Sharing our home buying adventure with you today! If you've bought a home before, adventure is a nice word for it don't you think? My husband Charles and I were renting for years while I finished up college, student teaching, and my first few classrooms. Rent was getting expensive and we felt it was time to invest in something that would put more money in our own pockets instead of a landlord's (no offense to landlords!) so we started our hunt. This was the spring of 2020 when prices of homes were skyrocketing for no other reason than everyone and their brother wanted one.
My husband is very practical. He wanted a home that was #1 within our budget, #2 livable as is, and #3 had character. No "cookie cutters" as he called them. My top three priorities were a little different, however. We were on the same page with #1 - budget is important and we weren't going to spend thirty grand more on a home that wasn't worth thirty grand more just to outbid someone else. My #2 was we had to have close neighbors. We knew we wanted kids, and with how much Charlie was traveling for work I wanted to make sure I had someone within walking distance if something freaky ever happened (you know, like a bat flying around the house). The #3 for me was it has to have potential. This is where we really ran into trouble because as it turns out I see the potential in every home... like every home.
Our first few tours went something like this:
"Wow this home is amazing. We could redo the whole kitchen and this little nook would be so cute with a bench!"
"Ash, this home needs a new roof, there are puddles in the garage."
"Wow Charlie, all of these arches are amazing and look at that retro stove!"
"Ash, that's a gas stove and there's literally no gas hookup in this house."
"Wow look at how charming this place is, we could totally make it work!"
"Ash, there's one bedroom and the bathroom entrance is inside it."
Needless to say, we left a lot of home tours without putting in an offer and I was starting to feel heartbroken. One home we looked at was behind a Chick-fil-A (not ideal now that I think of it) and when our offer wasn't accepted I actually cried. Like, sat on the couch watching HGTV all day crying over this home that I really saw potential in that went for 50 grand over asking price. How I longed for those quiet Sundays when the drive thru would be closed.
It was the end of the school year and time to resign our lease if we wanted to stay in our apartment. We were done looking at homes and had decided to try again the following year when our lease ran out again. Then I saw it - the thirty point buck home of all homes just waiting for us to come look at it. We were done putting in offers, but I messaged our realtor right away and said, "This home looks SO COOL is there any chance we can pretend we want to buy it just so we can go look inside?" I was shocked when he said, "Yeah, I want to see it too!"
This next part starts out as a horror movie would... It was a dark and stormy night when we drove out to Stoughton, WI (a place I had never heard of) to look at this 140+ year old victorian home in the historic district. Here are the pictures from the original listing and our first thoughts!
I loved the double porch and big picture windows. Look at that cute hand painted mailbox! The style of painting is called "rosemaling" and it's all over the little Norwegian town.
Here's the main living space, connected to the side entryway, dining room, and guest room. All of the woodwork was to die for!
The kitchen leads off to a little laundry area. There's a full-size washer and dryer in the basement, but the 80 year old couple who lived here before us couldn't walk down the steep stairs anymore so they put this little cutie on the main floor. We loved the old oven and plan to keep it until it gives out on us! The vegetable wallpaper was a little much, but an easy fix. And the attached island, which my husband lovingly nicknamed "the ballsack" just added that much more character. We should probably stop calling it that now that we have a baby who will learn to repeat what we say, huh?
On the left is our dining room with a dropped ceiling. The door leads to the kitchen. The dining room shares a wall with our guest room. Growing up I was always the one who gave up my room when someone came to visit, so I really wanted to make sure we had a space for family to stay since we live so far away from them!
The downstairs bathroom is a little vintage... I actually wish the tile was pink instead of gray! My great aunt has an old pink bathroom and made it look magazine-worthy, so I think of her every time I see one. Maybe I'll paint the tile one day, I've heard it's not that hard?
This photo on the left is our side entrance. We use that most. If you walk in the side entrance the bathroom is to the left, kitchen straight ahead, and living room on the right (if that helps you visualize). The little brick area used to be where the fireplace was that would heat the house and go out the chimney! There's no fireplace there anymore, but I would love to put in a gas one someday. Our heat and AC go through the vents now so if we wanted to put in a real wood stove again we'd have to rework all of that, probably not in the cards for us in this home. When you walk upstairs the first thing you see is this big open space that is now our tv room! We only have one tv in our home so if we're up here watching something it feels really special. When my dad came to inspect the home he jumped on the floor between those two windows and said, "feels pretty sturdy" so I knew that was a plus!
The bathroom upstairs is directly over the one downstairs. From the outside you can see where they added on this part of the house when the owners switched to indoor plumbing! The clawfoot tub is what really got me... I want to re-wallpaper the top, paint the woodwork, and paint the underside of the tub to make it feel more "us". To be clear, when I said I wanted a pink bathroom earlier this is not what I meant!
This is where it gets a little weird, but stick with me! These French doors are original to the home and connect this room with the tv room. The entire upstairs is sort of the same as downstairs, one big circle where everything connects. This room had FOUR openings, all with doors! I'm guessing it was some sort of sitting room? I knew this had to be our master bedroom because it's attached to the balcony overlooking the fountain in town! Plus I didn't want our future kids to be sneaky one night and end up launching themselves over the rails without us knowing, haha!
These last three rooms I think were considered bedrooms? They're all in a row, so you have to go through the middle one to get to the last one. A sibling walking through my room whenever they wanted is not something I would have enjoyed growing up, so that middle room has been an office / playroom for the time being. The room on the left is now our nursery and the right will be a "big kid room" as our little boy grows up!
The attic is where our bat family lived - ha! - but that's another story. The stairs leading up to it are a little rotten and smoosh so we don't go up here often if we don't have to! In a perfect word we would insulate this space but for now it stores Christmas boxes and seasonal clothes. Speaking of seasonal clothes... did you notice there are no closets in our home?! I guess they didn't need to hang their two outfits in the 1800's, so that's another project we're going to tackle one day.
Needless to say, we put in an offer that day. And by offer, I mean a joke -there's-no-way-we're-getting-this-home- offer. I wrote a love letter to the current owners who were an elderly couple in their 80's and had lived and loved the home for 65+ years. I told them we loved their home, I told them of our dreams of raising children in an old home where generations of families had before us, I told them exactly where we would put our Christmas tree every year. I invited them on the renovation journey with us, free to stop by whenever they would like to see what we've done with the place. Our realtor called and told us the offer was accepted, contingent that my dad (who builds homes for a living) would be our inspector as the home was old and likely had a few things that wouldn't be up to today's coding. I was in TJ Maxx with my friends when I got the call and almost fell to the floor I was so shocked. Remember when I said "it was a dark and stormy night"? It was actually so dark and stormy we didn't see anything in the town, let alone know there even was a town! For all I knew we were moving to the middle-of-nowhere creepsville! Nonetheless, they were so grateful someone wanted to love their home that had been in their family for generations and actually let us start moving in before everything was finalized! With covid starting we haven't had the previous owners stop by, but I do see them drive around our block to "check in" on us every once in a while. Below is the cutest picture of us popping champagne together.

While you wait for our next projects, take a moment and look at the home you're in. Whether you're renting, owning, living with your parents, or in a college dorm. If someone from the 1800's saw where you live now they would be amazed! We so often take for granted what we already have and forget that the way we're living is better than most kings and queens in ancient times. Take a look around and pick out three things that you're grateful for in your home. Write them down. Take a breath. Be grateful.
Watch out for deer!

You are so talented Ashley! Love this! I love watching you transform things and give them a whole new look.
Perfect thing to read while I'm drinking my morning coffee!
Love it!!!!