Doors!

I had THE MOST FABULOUS DAY - but I'll post on that tomorrow. I know ya'll want to see the new doors.

So - we had the remodelers in last weekend. It was one guy and he worked about 6 hours two days and did all of this. I didn't really want to show the laundry room pics yet because I'm going to paint it and get a new curtain but who knows how long that will take in real life - I better just show you what we HAD and now what we HAVE.

K- so the laundry room before. Pretty basic. The house is kind of weird- the garage is NOT attached. The house and garage are about one inch apart- they butt up against each other AND share a roof- but the builder decided not to attach them. SO WEIRD and inconvenient ... laundry before.

This is a close up of where we asked him to put the door ... we had our suitcases stacked up there and it used to get REALLY hot when we ran the dryer. No more!

Lookie there ... a door! I am painting it too- white. I guess AND the casings around the door have been put up now- they weren't in this picture ... but LOOK we have a door !!!!

Now this was taken by me standing in the garage looking into the house. Something I never thought I'd see ... and there's B standing on the platform. She's never been allowed to roam free in the garage. If we were ever in there, the big garage door was open and she could escape. Conrad added a motion detector to the light too - so now when we open the door, the garage lights up. It's like- we're real high class folks now! Also it's been SUPER nice to take out the trash or run get a hammer at 10 o'clock at night and not worry about someone hiding in the bushes ready to conk you on the head. Classy and Safe!

Ok- front door before. Hardware is sort of weak - but it was a good door. I painted it a few years ago. But look at that sad light ... I think we lost the globe in Hurricane Ike - and it's builder basic. Ick.

Now look at that! Look at that light! SHUT UP - it's sort of big and masculine and I don't know ... super cool. This was the most exicting thing for me. How easy am I to please? Don't tell Conrad - he'll never buy me diamonds again - he'll give me light fixtures for every holiday from here on out ...

Ok, this part is embarassing. So the builder did a BAD job and every time it rained, water got back behind the door. We had no idea ... until one day when I propped open the screen door and the thing holding it to the door popped off and look what we had- wood rot .... and I started thinking BLACK MOLD- we are going to DIE ... Conrad thought we would probably live, but who wants to look at THAT every day GROSS. Turns out- that's really just the door frame, not the house, the whole thing pops out ... So that's what we did. Got an entire new door and frame.

Hello! No more wood rot! Look at that - 100% difference! ... and the screen door is connected now too. I KNOW!

K, and here is the new door with the new hardware. Look at that big strong handle and lock- and that beautiful peep hole and knocker. It's like we're living in paradise or something.

... and that is the extent of the current renovations. I talked to Conrad and asked him just how much more $ were we going to pour into this house? He wanted to get it ready to rent. People look at rent houses like they do when they buy. I mean they have choices - why not make your house look really appealing? To be honest, this is one of the best ones in the neighborhood especially now with the attached garage. We also have gutters and sprinkler system - and it's professionally painted on the inside. It's a nice place.

So we're renting it ... we at least know that much - now the question of building vs buying. I'm hoping that question is solved soon. There are a lot of builders around here that went out of business - new homes and former models homes are on the market all over the place - it's sort of like building a new one, if you found one you loved ... so we're looking ... and in the meantime making this a palace so someone will want to pay us to live here.

Kah