A Sneak Peek Into Our New House

On Leap Year we closed on our new house! Although the day itself was incredibly stressful, I will forever remember it as one of the best days of my life.

This day felt like it was never going to come. Largely due to the fact that buying a house scared me more than anything in life. Yes, even more than having a baby! As an obsessed traveler who was either exploring or in the midst of planning another trip and as person whom never felt like anywhere I visited or lived in was truly “home”, I despised the idea of putting down permanent roots somewhere. With time, however, I realized that Charlotte, North Carolina is definitely my home. Not only does my entire family live here, but I love the city and the businesses that I have built, and more importantly my son deserves a house to grow up in.

You might have not noticed, but I added a Home category to my website, so that you can easily follow along as we decorate and renovate and make our new house perfect for us. On a side note: the following photos are not mine, they were the photos on our real estate agent’s website. From now on every photo you see of our house will be taken by me. I have also conveniently linked every title below with its corresponding Pinterest page, in case you are interested in seeing what will be inspiring me during this process.

House Exterior And Front Yard

We plan to paint to the house white with black shutters. We have yet to decide on whether or not we are keeping the red door, but we are leaning towards keeping it, as red is very good luck in the Chinese culture. What do you think? Should we keep it red? We would also like to add a garage at some point. There will definitely be prettier landscaping once spring comes.

Living Space

The living space is our favorite part of the entire house and one of the main reasons we purchased it (we also love the school district it is in and that it is a five minute drive from my parents house with a Starbucks in between). We adore the blonde, grayish wooden floors and that it is open concept. We will not do much to this area other than add some fabulous furniture and paintings/pictures to the walls. We would also like to add a fireplace in the future.

Dining Space

We will be taking the current light fixture down and replacing it with a chandelier. Last night we discovered the most gorgeous kitchen table and chairs, so hopefully we will have our first piece of furniture arriving soon! Who knows, maybe we will even be brave enough to host Easter dinner?

Kitchen

I refused to buy a house without an all-white kitchen. To me, there is nothing more stunning! I love the granite counters and the subway tile backsplash; the only thing I would like to change with time is to swap out all of the silver fixtures for gold ones. The red kitchen items pictured were for staging purposes and are no longer there. How beautiful are the french doors leading out onto the porch?

Master Bedroom

This will be our temporary master, until we can renovate the bottom floor of our house into our dream master suite. That is going to be our biggest undertaking with the house and will take a couple of years. In the meantime, we will not do too much to this room other than take down the fan. We will be bringing in most of our old bedroom furniture; some of it will have to stay in storage, since the room is on the smaller side. Eventually, when Joaquín gets older, we will replace all of the carpeted rooms with the same wooden floor on the main level. We hate carpet, however we know it is the best for our son right now and any other children we might have.

Master Bathroom

The first thing that will be done to the master bathroom is that it will be painted white. We want to change some of the cabinets and fixtures as well, but that is not a priority. Here is a great toilet review guide.

Guest Bedroom

We have yet to put any real thought into the guest bedroom. It will be the last room to be finished. We already have the bed, but that is it. It will probably have a global theme to it and I will display a lot of the treasures that I have bought around the world during my travels.

Guest / Joaquín’s Bathroom

We are doing the same thing to this bathroom, as we are to the master bathroom. The walls are being painted white and again some of the cabinets and fixtures will be replaced with time.

Nursery

We are going to try and make Joaquín’s nursery as similar to his original one as possible. It is going to be tough, as the new room is half the size of the old room. What does not fit, will be put into his playroom on the bottom level.

Bottom Level: Playroom, My Office, And Laundry Room

For now this is going to be Joaquín’s playroom, my office, and our laundry room. I am most excited about finally having a home office. I will definitely be putting a lot of time, effort, and love into creating the perfect working space for me.

Backyard

The #1 reason we bought this house is because of the backyard. My husband and I wanted lots and lots of room for Joaquín to be able to play outside. Something that we both did as kids. Our backyard consists of almost half an acre and although it is not pictured, there is a lovely little creek with a bridge. We plan to spend as much time as we can every day out back as a family. We are going to paint the deck, but have not settled on a color yet. Maybe white? We want to string lights in the tree next to the deck and find some pretty outside furniture. There could be a gazebo or hammock in the future? My parents are going to buy our son a playground and our nanny wants to make a little garden with him. The fence is going to be replaced with something that is both good looking and sturdy to keep Joaquín safe.

What is your favorite thing about our new house?