Our Home Tour

Can you believe it? It's finally here! I've been promising forever, and at last I bring you.... our home tour!!!


It's now been over a year since we've moved into our little home. Since the day that we got our keys, we've added our touch to every room in the house. Whether it be just a coat of paint, a new closet or a complete renovation, each room reflects us a little better than it did when we first moved in.

From time to time I have given you a sneak peak into each of the rooms in our house, but I have yet to share with you a full house tour. As we just celebrated the one year anniversary of moving into our tiny home last month, I thought now was as good a time as any to invite you all in for a good snoop!

Bear with me, as at this point we still don't have a completed room in the house (are they ever really complete?). We're just pulling together the final touches on the basement, but here's your first full look into the place that B and I call home (YHL style)!

Front Entry

When we first moved in, we weren't exactly excited about the dark wood paneling in the front entry. Despite all the windows, it felt really tiny. The brass track lighting did very little to improve the look of the space...

(L: Parker was nervous on moving day. R: The horrible wood & awful lighting)

(Looking towards the not so pretty front yard. Really, the whole was just not very pretty)

In order to spruce it up a bit, we pulled out the white paint and brightened up the room. We then replaced the track lighting with a beautiful hanging lantern we had picked up from Lowe's on clearance for $15! It changed the whole look of the space...

We have plans to take down this drafty, sad excuse of a room and rebuild it into something more functional. Keep an eye out for this project...

Living Room

The Living Room is where you end up directly from the front entry. It was anything but exciting when we first moved in...

(Staircase to our half storey, built in bookcase and pass through into the kitchen - oh and the puppy bum of course... it will make a number of appearances!)

We added a touch of grey to the walls which completely cozied up the room. Then, after the basement reno we were able to move all TV related equipment into the basement, and add a large mirror over the fireplace. It definitely helps to bounce the light around more, and add some height to the ceiling.

 

We still have plans to make some changes to the fireplace and add new flooring to the room. Once that is done, I can focus on making some serious changes to the decor. For now, we'll deal.

Kitchen

The kitchen was the selling point in the house for us. Obviously not because of the bright yellow on the wall (or everything else that also appeared yellow), or because of the odd placement of the fridge, but because of the size of the kitchen in such a tiny house.

After having enough of that awful backsplash and wall colour, we threw in some new paint to make it more us. I also painted the pantry cupboards white, something we hope to carry over to other cupboards soon. The stove has been replaced (with one we got for free!) and the range hood painted stainless so we could rid our kitchen of anything almond. We also replaced the dishwasher, after scoring a great deal in after Christmas sales. So we'll see where it all goes from here...

Staircase

I know, you are already wondering what could be so exciting and interesting about the staircase that I had to share it on our home tour? Well, it's another one of the little bits of the house that I fell in love with when we first saw it... the built in bookcase!

Since moving in, we had to remove a large portion of the bookcases to make room for our heat pump. Once it was all installed I spruced them up with a fresh coat of white paint, and then got to work stying the bookcase (after taking a cue from a couple fellow bloggers...)

The bookcase always receives compliments from new guests... and at our one year party a lot of people had nice things to say about my colour blocking as well! Thanks for the inspiration bloggy friends!

Upstairs Bath

The upstairs cave... I mean, bathroom was awful the first time we saw it. From the burgundy tile, coffee coloured walls, almond fixtures and natural wood vanity and french door the whole thing just felt dark, dirty and dreary.

(Looking from the bathroom towards the "Purple Cave")

Our first step was to paint ALL the walls, the sconces and the french door. We also wasted no time replacing the almond toilet, with a white water efficient model. Soon after, we opted to get a new piece of glass cut for the mirror and at the same time paint the mirror frame and vanity, which I also purchased some gorgeous blue glass knobs for. To make the whole space feel more private we frosted the glass on the door (after seeing a tutorial over at YHL) and added a sheer curtain on the inside of the door as well...

It suits us just fine for the time being, but plan to give it a whole new look in the future.

