Not Much In This Neck of the Woods

Well, it's been a few days since my last post, but I, for one, can't think of much to write at the moment.

Things are rolling along with the house. I've set a closing date and we've got closing costs estimated (which are a lot less than we'd anticipated, so that's a huge plus). I've been thinking more and more about the house and what I'd like to do with it. Here are a few:

1) Walls. OK. So, I'm not sure what the rest of you all might think, but I'm of the opinion that wallpaper is evil. You heard me. Not just annoying, but pure evil. It sticks to the walls, creates a lot of unnecessary patching and repairing and work after it's down, and it covers a wall in pastel flowers. Straight from Satan, I tell you. 

So what does one do with wallpaper? Well, usually, one just takes it down, does the extra scraping and repairing, and paints the bare walls with gorgeous paint. My walls are covered in lathe and plaster. Don't know what that is? Take a look here. This means that taking down the wallpaper would expose a lot of crumbling wall that could never be painted. So I need to decide whether or not to do one of these three things (in order of expense): 

1)Tear down the wallpaper and then put up sheet rock and then paint over the new walls. 2)Tear down the wallpaper and then put up texture on the walls and then paint over the texture. 3)Paint over the wallpaper. I'm learning toward painting the wallpaper. I know it's kind of a cheap thing to do, but isn't that the point? 

2) Shower. The shower has sliding metal doors, which are pretty ugly and make the room feel smaller than it needs. It might be a little bit of work to take them down, but that might be one of the first things I'd like to do. I can just unscrew them and rip them off of the walls, patch up the tiles and the tub, and then install a shower rod and beautiful curtain. I am very partial to this one from Target. But I also love this Michael Kors curtain. Then I'll need to take care of the walls. With my pastel pink tile I'm thinking that a rich grey or a warm, chocolate brown would look good. Any votes?

3) Floors. Apparently underneath all of the carpet at the front of the house are the original hard wood floors. Can you believe it? Floors over a hundred years old? What character they would have! I would love to take a weekend, rent a sander, strip the floors, stain and then varnish them. The house would be amazing with a rich, oak color on the floors. Though I do like darker wood, the oak color would match the original wood that's located in the rest of the house. 

4) Fireplace. I need to get the fireplace cleaned out and inspected so that I can start using it. Also, the brick on the front is a bit of an eyesore. If I had my choice, I'd paint the brick a neutral grey color. Well, maybe even a very light sand color. I do love the color grey, though. I might even build up a stoop on the fireplace, remove the trim, and add a large mantle. Or maybe I'd leave the trim on the fireplace and change the color of the grate. So many things to do to it, but it's mostly cosmetic. I have to admit, however, that I do love the look of painted brick. Some brick looks very beautiful naturally, but some looks better painted.

5) Paneling. In the picture above you can also see the wood paneling on the walls in the living room. This would probably be the last thing I would take care of, for it's not in bad shape and it looks fine, as it is. I've researched different ways to take care of it, so it seems that I have two options. I could fill in the seams on the paneling and paint over it as is, or I could take it down and put up sheet rock or texture. I'm not sure which is best, really.

So many options! The first two I'd like to do sometime during the fall semester. I might attempt the third one over Christmas break, or I might even wait until summer. The fourth and fifth options would happen if I really wanted to put some elbow grease into the house. 

Is it strange that I want to take down the shower doors just for those beautiful shower curtains? I love shower curtains.