July 2013

Its about time I share a bit of what we've got goin' on outside our house, because lately we've made some major changes and some minor changes and they have made a HUGE difference in the curb appeal of our home. So, let's take a look back at what our house looked like from the street when we bought it in 2010. These photos were taken by the previous owner just before we moved in. Notice the dated front doors and drab trim color. I knew I wanted to change these from the very beginning but we ~~had~~ have so much work to do on the inside of the house that some of the outside changes got put on the back burner.

In this shot you can see the weird little dwarf pine tree just to the right of the front entry stairs. Personally I think it looks like a Christmas tree with the top chopped off and obviously many other people did too. You wouldn't believe how many times people asked me what happened to the top of our tree...But apparently its supposed to look like that. Anyway, I spent a good hour and a half digging that thing out the first summer that we lived here.

We actually got a jump start to "project curb appeal" when our house was robbed this fall. Yes. You read that right. I was home when it happened and it was one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. But that's an entirely different and long story for another time or post. Nonetheless the burglary is what precipitated some major changes, such as new doors and windows. Obviously the windows and doors were as old as the house, which I believe was built in 1946, so that puts them at the ripe old age of 67. Some of the wood was rotting out, we only had one usable screen per room and the storms and screens were a major pain in the you know what to put in and take out. It was time for replacements, that is certain.

This is what our house looked like this past December right before the windows and doors were installed.

And here is the dated front door and peeling trim.

For the replacement windows, we got several estimates and hunted around to find what we felt was the best quality window at a reasonable price and we ended up going with a company out of Madison that uses Enviroview windows. We had a few bumps along the way with the installation and some errors made by the salesman but all the issues were resolved to our liking and overall we are exceptionally pleased with them... and we were also jumping up and down for the fact that we have 5 years to pay them off with no interest. Sweet deal.

Here is a view from my bedroom window from last fall.

And here was the view from my bedroom window right after our new windows were installed.

And here is the front of our house just a few weeks after the new windows were installed. Perhaps you can see one of the errors? The double-hungs in the living room are missing their grids. Eventually that issue was resolved.

Here is the front of the house, after we got our grids in the living room windows...and just after a January blizzard dumped a foot of snow on our driveway. Gotta love Wisconsin.

Let's take a look at the new front door. I love the Craftsman-style door with the shelf-detail below the windows.

As you can see from the following shots, the door alone wasn't enough. Our front entry still needed some help.

Well, mainly, it just needed a fresh coat of paint, and it was definitely time to get rid of that drab beige color trim.

The side door was replaced with the same door as the front door and it looks so much better than what we had. However, the trim around the door and surrounding the garage door is still in need of a fresh coat of white paint. I thought I would have gotten to that by now but I guess its been quite a busy summer. I'd like to add it to my "honey-do" list, but let's be real. We all know I'll get to it before he does. :)