In retrospect, these Moving in Pictures don’t seem as scary as they did while holding a 15-day-old Wyatt and walking through. It’s actually pretty amazing really to think through all of our biggest hopes and dreams, and then see them 10 years later. We just finished our biggest remodel ever. The one I’ve been planning since I first stepped foot into this orange and brown box of a kitchen. It only took us 9 years, but we made it and somehow Camp Kelso just keeps getting more magical.
Here is the tour of the BEFORE pictures for most rooms. I took these on 2/7/2015 when Billy brought me up here to show me his diamond in the rough.
Front Facing House Side | BEFORE
The front of the house looks very similar to how it looks now. The biggest change is of course the patio that Billy and my dad built to the left of the porch. This front view was actually a very big part, and selling factor as I’ve always wanted a wrap-around porch. Dream #1 accomplished! I spent the next few years designing the front flower beds, which are now finally mature with all the plants I chose… just in time for us to pull them all out and redesign the front steps. More on that later.
Kitchen BEFORE
Now this is the crown jewel picture of the remodel we just finished. The Kitchen BEFORE! I tell everyone, but now you know what I mean when I told you, I don’t know what they were advised to do with this paint plan… The walls, cupboards, and floors all matched in a very frustrating (for me) orangish brown palette. And the tiger stripe countertops were a real gem. In the first week of living here I painted the walls green, which was the absolute furthest I thought I could get from this orange on the color wheel.
Just look at this island countertop! It gets better though, this specific picture was taken a few weeks after we moved in. See my trailer out the window, still unloading? And our nice housewarming plants. You get to scroll down a few, after scoping this epic cardboard box color combination kitchen, and see where we found the kitchen island…
Living Room BEFORE
Yep! Here she is! When we moved in, the kitchen island was in the living room. It had this very hollow and lightweight top on it, so it was quite easier to move around before we ordered the granite for it, after landing in the kitchen where it belonged.
We did use this island for the next 9 years until the 2024 kitchen remodel.
The rest of this living room is HUGE and always has been. Still is. But let me introduce you to exterior door #2! Yes, that’s right, another exterior door that came into the living room off the front porch, just a mere 20 feet from the first front door into the kitchen. We still don’t know why. This space in front of the door became the boy’s Mess Mat area for Mom School because it came directly out of their bedroom. Shown here with the pink paint job, originally. These extremely steep stairs are actually a built-in ladder to what would have been a pull-down access for an attic. Talk about hidden gems- the attic up here is massive, wonderful, and eventually became my walk-in closet, the play room, and eventually, most recently, Wyatt’s bedroom.
Dining Room BEFORE
I say Dining Room because that is what this room does for us now, 9 years later. But it had quite the journey to get here. It had to be my work-from-home office for a very long time until we built my current office out in the driveway. This black fireplace is still here, but it’s white now.
Allow me to introduce you to Exterior Door #3… which entered from the porch, directly into my office, and then the dining room. Again, this is only about 20 feet from Door #1 but in the opposite direction from Door #2. Making 3, front-facing exterior doors across the front porch. Very confusing for our mail delivery people.
Shout out to all these massive light fixtures that came with the house… ceiling fans and pinecones everywhere.
Entryway BEFORE
I say Entryway because that is what it is now, after the 2024 Remodel. Obviously, as you can see, there is no door in what I’m calling an Entryway. But we eventually replaced this large window, which is centered on the outside of the house, with the French doors we have now. These new, French doors are now the only exterior doors on the front face, replacing all three you saw above.
Once again, they painted these walls to match the floors, an atrocious mustard yellow. These yellow bamboo floors were the bain of my existence for 9 years. All the yellow and orange paint was gone in the first few weeks of living here, but these floors had to stick around.
Check out this horrendous color transition from yellow floor to orange floor… This space was our Dining Room when we first moved in because the bigger space behind it was my office. When we moved my office outside, this space was just a floating room for 2 years. We did have a few folding tables in it occasionally and of course, it became the perfect space for displaying Christmas trees in December!
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