Humble Beginnings

I figured the best place to start was the beginning. (Duh!) The Mr. and I bought our first fixer-upper in 2007, located in the lovely city of Austin, TX. It was built in 1965, and not a thing had been updated since.

We chose this house for a few reasons: It was in our price range; it was centrally located; it was as close to mid-century modern as we could afford. 

This is the living room, looking onto the dining room. You can see the front door on the left and the lovely rug hiding the vinyl tile that covered every square inch of the floor.

Here's the dining room from the view of the spacious kitchen.

And the kitchen. You couldn't open two cabinets without them touching. The appliances were original, and also a fire hazard.

The windows had these cool screens on them. The downside was that they blocked a lot of light.

The house also came with free pets. Lots of them.

I realized that we didn't take any photos of the bathroom. Take my word for it, it was not pretty. Wallpaper from the '70s, cabinets that were tapered so that they could actually fit into the room, funky tile. Maybe it's better that we saved you from having to see it. You can thank me later.

This is the back of the house. The roof over the porch will soon be removed. It was installed poorly, which has rotted out the eaves. Please ignore me traipsing, unaware through the yard. If you're wondering about all the weird fences, the previous owner raised German Shepards. There's also sheet metal on the walls in the laundry room to protect it from scratching.

And finally, our beautiful Live Oak. It's old, large and shady. It makes the back yard feel comfy.