Before & After: Our Home Office

For nearly two years, we've had this grubby little room off our kitchen.

This picture doesn't accurately convey the horror of this space. The walls you see are painted green, but the other walls were wallpapered green, as well as the ceiling. It's a design featured in three rooms of our home (dining, kitchen and office), for reasons unbenounced to me. It was a grubby little green dungeon that screamed "run for your life" rather than "welcome to our home."


It gave a horrible first impression of our home. The room serves as entry point from the garage, upstairs and backdoor walkway. But we've always justified its disgust by saying, "the people coming in through the back door are our friends. They don't care what the room looks like."

But it got to the point that we really cared. What a waste of square footage! Plus, with a little one on the way, this would be a great place to store her toys and let her play while I'm in the kitchen. I couldn't stand the thought of my sweet baby crawling around on carpet with murder scene-like stains all over it.

It was time for a fresh look, so we started by stripping the wallpaper.

It looks better already, but that funk-filled carpet had to go!

At some point, this room was converted from a porch to an interior room, so we decided to put down some plywood to keep the floor sturdy and in good shape for years to come.

The walls had to be retextured because of the wallpaper and new baseboard needed to be installed.

We painted the room in a light, neutral color. Because it is a small space, we wanted it to be bright and take advantage of the natural light.

This wood siding was the worst thing ever to have to paint. The fact that we were having to paint over extremely dark green didn't help with my sanity. I hope to never paint this siding ever again.
We finally had the carpet installed yesterday, and I think the change is so dramatic!

I picked up some storage bins, so this room could still serve as our catch-all, but without being such an eyesore.

I think the space is so fresh and happy and a nice clean slate moving forward. Ty still has to change out the electrical outlets and put on new face plates. Other than that and decorating, we're done.

But here comes the real challenge. ...

Keeping our little gremlins (dogs) off the carpet for a while! I already see Baxter eyeballing the perfect spot that he's dying to mark!