home inspiration.

now that we have made it through most of the hurdles of the house-hunting process, i'm starting to get really excited. we still have the appraisal and final closing to get through, but it seems like there should not be any issues with that. we can't wait to get our hands on the house and really make it our own. while we don't have a ton of money to put into it (umm, hello? houses are expensive), we have looked into a lot of things that we can do ourselves. we plan to paint pretty much every room in the house. paint is pretty cheap, but makes a big impact. i want to do a lot of neutrals (taupes, grays), but maybe some colors in the bathrooms/smaller areas. my mom and i are going to look at paint colors this weekend when we're at the cabin for memorial day. it does pay to have an interior designer for a mom...

on top of painting, we're looking into getting all the carpet replaced (though, we may have to hold off while we save for it). we have a baby crawling around everywhere, and it'd be nice to know that everything is clean and new. plus, bennett's room currently has aqua carpet, which is definitely not going to work.

we also plan to paint the kitchen cabinets. the cabinets are currently white, but they're glossy which makes them look kind of outdated. i think we're going to keep the top cabinets white (only make them more matte instead of glossy like they are now), and paint the bottom cabinets a rich sage green. here's what we're going for (except not open cabinets because, let's face it, i'm not that organized):

i found new hardware for them at target that are like the hardware in the picture, so we'll put that on to make them more modern. then, we found white subway tile 50% off and joe's going to install that as a backsplash in the kitchen.

we obviously will have to work at these projects slowly, but it's so fun to talk about and plan out how we're going to make this house our home. turns out joe is addicted to pinterest (he's going to kill me for putting that on the blog), but feels he's keeping things under wraps because his username is "jakewienke." always throwing the younger brother under the bus...

i'm sure i will fill the blog with house updates, before/after pictures, etc. for now, i'm just looking for inspiration, dreaming of how it will all turn out, and considering which bank to rob to make it all come together. i'm thinking TCF.