Whilst in many ways it feels like a lifetime ago, it really is only in the last 12 months that our house has made its biggest transformation through the kitchen renovation and extension.
Whilst we’ve swiftly moved onto other projects – because we have a to-do list longer than I care to acknowledge – there has been no better way to see how far we’ve come until we got new neighbours this month.
Joe has got to know them really well and has been helping them out and lending some tools. And it’s been pretty funny seeing that they’re football fans (when we are categorically NOT) and he has to pretend to know what he’s talking about with football: “Yeah I really like it when they do them goals.” I could have died from laughter.
It’s a relief too because you never know what you’re going to get with new neighbours but they seem really lovely and they’re putting a lot of work into the house.
But what was the point again? Oh yes, so they’re renovating too. They’re starting from scratch much as we did. The house, like ours, had been left vacant for a significant amount of time and in terms of decorating, hadn’t been touched in that arena for about 70ish years.
The difference between us and them however is that we’ve lived in our renovation. They are living elsewhere for the time being meaning that they completed in about 2 days, what it took us to achieve in 2 years. I’m not jealous at all …
They’ve been knocking down the outhouse with a view to extend, taking the rooms back to brick ready for new coats of plaster and they’ve gutted the overgrown gardens. They really are going at it full force! And I’m sure they’ll do a great job.
When I stand down our garden and look back at the house, you can see the contrast of what ours looks like, to almost exactly how it looked only a few months ago. It really is spookily similar and it’s like going back in time a little bit. In fact, you only have to look back through our kitchen progress posts to find images almost identical to these. I suppose that’s obvious when you have 2 houses which are the exact same shell, but it just hit me seeing what is essentially the ‘before’ (next door) to the ‘after’ (us!) and it’s a big jump.
I’m excited for them to finish it and see what they come up with, because not only does it mean that the house isn’t vacant anymore, but any improvements they make to their house, increases the value of ours too. Winners all around.
