BLOG, DIY, DEMO, HOME PROJECTS, INSPO, RENOVATION

Hi there & welcome. For those of you that are new to my blog, I’m Kelly, eclectic creative, occasional DIYer, vintage lover, virtual designer and stager, eDesign business owner, and toddler mama here at Great Oak Haven. It’s that time again home lovers… ONE ROOM CHALLENGE TIME!

If you haven’t heard of the ORC before it’s an amazing creative bi-annual event where Instagram home and DIY bloggers pick a room to revamp within a timeline and give you the inside scoop on it each week until the final reveal! Reveal day for the One Room Challenge is like watching the last 5 mins of an HGTV show but it’s on Insta and you can scroll through tons of gorgeous refreshed, revamped, magazine-worthy spaces in minutes. I have been on “the gram” for about 2 years now and this is my 3rd ORC ever! I am still a newbie to the event as some people have been participating for much longer than me like the talented Jewel Marlowe, check her out! She’s a pro and has a stunning laundry room in the works! And one of my all-time favorites Kate Pearce, she’s a vintage queen with a very handy husband and they are working on a basement speakeasy… how amazing is that! The One Room Challenge is such a special place for me to connect with other creatives as well as get inspired by them! Kate & Jewel are a BIG reason that I am here so thank you ladies for all your support and your constant inspiration.

Also, a very big THANK YOU to Linda, the One Room Challenge creator. This woman has been doing a ton of work to make sure this event can be successful! Thank you for all that you do Linda, this event really does spread so much inspiration, joy, and creativity. The icing on the cake is that BetterHomes&Gardens is the fabulous media sponsor… I know right… just when you thought it couldn’t get any better throw in a dream publication like BH&G. So motivating 🙂

Okay so now that you know a little about me and The One Room Challenge, let me get to the goods. Which project are we taking on this year? Well, I am pleased to report that we are doing a full-on RENOVATION! My husband and I have been planning to renovate most of the house since we moved in. We moved into our 1957 Mid-Century Modern turned Contemporary (1987) split-level 3.5 years ago. I moved in when I was very pregnant after completing my Interior Design Degree in the fall of 2017. We have completed a DIY guest bathroom refresh in our home, as well as lots of design projects like our Patio, Playroom, and color-blocked statement walls throughout the house…BUT and it’s a big BUT… we have yet to fully complete a room from top to bottom since there have been a few things in the way! Carpet & Walls. Number one being the CARPET. So I don’t know if any of you have had this experience before but basically, we moved into a house that has just been freshly painted and carpeted, so even though we greatly disliked the carpet we didn’t want to get rid of it since it was clearly brand new. I didn’t want to go getting ripping up something that is perfectly usable even though it was ugly. Also, we didn’t know what we would find under there… since the house was built in ’57, we know it had water intrusion prior to buying it, and it was a rental in the past, so we decided not to risk opening up a crazy can of worms especially since we ran into some large expenses as new home buyers. You know just installing a brand new HVAC system, shed, and skylights (eye-roll), homeownership can feel like a money pit sometimes! And the biggest factor was once we were ready to rip out all the carpet we also noticed, oh hey that WALL is kind of in the way, I would love to remove it, and oh yeah, if we do that then we should wait to do the floors until we have a plan for the layout of this place. So here we are today with a very dingy carpet that is more than ready to be replaced. We secured our HELOC, we have an amazing architect and build team that have been excellent communicators with creative me (I cannot tell you how many architects I interviewed in the past 3 years), and we have a stellar plan that we are really excited about! Are you ready to hear what our GREAT OAK RENO consists of? okay okay, here it goes…

RENO PUNCH LIST

  • Replace front door
  • Replace all flooring on 3 levels
  • Add powder bath to the main entry
  • Demolish and relocate the fireplace
  • Demo Dining Room/Kitchen Wall
  • Redesign, Gut, and Install Gorgeous new Owner’s Bath
  • Create New His/Her Owner Closets
  • Reconfigure/Reuse Kitchen Cabinetry
  • Enhance Kitchen Island
  • Replace Kitchen Vent Hood and retile backsplash
  • New Lighting Throughout Home
  • Painted Stairs & Runner
  • A little DIY here & there 😉

We are sooooooo excited, I cannot wait to see it come to life over the next several weeks!

So if you want to hear and see some more about what is about to happen… go HERE and click on “Reno Details” in my highlights. I’ve been talking about it on and off since the winter. There have been a lot of highs and lows. Identity theft and COVID delays being the lows and highs have been creating with a plan that will help this house function for our family.

Tune in next week to see the design plans & more details!

Check all the AMAZING One Room Challenge projects HERE! For more play-by-play details on the reno progress follow me on INSTAGRAM– I also share my other favorite ORC projects on there and have a highlight dedicated to my ORC. If you need more inspo you can drop by PINTEREST — I will have pinned a lot of my Reno Inspo here if you want to check it out!

Here we go fellow ORCers, we’ve got this!