Our Muse (Dwell Magazine June 2006)

I thought some explanation for our reasoning to renovate this house might be helpful.

Amanda and I have been wishing and hoping for a MCM style home to pop up for over 4 years now. We wanted something in a condition that required some remodeling, as we really wanted to update the majority of the interior and perhaps some of the exterior. There are really only four neighborhoods local to us that have MCM style houses. Two of those neighborhoods are more on the depreciating side than the appreciating side and not the safest. That left us with two neighborhoods to choose from.

The only reason we had the crazy idea of renovating.. remodeling.. or in this case partially rebuilding a home is because of the June 2006 vol. 6 issue of Dwell Magazine. On page 172 begins a story about finding an ugly, perhaps dilapidated house in a neighborhood you love for the RIGHT price and turning that house into your dream house. We decided this option was for us. We didn't want to wait any longer for a house to pop up and the house we found was in a perfect location. We were even surprised to have a view of the lake outside our front door.

So thats how this all began. One night in the kitchen thumbing thru Dwell.... That is our inspiration, motivation, courage, lunacy, and zaniness began....

Goodbye Paneling, Hello Ants..

The neighbor came over and had a small chat with my extremely personable father. These were a few notable moments from the conversation....

Neighbor: "So did someone buy the house"
My Father: "Yes my son did"
Neighbor: (excited) "Is he going to tear it down?!?!?"
My Father: "No, he is going to live in it...."

sooo... as you can see the neighboorhood probably has a wonderful outlook on the house, lol. It is pretty much the ugly duckling on the street...

So we started removing the paneling. It has went extremely well so far, and even looks cleaner (from my viewpoint) without it. I still cant get over that someone thought this was a good idea for the WHOLE house. The bathrooms were only spared because someone decided to sheetrock over them at some point.

The paneling starting to stack up in the Living Room. It seems Habitat For Humanity is willing to come out and pick this stuff up. Why, I have no idea...Hopefully it will do someone some good. Lord knows it has done enough bad..
This Window sill and behind that wall is COVERED with ants.... Today was the day for the fogger which hopefully will sidetrack (KILL) those little boogers. I still cant believe with all the trash, food, crap left behind we havent found one huge RAT in the house. Well besides the Selling Agent who sold me the house, but that would be a totally different blog all together.

Progress being made on the dungeon.

The beginning: We bought a house!!!

View from the road... We are still undecided on if we should keep the cross or not (complete with Christmas lights). It might come in handy should we decide to crucify me later for deciding that we should buy this house..
This so happens to be the front door (the door open) as no one really wants to walk up the 10 foot dilapidated staircase to the dilapidated porch..

This is the basement/garage/rat village/dungeon/ (ran out of good words, please feel free to add as you seek fit).. Our original plan of turning this into game room might be derailed, more to come on that later..

This insulation is all ruined and needs to come down. After researching it, unless you are setting up Rat Condos and charging rent, insulating the floor is pretty much useless. I can definitely vouch for the rat condos part..

This would be the guest (hall) bath. Pay close attention to the custom wallpaper design directly in front of you. I am assuming that was inspired from a Homes and Gardens magazine photo perhaps a DIY hack watching HGTV. Either way its f-a-b-ulous... I honestly cant imagine anyone using this thing, however.....

The hair that the previous owner left us on the shower wall once gain proves us wrong, it IS move-in ready.

This is the master bath. I am going to save you from the details.. Its small and somewhat dirty, I figure they must not have cleaned upon moving out. Its easy to understand how things can get away from you being that you only clean the house once every decade..

Yes sir, that is one nasty toilet. However by the condition of the house, I think the previous owners just assumed shit on/in the house. So this thing might in fact have had little to no use...

This is the newly re-designed kitchen. Complete with cereal left in the cabinets for us to munch on while we look through the house. I tried to get my hands on the Cookie Crisps but my agent (pictured) had already eaten the whole box.. She looks like she is writing (probably that I am an idiot for considering this house) but she is really pulling all of those drawers out looking for more snacks...

This would be the living room. Thats making a assumption that there were people in this house that actually lived. As you can see the lovely hardwoods are coated with baking soda to mask the smells. Also that paneling you see, its in EVERY room. Wow, one room wasn't enough for that warm earthy feel? Really?

Some photos of the rooms to show off the modern, high end wood paneling. I should thank the previous owners for trying to mask the paneling with paint (the baby blue especially). The entire house except for closets and bathrooms is done in this stuff. Talk about vintage.. bleh..