Home Tour

Well peeps I'm still here, and I'm still living it up, Louisiana style.  There is one thing that has changed though...MY ADDRESS!  We moved from The Internet Black Hole our rental recently to our super duper awesome new (to us) house.  Its actually the same age as Señor Hotness, but I'm thinking that's a good vintage.  I'm still in the process of unpacking, and organizing our mess...literally.  Stay tuned for pictures of us updating our home backwoods babies style.  Until then here are some pictures of it before we closed.  Looking all empty and lonely.  So without further ado...

Isn't she beautiful?  Pretty Miss J offered to name her for us, but we politely declined.  I didn't want our house's moniker to forever be known as Princess Pink Castle, but seeing as how our home is full of ladies (with the exception of Señor Hotness) maybe it was a fitting name. I'll pass all the same.

This is our formal living room.  What I love about this room is the awesome hardwood floors, and the plantation shutters.  Also the fact that when I have guests over it provides a place for the adults to hang out while the kids run wild in other parts of the house.  I'm not crazy about the beige, but that is a problem easily remedied.

Here it is so far.  Stay tuned to see how I tweak the furniture pieces to suit my style (on a shoestring). 

Just another angle of....AWESOMENESS!

The little desk in the corner is my office area, and was a freebie gift from my best friend, Awesome Kristie.  All of the furnishing in this room (except for the piano) were either free, craigslisted, or purchased off of a Facebook sale group on the cheap. Honestly most everything fits in the free category, which makes my heart happy.

This room is my family room, and I love it!  Here in the south is gets hot, and with the humity it feels like your face is melting off.  Its not though.  Its just you losing a majority of your body weight through sweat...I only wish I were joking.  Those stained concrete floors are refreshingly cool though, and a perfect way to combat that insufferable summer heat.  This room is sporting a lot of the same color though, and I'm honestly not a fan.  I prefer a higher contrast.  So this one will also be getting a new wall color to spice things up.

Just keeping it real. I though I should show where we are in our unpacking and organizing initiative.  When I move I use extra clothes to pad my breakables because I'm too cheap to buy bubble wrap, but the aftermath is, well...this.  Its getting better, and I'm determined to have this squared away tomorrow...hopefully.  I mean I have to because we are having birthday revelers over to consume vast amounts of cake.  Pretty Miss E and Pretty Miss J share a birthday, and I think it only fair for them to each have their own cake...but then we need help eating it.  Its rough being our friends.

Then there's the downstairs guest bathroom, or as we call it the 'monkey' bathroom.  If you've been reading my blog long you will know of my intense dislike for wallpaper.  Its a pain to remove, and it becomes dated far to quickly.  It is the tattoo of the design world.

I hate to be harsh, but I will say this was the only thing about the house that I REALLY didn't like.

I'm now in the process of removing the munching little buggers now.

Semi-updated pictures coming to a new post soon.

This is the breakfast nook.

I LOVE the brick flooring in here, and in the kitchen.  I sadly still don't have a table in here, but we are going to be using Señor Hotness's desk for its intended purpose in this room eventually.

Double OVENS!!!!  Please try to look past my mauve counter-tops.  I have plans to give these a new look until we agree on what surface we want to use for the counter-tops.  You never know.  We might just do pennies again.

I don't really feel strongly about the trash compactor, honestly, but we have one now so I'm sure to form an opinion soon.

The pictures make it seem small, but its honestly pretty roomy with lots of storage space.  Which is good because I have a lot to store.  Another awesome feature is the over-producing ice maker on this fridge.  Most might find this annoying, but seeing as how I live in the south where a beverage isn't refreshing unless its consumed on the rocks.  So this is a huge boon.  In all of our former homes I've had to ration the horde's ice consumption so that we didn't run the well dry on a daily basis.  I also realized that I would never be happy with any kitchen if I kept comparing them all to our Texas kitchen.  After I stopped holding up that impossible standard I could find happiness is my cooking space once again.

Do you see those double doors? Holy pantry space Batman, and this pantry is the same depth as the double oven cabinet so its extra roomy.

This is the dining room.  I will just say that I am not overly fond of the color, or the extremely formal curtains.  I'm just not a formal person, and the overall feel of this space doesn't fit with my personal style.  You can bet that I going to give it a little Backwoods Babies flair soon though!

