House Tour.

Without further ado, here's a tour of our new house!

A couple of things to note:

• My video skills clearly need some work.
• I was really afraid of the video being super long, so I kind of breezed through some rooms.  Sorry about that!  Obviously, if you have any questions about the space, feel free to ask.
• At about the 25 and 35 second mark, when I refer to "Walter," I'm referring to the massive ostrich print previously mentioned here.  That's just what we call him now, so it didn't occur to me until I watched the video that me referring to a Walter could be a little weird/confusing.
• At about the 50 second mark, I guess I am very excited about the powder room.  Why do I say "powder room" like that?  I have no idea.
• Around the 1:30 mark, look for our new cabinet hardware on two of the upper cabinets in the kitchen.  We love them (anything is better than the current pulls)!
• About the 2:30 mark when we head outside, note that the grill is not staying, and the hose is in the fountain because Justin was siphoning out all of the rain water.

Hope you enjoyed it!  I can't wait to do a similar post with tour after the renovations are all done! 

Tub Talk.

I had high hopes of posting the video tour of our new place, but being the You Tube novice that I am, I had no idea it would take so long to upload my video.  I'll post the video tour later this week (unless I decide by then that listening to me talk for nearly 7 minutes as I cruise around a house is not entertaining for anyone).  So instead, let's talk about bath tubs. 

As I mentioned in a previous post, there are a so many freaking decisions to make when you renovate.  This weekend, we spent a substantial portion considering various bath tub options.  In doing some research, I came across this fabulous post by Holly at Things That Inspire.  It basically sums up our dilemma.

I mean, you can't really deny the beauty of a free standing bathtub.

Source: decorpad.com via Emily on Pinterest

Source: sarahrichardsondesign.com via Emily on Pinterest

We've talked with our contractor and a freestanding tub is going to be substantially more expensive to install since you have to rerun the plumbing and change the drain.  Neither of which are easy (read: cheap) to do on a slab foundation.  And maybe in an attempt to rationalize keeping the budget in check, I've realized that, with a freestanding tub, there are two potential downsides:  (1) there is no place to set my book, magazines, and/or wine; (2) the Inspector-Gadget-arm-reach needed to turn on the faucet.  The width of our tub is 42 inches -- that's a long reach across to turn on the water -- or maybe I just have t-rex arms.  Either way, I would probably have to stand in the tub just to reach the faucet.  See what I mean?

Source: sarahrichardsondesign.com via Emily on Pinterest

So now our search has been focused more on drop in (and possibly under-mount) bath tubs.  Even though we had jets in our last tub, I hardly ever used them.  So this time around, we are just going for a deep soaker tub without all the bells and whistles.  But we can't decide on whether to go with a rectangle shaped tub or an oval one.  

We had an oval one in our last house and we liked it:

The tub is in an alcove in our new place, like these:

Source: justinetaylor.tumblr.com via Emily on Pinterest

Source: houzz.com via Emily on Pinterest

But there's something sleek and a little more modern with a rectangular tub:

Source: apartmenttherapy.com via Emily on Pinterest

Source: styleathome.com via Emily on Pinterest

The tub size we need to fill the space is 72" x 42".  That's a big tub!  I don't think I realized it until I saw this picture of a tub we were considering:

(photo: here)

I sure hope it's the angle of the photo that makes her look so tiny in there.  I don't want to have to wear a life jacket to take a bath!

Here's Riley and me trying to recreate the above picture in our current tub.  Okay not really, I was trying to figure out if I liked having those little arm rests inside the tub and Riley wanted to assist (he laid down shortly after this and got comfortable in the tub). 

So what do you think?  Do you guys have a preference -- rectangle or oval tub?  Anything I'm missing that I should consider? 

30th Birthday Present.

I turn 30 in 2 weeks.  Yikes!  I already know what Justin is getting me for my birthday.  And it's not because I'm super sneaky/nosy and figured it.  (But that would be something I would totally do.)  Instead, this present was one he couldn't really keep from me.

We are going back to Paris for a week! 

When I did my Paris recap shortly after returning from our 2-week Europe trip about a year ago, I said the following: "I seriously loved every single second of Paris. I would go back tomorrow if I could."  Well, it may not have been "tomorrow," but I will take a year instead.

