Dining Room Renovations over the years.....

We live here....

We bought our home in June, 2001.  This picture was taken in July, 2001

as you can see from the date stamp.

It looks pretty much the same on the outside today as it did then;

the inside is what has changed drastically from the day we

bought it.

I am very lucky in that my husband can and will (after I nag him for a thousand

days straight) do home renovations.

I think the only thing he might have some difficulty with would be

plumbing.  We haven't had to do much of that (thank goodness)

so I'm really not sure what he can do.

Other than that, he can do pretty much anything.

This is my dining room:

I (bold, capitalize and underline) wallpapered.  By. My. Self.

I was so proud!

It looked like this.



Nothing fancee, nothing major.

This table is the first piece of furniture

we purchased together.  It is solid pine and I love this table.

I was very content with my dining room. 

It stayed exactly like this for many years.

It's always been a dream of ours to not have carpet in our house

and to put in hardwoods.  Between the dogs, cats and kids, we were over

the carpet and how dirty it always seemed.

So we did it! We just took the plunge and decided it was time.

Pulling up carpet is one of the nastiest jobs ever.  I couldn't believe

the smell of the padding underneath and the fine gritty dirt that was underneath

the padding.

I couldn't believe we had been living on top of all that dirt.

But, lets not go there!

More carpet padding.  This took forever!!

The kids call themselves helping.  I guess they are making sure the

new wood doesn't go out the window.

Everybody pitched in to open the boxes of wood and sort it by size. 

FINALLY!

The moment I have been waiting for.....

the floors start to go in.

I'm a terrible person to do home projects with,

I want everything done Yesterday!

The completed floors.  So Happy!!

The furniture went back in and looked great.

Then.....

One of my girlfriends moved this past Summer.  As she was packing

up her house and sending things to storage and her new condo, she found this in her basement.

In.Her.Basement

It had been there for about 5 years she said.

She asked me could I use it.

Could I use it!

Heck Yea!!

Check out this hutch.  It is just gorgeous.

The table, along with 6 chairs and 3 leaves; I only use 1, my dining

room isn't that big.

This is my favorite piece.  An old serving table. 

My plan is to redo the material on the chairs but for

now; they are just fine.

I cannot wait to decorate for Christmas!