Making a house into a home

We looked at a ton of rental houses online, but we had very specific hopes for good schools nearby, 4+ bedrooms, 2+ bathrooms, nice yard, reasonably large kitchen, and all at a relatively (to Utah) affordable price tag.  In the end we only looked at two houses.  This one won out because the landlords seemed super nice, there were kids to play with next door, a bigger yard with a garden space, and there was central air (the other house had an evaporative cooler, aka swamp cooler.)

 

That said, it wasn't our dream home. The landlords allowed us to borrow this couch, a chair, and a dining table while we waited for our shipment which made camping out a lot more comfortable though.

 

The main thing that bothered me were the bathrooms.  The wallpaper was kinda ancient... like 1980s ancient.  And there is no tub in the house, which was such a bummer.  But our kids are all old enough to shower, and with 2 full bathrooms, that didn't seem like it should be a deal breaker.

 

I liked the built in shelves in the basement.  But the nearly shag carpet, not so much.

 

Gas fireplaces in the living room and basement family room were a bonus.

 

And the backyard garden plot was very neglected, but large and showed potential.

 

Grapevines and apple trees were unexpected, but we were super excited about them.

 

And so we moved in!  Our first purchase was an indoor/outdoor rug for under the table to protect the carpet from all of our messy eaters. 

 

Then we found these 6 chairs in a thrift store.  Our old dining chairs had been from IKEA, and after more than 10 years of use, we had given them away before leaving Germany.  I liked the style of these, and thought I'd re-upholster the seats. (though I'd never done that before, at $5 per chair it seemed low risk.)

 

We camped out on air mattresses and borrowed bedding from Grandma until our shipment finally arrived! Many neighbors stopped by to introduce themselves and brought jams, breads, and treats. It was the warmest welcome we've ever had to a new home!

When it did arrive, we learned our dining table had broken in the move.  A trip back to the thrift store scored us this dining table for $20 that seemed to match the chairs we'd bought a week or so earlier!

 

It took some work to find a place for everything, this house being roughly 2/3 the size of our last house.

 

But slowly it began to come together and look like home.

 

I even got my chairs done, and we were really happy with how they turned out.

 

The apple trees began to bear fruit and I canned applesauce, made apple pies, and Roman apple cake, and packed apples in every lunch box.  They just kept coming!  We gave some away, and still have some stored in the garage for the Winter.

 

      We set up a volleyball/badminton net in the backyard.

 

And decorated for Fall.

 

And then one Saturday morning our neighbors said it was time to pick grapes!

 

I spent that weekend borrowing Grandma's steam juicer and canning quarts and quarts of grape juice.

 

Our neighbor also gave us peaches from their trees, so I made peach jam and also froze peach slices for smoothies and cobblers. It is fantastic to live in a neighborhood where everyone has a garden and fruit trees!

 

The landlords agreed to buy the paint if I wanted to take down the wallpaper and paint the bathrooms.  We agreed on a shade of blue gray,  and so far I have finished one bathroom.  The other one has the paper down and may get painted this week- if I can make the time!  We still have a lot of pictures to hang, and we still move things to different kitchen drawers to try to figure out what makes the most sense, but we are well on our way to feeling at home here in Utah!