Source: Uploaded by user via Emily on Pinterest

I can't hardly wait.  Our trip won't be as near as rushed this time around.  We are already planning on hitting up some of the places we didn't have time to check out last time, and I've been scouring blogs for some other great tips.  If you have any to share, I'm all ears!

I'm just keeping my fingers crossed that the house renovations go according to plan while we are away!  I like to think I can calm my worries of what's happening back home by drinking copious amounts of wine and champagne and eating lots of French pastries and cheese.

Decisions, Decisions.

Hope you guys had a wonderful weekend.  Ours was spent mostly researching and thinking about kitchen and bath renovation decisions.  There are so many!  My head is spinning with all of the options for the layout, appliances, sinks, faucets, hardware . . . and that's just the kitchen!   

We also got some tile samples this weekend for the bathroom.  We are debating between 1x2 or 3x6 carrara marble tiles, laid in a herringbone pattern for the floor.  The 3x6 tiles in the picture are just ceramic tiles from Lowe's so we could get the idea of the scale of those compared to the 1x2.  What do you guys think would look best for the floor?  1x2 or 3x6?   

I have also been contemplating some new art work for the entry way.  Specifically, I have been obsessed with a massive ostrich print from Z Gallerie.  It's funny because it really doesn't seem like something I would be drawn to, but for whatever reason, I love it.  I finally took the plunge and brought it home with me.  We immediately hung it on a hook that was leftover from the previous owners and knew it was perfect for the space.  It makes me smile whenever I see it. 

I had Justin stand by it when I snapped the picture so you could get a feel for the size (and so he could work on his Vanna White pose).  Justin has named the ostrich Walter.  So everyone, meet Walter!   

As you could imagine, a lot of our time has been filled with renovation decisions, meeting with contractors, and all of the other fun things that go along with buying a house.  I've been hesitant to post too much about it all because I don't want to bore all of you with the million and one decisions.  And since the house has really been the only thing on my mind, I haven't had much else to post about! If you want to hear more about the specific decisions we are making along the way, let me know and I can share them.  Or if you prefer just to be kept in the loop on the big things and see it once it's all done, that's cool too.  Just let me know . . . I aim to please!   

I plan to go over to the house next weekend and take good pictures of the house before the renovation starts so y'all can get a full house tour in its before state.  I may even go all out and do a video tour!  Crazy!   

Homeowners!

We're officially homeowners again!  We closed remotely, as previously discussed here.  Thankfully, our lender moved our paperwork to the front of the line and was able to get it all to the title company in record time so we could sign the docs before we headed out of town (and we would just have to fund the following day).  The only hiccup was that the sellers' paperwork was delayed because they were sailing off the coast of Florida and tropical storm Debby slowed down FedEx's delivery schedule.

But despite all of that, we closed and picked up the keys to our new house from our realtor on our way home from the airport!

(if we look excited but tired, we were.  we had been up since 4:45 am to catch our 7:05 flight!)

Of course we've been spending lots of time at the house.  Here's some iPhone shots from around our new digs.

Zoey's just chilling in the middle of the living room.

I love our huge crepe myrtles.  You can't really tell from the picture, but the flowers are pink and so pretty.  Not to mention the trees add such great privacy in our back yard.

Justin holding up our new entry way chandelier for size.  When you see the old one, you can understand why I was in such a hurry to find a new one!  

For those of you who are wondering, we've officially decided to go with white marble.  And don't worry, we will also be replacing those sweet cabinet handles. 

Justin was honing his MacGyver-skills and rigged up the hose to drain out our fountain, which is in desperate need of good cleaning. 

And my favorite of them all . . . sweet Riley and Zoey peeking out the backdoor.  

And I have to give a shout out to two sweet bloggers who I met up with this weekend.  First, Elz picked me up some amazing chocolate and almond croissants at the new Trader Joe's.  I knew we'd get along just fine when I discovered she was also addicted to TJ's mini peanut butter cups.     

Then I went over to Megan's house from Honey We're Home to check out her white marble counters.  It was so thoughtful of her to let us come check them out so we could see how they've worn before we made a decision.  Yippee for sweet friends met through the blogosphere! 

Hope your week is going well and you're ready for the 4th!