We’ve been in our new home now for nearly four months. We moved in on 8 May, which in our southern hemisphere means we moved in as we were nearing winter, and what a winter it’s been. We’ve had rain, showers, or storms almost every day, so not very inspiring weather for any household decorating, or garden tasks. We’ve made very few changes as yet, which is a bit of a slow start for us. Normally we would have re-vamped the garden by now at least, and we would have at least begun to put our own stamp on the inside of any house that has become ours.

A couple of weeks ago an acquaintance from Bridge asked me how we were enjoying our new home. I answered without a lot of enthusiasm, which is unusual for me. Despite having moved house quite often, I usually love my homes. I think that’s because I love decorating. We usually buy run down places and we quickly get to work fixing everything up. After putting our hard work into transforming the places we buy we’re usually proud to call the re-newed places, ‘home’. My lack of enthusiasm this time took me by surprise. 

There’s lots of changes I’d love to make to the house, but most of them would end up too costly, as each would have a domino effect. For example, I think the layout of the kitchen is terrible. I’d love to change it, but what a can of worms that’d open – not only would it mean re-aligning plumbing, and a total rebuild of the area, but it’d also mean all the floor tiles that extend through the entire living area would need to be lifted and replaced. A $40 – $50K new kitchen would end up snowballing to an horrendous job, a job which I’m sure would end up costing in excess of $100k. Not only is that money we don’t have lying around, it’d also be over capitalising for our little unit. So – the kitchen layout will remain as is.  We had a good think about what we reasonably could do though that would put our own stamp on our little unit, things that would make the place feel like it belongs to us.

Consequently we’ve made a start. The first job was sorting out the TV alcove. As the recess isn’t very deep, we had temporarily adapted a couple of shoe cabinets to use until we decided how we’d furnish and decorate it. However the shoe cabinets fit the place so perfectly we decided that with a few adjustments they could stay. Paul’s butted them up together properly which meant shaving off a little bit of the wood, and he’s topped the white cabinets with a lovely piece of raw, light coloured timber. With the offcuts from the wood top he’s put up two offset shelves over the TV. We styled it mainly with coastal  bits and pieces we already had around the place. The only thing we had to buy was a little stack of small books, and two tall vases in which to put the white reeds which we already had. Just that little change has already added a heap of ‘Paul and Chris’ type character. Paul’s done such a good job, I love it!

 Next is the kitchen. Apart from the layout of it, there is really nothing wrong with it. All the laminated cupboards  and drawers are in good condition, but they’re beige and brown in colour, and I’m a ‘white kitchen’ person. The exhaust canopy is good quality, and is reasonably new. The gas stovetop is fine, but induction will be better down the track a bit, and the oven, well that was appalling, so it’s already been replaced. The dishwasher works well, but it’s not a great dishwasher so that’s on the list for replacement too in the not to distant future. But for now, well with the grey floor tiles, the greige coloured walls and the beige and dark brown coloured kitchen cabinets, it was all feeling a bit to – well ‘beige’ I guess.

So what to do – paint it of course!

At the moment our kitchen is in bits. All the drawers are emptied with their contents all over the bench tops. The dining room table has paint sheets under it, and paint sheets over it, and all the cupboard doors are off, and are laid out wherever we can find a space for them. Within a couple of days they’ll all be re-fitted but instead of being beige and brown, they’ll all be gloss white. Then in the not to distant future, the beige panelling backing onto the cupboards will be re-done with white shiplap panelling. I’ll post progress photos as we go.

After we’ve replaced all the appliances and the single sink with a double one, we’ll probably get a new bench top. Apart from the cost of the new appliances, and a new bench top, it’ll cost us very little really in the scheme of things. When our spring weather starts we’re also going to go through the entire house and repaint all the ceilings, and will freshen up the walls changing the colour from greige to a warm white. It should make everything feel lighter and brighter, and it’ll make it feel like it’s ours. Then next time someone asks me, “how do you like your new home?” I’ll be able to answer with an enthusiastic, “I love it!” Won’t that be a pleasure!