Tour of Homes

So, I've noticed that a few of my fellow bloggers are doing this virtual tour of homes. Well, it just so happens that our little money pit was actually part of Douglasville's annual "Old Fashioned Candlelight Tour of Homes" this past weekend, so it only makes sense that I participate!

Let me begin by showing you Bennett's first "15 minutes of fame" - a neighbor of ours who is a tour committee member asked Bennett and me to participate in a photo shoot for an article in our local newpaper promoting the tour. Of course I said yes, so here you go:


I guess it's kind of small and you can't really read the article, but you get the idea. And yes, Bennett has two n's. Leave it to the Sentinel to mess something up. I swear, I need to be their editor.

Also before we begin our little virtual tour, I wanted to add this:

Also not legible, this is the description of our home in the tour brochure. I thought they did a very nice job; we were happy.

So all of that being said/shown, here we go!

Welcome to our money pi - I mean, home.

First, two more things: 1) it's not actually our home, just a house we bought and restored. 2) I decided to kill two birds with one stone here and do not only a Christmas tour of homes, but also a before and after. So, it's kinda long, but, I hope you enjoy.

Yes, I know, it still looks like total crap from the outside. We wanted to have it painted in time for the tour, but it just didn't happen. We did cut the top of the porch railing off to make it look less like there is a fence on the front porch... And we also had porch lights installed and two very nice, lit topiaries on either side of the door the night of the tour. I just didn't get a picture of it.

Anyway, come on inside and into the foyer. Notice the newly sanded and refinished heart pine floors.

And to the left you will find the living room. Each window in the house has been carefully restored to working order and still utilizes the original window weights. Most windows still contain the original wavy glass panes.

On the fireplace are the stockings that Mama made for us, along with our pictures in each of our stocking holders. There are lots of handmade items in the house because if you know me at all, you know I'm not big on spending lots of money. Especially since all of it is gone, thanks to this masterpiece.

And on into the dining room you will find the home's second fireplace.

Here, I handmade a card garland.

Continuing on into the kitchen, we welcome you to the "work in progress" portion of the tour. The kitchen will eventually have the same refinished floors to match the rest of the house, and will also have new cabinets, countertops, and a breakfast bar. I'm not putting a before of the kitchen, because it pretty much still is the before.

In the kitchen we had a sad, scrawny little tree that wasn't really worth posting a picture of, but on the tree were great little homemade *real* fruit ornaments.

Exiting the kitchen and making a left, you will find the first bedroom of the tour. Also part of the "work in progress" segment, this bedroom, along with its (now) attached full bathroom, will soon be complete.

This being one of our "work rooms," we made use of what we had. Notice the extension cord wreath.

The attached bathroom:

This is the back hallway / mudroom area. In this space you will now find the water heater closet, utility closet, and the spacious laundry room, none of which were present in the home before the renovation. While still keeping the integrity of the historic home, we were able to create modern conveniences.

Traveling back through the kitchen and dining room, we now come into the middle hallway. This area is large enough for an office space, and has been wired accordingly.

At the end of this hallway you will find the common bathroom. The clawfoot tub was refinished (by my brother, thank you Jeff) and moved from the back bathroom into this bathroom so that it could be showcased.

In here we made a "bubble bath" of all gold, silver, and cream colored round ornaments.

Next, we come to the master bedroom. Before, this was just a large, awkward room being used for storage (not unlike most of the house, but that's a different story). We decided to turn it into the master bedroom.

This is also part of the "work in progress" portion of the house. The tree in here is decorated with real holly limbs from our back yard at home, and nandina berries from my parents' house. It is a 9 foot tree and I didn't want to put lights on the monster, so we just set up a work lamp and pointed it in the direction of the tree. Again, making use of what we had.

From the master bedroom you enter the master bath. Okay, this area used to be the master bedroom. We divided the room up into three parts to make the master bathroom, the walk-in master closet, and the laundry room in the back. The windows on that back wall were just far enough apart to frame up a wall in between them. Nice, huh?

Back towards the front of the house, we come to the last bedroom.



Well, thanks for touring, and if you know of anyone in the Douglasville area wanting to rent a great historic house from great people, let me know! :)