I’m writing this just a few hours before we officially close on our house in Saint Paul. It’s so exciting to have found a seller so quickly, but I’m a bundle of nerves because things happen at these appointments. We left this house a few years ago, but recently went back and put a ton of work into it. We are so proud of the work we did and the fact that we stuck to our 5-7 year plan. It’s the perfect home for a young couple and we are excited for the next owner to make their memories here.

I saved some pictures from a few years ago so you could see the before and after shots. I was busy getting my hands dirty, so I didn’t do as good as I should have, but it’s better than nothing.

That’s what it looked like when we bought it. That front yard had issues – the retaining walls were built with timbers and they were rotting and falling. The bright red kitchen walls inspired me to buy a bunch of horrible kitchen stuff that we sold in the garage sale when we moved out east. Don’t even get me started on the vinyl selections. The rest of the house had old carpet and the bathrooms had huge orange cabinets that filled the space. But really, we loved every inch of it.

So now, some in progress photos from April (and some from earlier – my timeline is off a bit.)

Normally I don’t endorse a product that probably has chemicals galore, but we needed something that would take care of a stain and this shit worked.

And for those of you that missed my snapchat coverage of the final walkthrough of the house, you don’t need to worry anymore. I downloaded the whole video for your viewing pleasure. Also, you can follow me on snapchat: stephgregerson (I just realized that most of this is horizontal, but I’m leaving it.)

And there she is. The red door was a game changer in my opinion. My dad and company killed it on the front yard retaining walls (his website is here.) It was a lot of work, but worth every second.

I’m so grateful for the time we spent in this house, the things we learned, the memories we made. The nights playing dice on the patio, the blizzard parties with beer & friends, the movie nights in the theater room, the dogs sunbathing in the living room, walks around Como Lake and Creamy Cone, Christmas morning with my family, Easter Egg hunts with our nieces, poker nights in the garage. Then I started reading these old posts.
This was our first home that we owned. It was our first big purchase as a married couple. We had so many fun times there. It feels weird because we said goodbye to that house when we packed up and move out east, but this is more final. We won’t be stepping across that threshold ever again. It’s a crazy feeling, but life goes on.