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STEP ONE: Floor Plan and Exteriors

I love floorplans.  I love browsing Zillow and MLS listings and I am really enjoying this process of building our own home.

We’re doing it owner/builder, but we’ve got a contractor friend who is walking us through every.single.step.

So, we are not alone!

The first step is find a floor plan you love.

This is ours:

Ryan wants a large master suite and a three car garage and I’d like a large island a roomy master closet. We both want a spacious great room so we can trick our children into hanging out with us.

I’ve always wanted a bonus room, I love how vaulted ceilings in bonus rooms add so much character to the space.

I have three daughters that love to dance. My plan is to use the same wood flooring from the kitchen in the bonus room so they will have a place they can dance. . . I still might like my bedroom up there, it’s going to be the cutest room in the whole house!

Thank you for visiting, have a great day!

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Great Room Ideas for Expansion

Our current  kitchen is darling but it’s small.

It gets crowded REALLY fast if you add even just a 2nd person.  Imagine having 3 people working in there at the same time.  We’re a family of 7 and this kitchen is cramped for us.  One day I’ll show you photos of the  kitchen we had when we lived in a small 2 bedroom/1 bath apartment in Korea.  It may have been more functional than this one.

We met with an architect last week.  We talked about our goals for the space and I showed him the pictures in this post.   He’ll have a draft for us by the end of the week.  Please take a look and share your thoughts. . . . I don’t want to miss anything!

(To get an idea of the size of each space, I used 1 square =1 foot.)

Floor plan of our current kitchen, dining and family room:

Original Kitchen and Great Room Floor Plan

This is the first sketch I drew up when we were considering expanding.  I told my dad that even 2-4 more feet would make a big differences, he  told me it wouldn’t be worth the price for that small of change.  So I drew out some ideas at 8′.

Kitchen and Great Room Extension *’ with 2′ Cantilever in the Family Room

And I drew out another idea with a 12′ extension and quickly became sold on this idea, because I can tuck the dining area next to the kitchen and end up with a HUGE Family Room.  There’s even room for an 8′ island! Maybe dreams can come true.

Dining Room relocated and larger Family Room
Kitchen and Great Room Extension 12″

I’d love French Doors leading to the back yard.

Behind the kitchen there will be a utility sink, lower cabinets and a “mudroom” for everyone’s shoes and coats, etc.  If I had my druthers, I’d like to see an exterior door near the utility sink. Not sure of the exact placement of the Washer and Dryer or sink.

Have a WONDERFUL DAY! I’m looking forward to hearing from you.

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Sort of Before, Sort of During – Main Floor

Our previous home had a large kitchen with a dining area, but it wasn’t a great room.  I always felt disconnected from my kids when I was in the kitchen and they were playing elsewhere. I wanted  to have a space that everyone could spend time in together, so when we were house searching “Great Room” was at the tippy top of the list.

Great room – view from the kitchen. Gray paint, fresh white paint on the cupboard boxes and banister. These are the old light fixtures. and if you glance to the left you can see the counter-top on  the kitchen desk, I can only assume this is the original counter-top  that was used in the rest of the kitchen.  Dishwasher has been replaced, too.

Kitchen with counter-tops on and flooring almost complete.

Different angle in the kitchen, better view of the sink. You can see the space where the stove will be.

Music Room, old light  fixture, old windows and waiting for new flooring.  Love the bay window.

Office. I love, LOVE this window and the chair rail and the fact that the closet was full of built in shelves, PERFECT for an office space.

Nursery. Good sized closet. Lots of large beautiful windows on the main floor.

Master Bedroom, view of master closet.  Not a walk-in like I had hoped, but larger than what we had before.

All the boxes on the ground are the new light fixtures for the home.

Master Bathroom. It’s a great size.  Shower, but no tub, BUT there is a large closet.  You can see that the drawers have been taped and painted and the vanity is waiting for a new, beautiful granite counter-top.

You can see  how the master bath is coming together. I love this piece of granite, especially up close.

Hall bathroom and the one and only bathtub.

Hall bathroom again, a different piece of a granite than the master bath. I actually love the variety. All the bathrooms are large. It’s nice to have the extra space.

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Sort of Before – Exterior

We bought this home in 2015, it was a flip, but we still had/have some work to do. You can see in the photos what we were up against when we moved it.

Front Yard, old roof and one CRAZY tree. Look at the those roots!

Do you can see a second crazy tree in the back yard to the right of this tree?

The daffodils are pretty. =)

Back yard, splintery swing set, & sad grass.

Backyard, backdoor and second CRAZY tree!

Garage with drywall and tape, but not painted, walls were FILTHY from 20 plus years of dirt collecting on the drywall. Garage door is being cleverly propped open with a 2×4 and the garbage can.

Our plan:

  1. Remove the crazy trees.
  2. Paint the garage.
  3. Fix garage door (that was done in the flip)
  4. Remove  the swing set.
  5. Revive the grass.
  6. New roof.
  7. New windows.
  8. New house numbers.
  9. Landscaping.
  10. Sconces. (done in the flip)
  11. Hot tub??

Stay tuned to see the changes.. . . . this could take a while.