A hello and some ‘before’ pictures

Good morning, my dears. Hope you all had a great weekend. We’re officially signed up to participate in the march WildHare Flea Market here in Pocatello at the Bannock County Fairgrounds March 22nd and 23rd (go mark your calendars now!). I’m so excited and already have some really great pieces that will be up for grabs. I may be posting an item or two here and there, but for the most part, I’ll be stocking up for the flea market over the next four weeks. In the mean time, though, I’ve decided to take the next little bit to post pictures of our new home. I also have a stack of projects I’m planning on sharing, too.

I’m so excited to finally give you a glimpse of what has, honest-to-goodness, been our baby over the last six months. Blood, sweat, tears, sleepless nights…you name it. This house sucked the life from us. We’ve bought and sold several houses since we’ve been married, but this one just about put us in the grave. It had a terrible mice infestation and mold (both of which we properly mitigated), not to mention the fact that every single room was indescribably filthy. The stench was so bad I couldn’t (and still can’t!) believe someone actually lived here. I remember laying in bed at night, sick to my stomach, worrying about things being properly cleaned to make sure none of us contracted some sort of nightmarish disease. It was a long autumn for our family. And nothing in the house went untouched – all 3300 square feet! There were walls to be taken down, bathrooms to be ripped out and replaced, a kitchen that needed a full overhaul, new paint throughout the entire house, new texture in the basement, new flooring everywhere, new windows, new exterior paint….etc., etc., etc. Gah! I think about all the work that was done, and my head just spins. Three months of chaos behind us and it finally felt like home. We moved in in November and I’ve so much enjoyed taking time to settle in and decorate. While we still have those annoying, small things to check off our list, (and a huge yard to put in in the spring time), we’re mostly done with the major things. I’m so thankful. I’m also thankful to Mr. Keller for putting up with my demanding shenanigans. I was the one who fell in love with this house and I was the one who begged and begged and begged to take on the project. We done near pulled each other’s hair out in the process, but we’re still married and I’m thinking if we survived that, we’re thick as thieves. (Though, I daresay we probably won’t be doing anything like this ever again.)

Anyway, without further ado, here are some ‘before’ pictures I snapped the 3rd and final time we did a walk-through of the property. It was a short-sale home and we ended up closing the day before it was to go into foreclosure.

{ The Entry}

{The Living Room}

{The Family Room} – and the gorgeous brick, wood-burning fireplace that was the cupid’s arrow. Head-over-heals in love, you guys.

Wood beams, kids! Wood beams!

Orange walls, turquoise countertops!

{Dining Room}

Purple! YES! And how *great* is this wallpaper?!

Down the stairs we go…and for the record, when I look back and think about how we took our kids through the house before it was scoured from floor to ceiling, I just about send myself into a full-blown panic attack.