A line drawing of my home. It is one story with 9 windows with black shutters. The house is a light colored stucco with a black roof and there are many large bushes in the front.
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Tour de Palmetto | A First Look at our Super Dated Home

A LOOK AT OUR CIRCA 1989 COUNTRY HOME, BEFORE ALL THE DIY

Greetings fellow craftswomen!

One of the reasons I started this blog was to take you on a tour through my renovation journey so that we can both learn to make our homes Pinterest-worthy and magazine-ready. My boyfriend, Taylor, bought his grandparents home 2 years ago. Let me tell you, my mind was going crazy with all the possibilities. Once Taylor talked me down from my lofty ideas to expand the upstairs and take down half the walls, we started getting some renovations started.

Taylor’s grandparents, Betty and Woodrow (Dub), built this home in 1989 and expanded to an upstairs space some years after. Betty and Dub were hip with the times and made sure the house was complete with wood paneling in the ‘den’, different colored carpet in every room, and wallpaper everywhere.

The house is nicely set back from the road on 5.5 acres and as much fresh air this city girl could possibly dream of. Woodrow built the house himself and definitely did things “his way”. We have observed some interesting piping and electrical choices. Taylor and I will be trying to clean all those up along the way. 

Since I just moved in, my stuff is everywhere and waiting for me to find a home for it all. We have so many plans for this house, you guys! I am super excited to share them with you. I hope you are as excited as I am to watch this house transform into something amazing. Let’s get started on the tour!

Kitchen

First in this Tour de Palmetto is the kitchen, because according to Taylor, “we don’t use the front door in the South, we come in through the garage”. News to me but let’s keep moving.

Dub decided that, although he was of a very normal height, he needed his countertops at a height fit for an NBA player. Standard counter heights are 34”-36” yet this counter sits at almost bar height at 41”.

Powder Room

Off the kitchen is the laundry room and powder room, whose toilet was just fixed but the sink still needs work.

Dining Room

The eating area off the kitchen has a dining table in it for the first time since Taylor has owned the house and I love being able to look out at all that nature!

This part of the tour shows the dining room. The walls are covered in a busy grape vine wall paper but at least I have a cute wood table with blue velvet seats.
I’ve done what I can to make this space feel somewhat updated. The grapevine wallpaper and dated light fixture aren’t helping much!

Office

At the front of the house next to the dining room is where the formal dining room would be, but since we are rebels (and I think our generation believes formal rooms can be too formal), we decided that this would be our quarantine office! This room is decked out with the most lavish textured/floral wallpaper I’ve ever laid my eyes on.

Before we made it an office, it was our renovation catch-all and game room apparently.

Living Room

Next up is the paneled living room. This is the darkest room in the house but we hope to remove the wall between here and the dining space to let in all that natural light and to open everything up. This room has one of the coolest fireplaces I’ve seen in a home and if you know me, you’d know I love fireplaces… and would want one in every room, but I looked it up and it’s too expensive.

I’ve tried to add some color and design to this space. We have a new ceiling fan and lots of mirrors to help bring more light into this dark room. I think removing that bookshelf wall and painting the room white will truly brighten up this space!

Foyer + Renovation Central

This is the hardly used foyer that I still want to make pretty, and just beside it is what is supposed to be the formal living room but is currently renovation/storage central. I used to be able to walk through this room but what can I say man, it’s a work in progress!

This is the couch room. 1 white pleather sofa, one fake Victorian with horrible red fabric, and one brown suede sectional. Also, check out those fancy drapes.

Hallway

This photo was taken mid Master Bedroom renovation so we have a super fun wood to carpet transition. I’m definitely looking for ideas to make this hallway feel less narrow.

Down this long hallway are 3 bedrooms and 2 baths!

Guest Bath

First up is the guest bath with half removed wallpaper and a weird layout. I had some big plans for this space but Taylor has to pull me down from the clouds and remind me that most of my ideas cost too much money and removing a wall and re-piping and changing the layout of this bathroom is definitely not in the cards right now. 

Guest Rooms

Following the guest bath are the two spare rooms.

One of the two rooms, we had set up as the guest room and I promise you it took a lot of work and a lot of the Folex carpet cleaner(found on Amazon.com – https://amzn.to/3guRnsJ -seriously tho this stuff is absolutely amazing) to get this room looking this good. The other spare room is Taylor’s storage/closet/nerd room, complete with piles of clothes, old game figurines, and miscellaneous forgotten items.

Master Bedroom

The last space on the hall is the Master suite. I’m going to show you the before pics because I will have another post about what we’ve done in that space since I’ve moved in. Originally Taylor wanted to have a crazy giant closet by taking over the adjacent room and re-laying out this bathroom and as much as I wanted that too, it was my turn to remind him that we can’t do that right now.

Upstairs Bedrooms

As long as this has been, there is still more. The upstairs consists of 2 nicely sized bedrooms that we are renting out to my best friend. I mean how cool is that? I get to live with my boyfriend AND still be roommates with my friend Kate! She also has the most renovated bathroom in the house which you can see the reveal for *here*.

Sun Room

Do you see it? do you see how amazing this space can be?!

I saved the best for last. I don’t know if it was Betty or Dub who wanted this space but, this sun room has stolen my heart since day one (sorry Taylor). It has so much potential! I am so excited to see it come to life BUT it is currently a woodshop where we can make all these fun projects and leave our tools out.

My little corner jungle oasis in my messy wood shop sun room.

I commandeered a corner for peaceful bug-free solitude that faces the trees. One day I’ll get to transform this whole space and I hope you can join me when I do.

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