Front Bedroom

We affectionately referred to this room as "the purple cave"... because, well, that's exactly what it was! It's the smallest bedroom in the house, but we had to make it our room as it was the only place that our large headboard would fit.

 

The skylights, awesome. The purple... not so much. We covered it up with a colour similar to the one we hated so much in the bathroom, threw in some black accents and even added a little something to the wall. B also refinished a free craigslist dresser with some left over black stain that we used for our dining table project.

Much more us. However, we already have plans to move our bedroom to the back bedroom and make this the guestroom. Big changes coming!

Back Bedroom

This bedroom has existed as a guest room / my dressing room since we first moved in. The biggest changes so far have been the movement of furniture, and a major renovation to a closet that didn't know how to do it's job very well...

The changes to the closet have really made a big difference. It's helped me to better organize the room, and we're not quite finished with it yet!

This will eventually become our master bedroom. I have slowly started to pull together some other pieces that I plan to use, and we have started some of the work. I can't wait to have it all come together.

Basement Living Area

Our basement truly was in a sad state when we moved in. I refer to it as the basement living area, but we really didn't do much living down there before. It smelt musty and the carpet was not in very good shape. The lighting was awful, and the drop ceiling and low duct work made the space feel dark, small and cramped. The space under the stairs was not being utilized at all. In the end, the whole space just ended up turning into a giant storage area.

Let's head down... shall we?

This was the last portion of the basement to really get touched but it has made a huge impact. We made the space feel larger by ripping down the old drop ceiling and drywalling, and used recessed lighting as our ceilings only sit a little over 6 feet tall (no money to dig and underpin... if only!). The far wall was pushed out a few extra feet when we removed the old furnace in favour of our heat pump, which also meant, no more duct work taking up precious head room. The old dirty carpet came out in favour of laminate flooring that we picked up at our local ReStore. Lastly, we added some extra storage by adding risers to the once open stairs and building a closet under the staircase. Next to that, we added a seating bench (inspired by Lindsay) that will serve as my own little reading nook, and provide some much needed storage to our little casa...

Don't mind the little bit of mess... or the dog crate. A certain young pup has taken to eating pillows... Awesome! There are some minor details we need to finish up, like trim and doors and then I can finally focus some more effort on decorating. The basement is definitely by far the most drastic change. I'll be sure to share more details once it's done, but for now, you get the idea!

Basement Bathroom

YUCK! Yeah... I think that sums it up pretty nicely...

I don't know if it's even worth giving you a whole run down of everything single thing we did in here, as we basically started from scratch to make our new second bathroom...

The floors were a pain, but thankfully they get the nicest compliments from guests. We still need to add a glass wall to our shower, and purchase a towel rack. I also need to decide what to do with the wall behind the toilet. Any suggestions?

Basement Guestroom turned Laundry Room / Office

I feel embarrased that we ever let our guests sleep in this room! I mean, the PEACH! The vinyl floor! The wood panelling! UGH!

The laundry area was once just a small nook in the hallway between the bathroom & guest room

Before we ripped it apart we had brightened the room up with a pale, pale green and painted the wood panelling a creamy white. We had also covered the entire back wall with curtains, and it made it at least a little more cozy for guests.... I guess. This was the first room to be ripped apart and man did it feel GOOD! The initial plan was to turn this into our new laundry room / my office space. It still has a long way to go... but here is where we are right now...

Obviously a big messy storage room at the moment, but soon enough, my own space! I'm dying to get this space completed so that I can have my own little nook to blog and create. It'll definitely help me be a little more organized. That's for sure!


I think I'll save our outdoor spaces for a separate post - they haven't changed a whole lot since we've moved in. We're hoping that next year will be our time to focus on outdoor spaces.

It's been a really busy year, as you can see. Looking back at those before pictures, sometimes I am in awe that it's even the same house and wonder how we saw the potential through some of the awfulness. Then again, I know I became more critical of the space as time went on, which is ultimately what helped us when space planning the basement reno.

I hope you enjoyed our little tour. There is plenty more projects to come as we enter our second year of home ownership! Hope you stick around for the ride.