My Room (before)

My room (before)

This is what my room looked like when we bought the house. This is what the room looks like now. This room was an addition to the rest of the house. We thought it was a newer addition but when we started renovating we found wood beams that were really thick and very solid, unlike the newer wood used these days. The wooden beams were covered in faux wood panneling which was then covered in a couple layers of wallpaper. The floor had a really ugly shag carpet. To say this room was hideous is an understatement!

We bought the house on April 30, 2007 and didn't start doing anything to this room until mid April 2008. I think we were avoiding tackling this room because we couldn't decide what to do with it. My husband wanted to make the kitchen bigger and I wanted a room for myself. Anyway, the problem was solved because the connecting wall is a load bearing wall which would have made the removal of that wall very expensive...so I got my room! When I was nine months pregnant with Kiran, my husband and my father- in-law demolished the faux wood paneling, removed the carpet and pretty much everything else in the room. Then the original doorway was closed out and they put in the door that opens straight out into the backyard. We had to put drywall up and then my husband installed the wood flooring. Yes it is real wood and I am pretty amazed that he figured out how to lay the wood.

We bought this mantel at a thrift store in Philly. It was love at first sight. We bought it even though we didn't have a fireplace! (You can see a little bit of the ugly carpet in this picture). This room was used as a storage room while we renovated the rest of the house.