Sorry I just threw this one in because I REALLY, REALLY love those floors.  Did I mention how much I love those floors?  I do love them...

This is the upstairs guest bathroom aka the little girls bathroom.  Nothing overly spectacular about it, but in case you are keeping counting that is toilet number two for our house full of ladies.  The wall color is absolutely perfect for a girly paisley shower curtain.  So yeah!  Not need to paint this room.  Just hang our shower curtain and done.

The is the room for the youngest two, Pretty Miss J (Destructo Girl), and Pretty Miss P.  You can't see it, but there is another closet.  So even though we are doubling up in the rooms they still each have their own closet.  I've got some fun ideas for this room that involves dots and stripes.

This beige room is where my middle two, Pretty Miss H and Pretty Miss A are going share.  They also have their own closets, and at 11 and 7, being women who know what they want, have decreed that the beige is blah.  They REALLY want to paint this a pale turquoise.  That's on the list to happen as soon as I de-jungle the bathroom, and banish the maroon from my dining room.  Thank heavens I already have most of the paint on hand.

In this house my awesome oldest, Pretty Miss E, gets to have her own room.  She has dreamed about this blue room for weeks, and it goes beautifully with the Parisian Hope Chest she and her sister worked on months ago.

Now on to the master bedroom.  I don't want to brag, but my bed looks like a million bucks in here.  I will have to take pictures soon after I get all the boxes out of there.  This room also currently looks like a war zone, but I will tell you that we are using sewing tables as our bedside tables and that also looks crazy awesome.  This room has a built-in corner unit, and his and hers closets.  These curtains here are also a little too formal for my liking so I'll be looking for alternative ways to dress these windows and the door.  Speaking of the door it leads out to our very own...

Balcony!  I have always wanted a balcony. As you can tell from this picture our new house is located in town.  I never really thought that I would want to live in town again, but this is in an old established neighborhood with big lots, great curb appeal, and is fantastically family friendly. Honestly its super quiet, and doesn't really feel like town.  I'm in love.  Okay lets head back in for a moment.

To the master bathroom, and there my friends is toilet number 3.  I know that in today's market its all about huge bathrooms with all the bells and whistles, but...can I just say that its been roughly 7 years since I've had a bath tub in MY bathroom?  A woman should be able to take a soak at a reasonable hour of the night without fear that any of her MANY female children are going to waltz in, rip back the curtain, and stare at her, naked.  The need is great, and for that reason I LOVE my new master bathroom.  It has his and hers sinks, and despite the shower/tub combo the tub is a surprisingly spacious tub, fabulous for soaking.

This was one of the biggest selling points for me.  This my friends is the "fifth bedroom", but its what we are choosing to call the...playroom.  What?! Thats right we have a playroom!  I want to scream it from the rooftops...or my balcony.  In this room there is also a large walk-in closet for all of our games, karaoke machine, and the horder-like toy collections that we have accumulated over the years.  The best is the walk in closet door has a lock so they can't just get it all out at once, and trash this room.  Also inside one of the attic access doors is an old wooden sled (not sure what use that sucker is in Louisiana but...).  Unfortunately my younger girls are having trouble with the word so if they ever tell you that we keep our slave in the attic...rest assured its really just an old sled.  No human trafficking happening here!

This was a selling point for our girls.  At least the little ones.

The play equipment.

Sorry for the rail through the picture, but I snapped this off the balcony.  As you can see this is where they are choosing to spend most of their time.  I often lose track of them only to look at the window to a scene similar to this one.  Unfortunately we are trying to get a handle of the mosquito problem because what isn't obvious is the creek that runs through the back yard.  Our girls love it, but it is a breeding ground for the buggers...and my kids are tasty.

Under the balcony, and outside the family room doors is this awesome feature.  The porch swing.  As much as I've always wanted a balcony.  I've also always wanted a porch swing.  How fortuitous that they came as a packaged deal.

The littles have also been loving the swing.  This home has been such a blessing for our family, and we look forward to making many happy memories here.

linked up at: jannolson.blogspot.com, thededicatedhouse.com, savvysouthernstyle.net, www.shakentogetherlife.com, the-chicken-chick.com