Method & Madness ~ One ~

This is the first post in an ongoing series – which will be staggered in and around my regular posts.  I want to explain  a little about how we came to be where we are, why, and how it’s going to help us get where we’re going.

We’ve never owned a home.  We’ve always rented, pouring thousands of dollars a year into someone else’s mortgage.  I’ll be 37 in a couple of weeks, and hubby is 42, and we both thought we’d be so much further along in life by now.  I can’t complain too much – the path I’ve chosen has given me the most beautiful daughter – who is turning out to be the best young woman I know.  It’s led me to Hubby, and so many great friends along the way.  Had I not chosen this path, I would be missing out on all of those blessings.  But now, it’s time to move forward.

We’re both tired of throwing our money away into something that will not benefit us…ever.  So when this opportunity came to us…more like fell into our laps (with the help of a co-worker), we just couldn’t say no!  We had been looking for a place in town for some time, but nothing was available within our budget, and expectations.  When I got a text one day from a co-worker, saying there was this house, but it wasn’t exactly what we were looking for, I thought we’d take a look anyway.

It was bad.  Oh, it was really reeeeaaaaallyyyy bad.  The worst place I’ve ever looked at, let along lived in!  The smell, the crud…it was just disgusting.  We took it on the spot.

Are we crazy?  Well, maybe just a little.  But we’re also smart, and determined.  This little house is less than half the size of the one we moved out of.   Moving out of a 2000 square foot farm house, and into a 750 square foot “cottage” house, takes some major adjustments.  Especially when it looks like this….

Living Room

Kitchen

Master Bedroom

Friends, let me tell you – it smelled as bad as it looked, if not worse!  Between the orange and lime green carpets, psychedelic linoleum, wood paneling THROUGHOUT, and that kitchen… well, it doesn’t need any introductions.  You see that brown-ish “stuff” on the drawers there?  Yeah…that’s dirt.  Literally…it’s years and years of just never being washed.  Kinda makes your skin craw doesn’t it???

Now you’re probably thinking we’re REALLY crazy.  Nah….just a little. haha  My eyes look at a place like this, and all they see is potential.  Hubby looks at it, and he sees project.  He’s a contractor, does it all.  So looking at this home (the term is said extremely loosely at this point) – I still describe it as the 70’s throwing up…we took the plunge, and dove in head first.

Kitchen

The series will explain how this is helping us get where we want to go, and will show the transformation of this little cottage, for “porn set chic” to “Country-Beachy Cottage” (I’m still unsure on whether I want beach or country, so maybe it’ll end up a little bit of both)…Stay tuned!!! 🙂