The Never Ending Project: Porch Reveal

Whew!  We. are. done. And exhausted!  It only took us ten months to get to this point.

Giggle.  Did I really just say "only took us ten months"?

I must be delusional.  That is the only explanation.

Oh well, on with the show tour, folks!

First, I'm going to take you back.  Waaaay back.  This was a picture taken on the day we closed on our house.  

 

Can you even see the porch?  

Let's see what that view looks like today, shall we?

 

I think the house just took a deep breath and released it slowly. SIGH.

At this point, I should mention that the porch is not done. It's close, but we have some finishing touches that we are working on completing that I'll show you when we finish them.  Plus, we still need to add gutters and a new roof.  But the building is done and we are so happy with our results!

Ok, back to the fun stuff.  This was taken day one of demolition.  We had no idea what we were getting into.

We knew the porch was in bad shape based on the house inspection.  But we were still surprised to see what was lurking under all the cosmetic band aides.

SIGH. This time, it's me you hear breathing a sigh of relief.

The biggest change that we made to the porch was the ceiling.  Previously, the ceiling was level with the brick which is just under 71/2 feet. When we tore down the rotten ceiling and saw the slope of the joists, we decided to follow that line and gain the extra head space.

While we had the DIY construction crew here, we picked their brains about the porch.  They strongly encouraged us not to do this.  They warned us of all the tedious measuring and cutting that it would involve.  But Bryan (along with Bindi) was set on putting a ceiling fan out here.  The fan has to be seven feet from the floor and there was not enough space unless we went with the sloped ceiling.  And yes, it took a lot of tedious cuts to get this result, but it was so worth it!

Our house faces south so some shade is a necessity.  An easy solution was to add curtains.  They're crisp and clean and cozy.

Previously, our porch did not make a good impression.  More than once, we've had visitors exclaim how nice our house is once they step through the front door.  They're pleasantly surprised mostly because they think it'll be as dark and depressing as the porch used to be.

I don't think that's the case anymore!  Not only does it make a good first impression, no haints are getting in!

To see more of our porch renovation, click here. 

I would be remiss if I didn't mention that this porch is my husbands first foray into building.  Anything.  As in, never worked with a table saw, hand saw, jig saw or even touched a saw before.  But wood working was something that had always interested him, he just never had a space in which to do it before.  It was a lot of trial and error, blood and sweat and just a few tears.  Mostly mine.  And only tears of joy!  I had no doubt that he could do this!  Little does he know the plans I now have for him--everywhere I look in our house, I'm picturing built-ins and moldings and shelves and everything custom, custom, custom!  But I'll give him a little time off first.  :)