Home Makeover...In the Making!

I have a lot I want to do to our house, I have since we moved in...but this being our first home, we were kind of just living in it and not making it what WE wanted because we always have the thought of "will renters want to live in this?" which now I think is stupid but whatever! 

So after living here for a year and a half, its time to get serious! I need to do some serious makeovers in all of our rooms! Don't get me wrong- we have done SOME things to our house- before I even moved in (Kale was deployed still...I lived here for a month before homecoming), I hired painters because the colors were AWFUL! Even the Realtor couldn't hide her distaste for it! Besides painting though, we haven't done much and even with the painting, it didn't turn out how I wanted it too- paint chips totally lie! They turn out way lighter then the color on the card!

I thought it would be nice to post pics of what the house was, what it looks like "now" (and by now i mean when it was first painted", and write what I want to do to that room! I figure if its in print, I will need to stick to my word! 

Outside: Before- this is the day of closing

Outside after painting: He painted the front door black which really makes it pop and repainted the shutters! Also, not pictured is we took the shrubs out of the front yard and seeded grass since it was just like straight weeds growing...

 Future: I want to paint the scones on the garage black to make those pop more, I also want colorful shrubs/flowers in the small flower beds right in front of the house but because controlling weeds is so difficult, I want it to have a stone overlay so the weeds wont pop up as easily as they do now through the dirt.

Living Room: Before: the color doesn't look *too* bad in the picture but it made the room feel SO tiny...

Living Room after being painted: It looks double the size...I wanted a medium tan color and its really really light tan- almost egg shell color. Ignore the mess please...

Future- because the walls are so light, they show dirt super easily and when you have lots of dirty Marines touching your walls, it ruins them pretty quickly so I want to paint it a darker tan color.  Also, I really want a coffee table, a lazy boy and end tables for this room, and not pictured (i would have been standing right in front of it to take this picture) is the fire place, that needs a mantle.  I think it can be a great "statement wall" but I don't have a clear vision for it yet...Oh and last but not least,  I want the snap together hardwood flooring...that is our top 5 things to do when Kale gets back since he doesn't seem to trust want me to deal with it alone while he is gone.

Kitchen- Before: OMG, it was awful...it burned your eyes looking at it....don't stare too long...

Kitchen after painting: This was not the color I envisioned, I even had the painter triple check they gave us the right color...they did, but it looked nothing like the swatch, it photographs even worse though...Oh and do you see that white chunk toward the middle of the floor...that is where Best Buy ripped a chunk of the cheap but I didn't notice until after I had signed the release- the guy was standing on top of the rip so I didn't see it, coincidence? I think not...Also, my loving dog Cujo has made the hole bigger....oh and we replaced the lighting with a white fan/lighting combo that Kale's grandpa installed! flooring

Future: I want to repaint, badly! I think I want a shade of blue but the trick with this is that after the kitchen is a long hallway so whichever color I chose has to be continued down throughout the hallway and even with that green it looks dark so I need to either 1. add brighter lighting to the hallway or 2. pick another lighter color that will not make it look so dark! I also want to get flooring that is more realistic- I would like the fake tiles where you just snap them together but they still feel like the expensive kind! Kale is going to see if his Dad wants to come "visit" aka help install flooring!

Well, those are the big main areas that I really want to re-do...I have smaller projects that need done but most include cleaning/reorganizing! I failed miserably at being motivated enough to do Kale's UK themed guest bathroom but I am going to get it done by the time he comes home, I think I'm actually gonna work on it starting next weekend! This post is so old (see how unmotivated I am was? but its what I want done to the guest bathroom- Kentucky Bathroom

Ill post pictures as we slowly make this house our home...better late then never right?