WE BOUGHT A HOUSE!

design darling we bought a house

I thought this day might never come (or at least not before my due date!) but thank goodness, here we are — we bought a house!!! I am so relieved, excited, overwhelmed, and absolutely chomping at the bit to get started on all the projects we have in store. Let’s just say the house we wound up in will be keeping us very busy over the next several years!

design darling darien house before photos

Our new (very old) house was built in 1850 and the previous owners lived here for nearly 50 years, so we have our work cut out for us in terms of restoring it to its former glory! I’ll be documenting every project we undertake, from refinishing floors and moving walls to relandscaping the yard and ultimately renovating the kitchen and bathrooms.

design darling darien house hardwood floors

I wanted to share a little more about our house hunt since I was admittedly a little discouraged when I wrote my last update! After looking at 15 or 20 houses, we realized what we could afford in my hometown fell into one of two camps: either a completely updated but relatively small three-bedroom house or a house with more bedrooms and more square footage that would involve some serious projects. After we had an accepted offer on a newer construction house outbid just hours later, we revisited some of the older houses we’d seen and started to more seriously consider taking on a house that would involve some renovations down the road. I had fallen in love with this one during an open house and the moment it fell into our price range, we made an offer and the rest is history! Well, there were about a million and one hurdles between getting our offer accepted and officially closing this week, but I’ll save those stories for another time. 🙂

design darling darien house before photos fireplace

Like I said I’ll be sharing lots and lots of projects in the months (and years!) to come, but we’ll definitely have to space them out so we can save our pennies between projects! The only other home we’ve owned together was a new construction townhouse in Dallas, so I’m equal parts excited and intimidated about taking on a house with so much history. There is so much to love about this home, from the original hardwood floors to the 10’ ceilings, and so much I can’t wait to get my hands on (like the very 1980s hall bath and the very overgrown yard… but all things in due time!).

design darling darien house before photos stairwell

We started ripping up old carpets this week and for the most part we’ve gotten very lucky with the state of the hardwood floors underneath! We’re having them sanded and stained over the next week or so and then we’ll make the move from our rental in Greenwich to the new house in Darien and start on painting and getting the nursery ready for the end of September. Our hope is to be able to tackle renovating the kitchen and the powder room in early 2020, but I may be getting ahead of myself there! For now we’re just happy to have a plan in place and grateful to have ended up in a home that will house our growing family for many years to come. I never thought I’d be back in my hometown at 29, but I suppose it took me leaving and living elsewhere for the past decade (San Francisco, New York, and Dallas!) to know this is exactly where we are meant to be. I am beyond excited to share this next chapter with all of you!