House Tour--First Floor

I thought I'd go ahead and post a "tour" of our new place to get some "before" pictures. For now, the first floor:

This is the entry hall, standing with your back to the front door. I'm not crazy about the black runner on the stairs, or the brownish color on the chair rail and decorative molding. The walls appear off-white in this picture, but they're actually a yellowish shade, I think, maybe the same shade as the living room.

From the entry hall, to the right is the living room. This picture is actually the view from the dining room, so to the right of the windows is the entry hall. There are plantation shutters on the windows, which I like. But I don't like the valances. I think I'll just do decorative drapes. This will be our "family room," since we plan to make the family room the playroom. The color is a pale yellow, which works for now.

This next picture shows the corner of the living room not visible in the above picture. (You can see the two chairs peeking out.) This is where we'll put our piano. The doorway from the entry hall is to the left. To the right is the dining room.

From the living room, you walk into the dining room. I don't like the brown color below the chair rail. I can't remember if there's decorative molding below the chair rail or not. I'd like to have the molding and paint it white, I think. Right now, we don't have a dining room table. Just a china cabinet and a cool, mid-century liquor cabinet.

 

The doors in the dining room lead into the kitchen. The view through the dining room doors is this small eating area.

The kitchen stretches to the left. The family room is at the other end. I love all the drawers in the kitchen. There are also double ovens, and a microwave over the gas stove top.

Here's a view of the kitchen from the other end. The doors at the end on the left are the laundry room/closet. On the right is the pantry. At first I wasn't thrilled with the idea of the laundry room in the kitchen, but it will probably be pretty handy.

From the kitchen, you enter the family room. You can also get to the family room by walking down the entry hall and turning left at the end of the hall. This is the view from that door. The door that is cut off on the right leads to the back porch. This room will start off as the playroom. For now, we don't plan to put any furniture in here. Just shelves for toys and a carpet on the floor.

Here's the playroom from the opposite direction. In the right rear corner, there's a little wet bar. I'm thinking that in the future, we might pull out the sink and turn it into a closet. It would have more functionality that way. I can only imagine the fun the boys are going to have with that sink! We'll probably have to fit the door with a little lock.

This is the fireplace mantle:

It's lovely--some kind of marble. And the screen is neat, too--leaded glass--but I don't think it will work well with the boys. (All I can hear is *CRASH*.) The fireplace has been retrofitted to be a gas fireplace, so I'm trying to figure out if we can get a different kind of screen for it.

So going back to the entry hall, there are two more rooms to explore. The first room on the left is a den or study. We plan to make this a combo office/guest bedroom. The wall color in this picture looks yellow, but it's actually a peachy orange color. I want to repaint it blue, with the chair rail and decorative molding white, I think. (You can see a peek of the chair rail and molding behind the brown sofa.)

Also on the first floor, there is a full bathroom. If you're back in the entry hall, it's on the left, between the study and the family room. Right now, it's very dark, with wallpapered walls and ceiling. Ed actually likes it, but I hate it and hope to get rid of it soon. Since it will be the guest bathroom and not just a powder room, I'd like to make it bright in there. I'm also not sure why there's a drop ceiling, but I'm sure there's some good reason. I'm not crazy about the mirror, either.

And last but certainly not least, the back porch and the patio! I posted pictures of the porch before, but here they are again:

And here is the patio, facing the porch.

So that concludes the first floor tour! I can't wait to start making it ours, as intimidating as it is!