had the vintage kitchen table.  I bought the four chairs on Craiglist for $60 and spray painted them assorted pastel colors. I got the rug on Overstock.com for $120.   The blinds came to $100.  We already had all of the accessories.  For the floor, we simply (well, maybe not so simply) removed all of the nails and staples after we pulled up the carpet and then painted it with dark blue-grey porch paint.  Doug gets big points for repairing and adding trim to make the whole room look better.

The bathroom:

This was our cheapest upgrade, and we will do more later.  I painted the walls and ceiling, pulled up dirty linoleum, and painted the floor the same grey as the dining room.  We bought the sailboat wall plaques at a yard sale for $2 each and the shower curtain at Good Will for $4.  At Bed Bath & Beyond, we bought a toilet paper holder and floor-to-ceiling shower caddy for $20 each. We already had all of the towels and other accessories. It's not shown in the picture, but I also painted a hideous gold mirror and hung a blue ticking curtain over the vanity opening to replace gaping drawers.

After my hero Doug went home in his pickup truck, Christine and I stayed for a couple more hours.  We went to Walmart and bought some playing cards and board games.  We came back and ate lunch at the dining room table and then played a game on the trunk in the living room.

Now, it's truly a second home.