Life is Beautiful

Motherhood, Sewing, Family

Water table.

~ Etc.

One of our girls’ favorite activities is to play with the sink.  The kitchen sink, the bathroom sink, they’re not picky as long as there’s running water.  They’ve drenched the carpet/floor/counter tops many many times, so one Saturday Jay built a water table for the girls.
And since then, no more soaked up floors in the house!

my husband’s got skills.

~ DIY DREAM HOUSE, HOME, Jay's DIY

 
 
 
i’ve mentioned this in the past, but my husband’s hobby is to buy and move into an old home and renovate it himself, then rent it out and then buy/move into another old home to renovate it and so on.  so after he renovated our previous house, (to see the house go here for before/after pictures.) he couldn’t wait to renovate the house we live in now and he’s already renovated our whole basement and was about to tackle the main floor, but when my parents retired and moved back into their house in the states, jay offered to renovate their whole house for them.  isn’t he such a sweet son-in-law?  my parents sure adore him and love him dearly.
 
so while our house is on a pause from the renovation mode, my husband’s been busy renovating my parents’ house.  he’s not completely finished yet, but here is his work so far.
 
 
pictures of the kitchen and the dining room before:
 
(just to note, my parents are meticulously clean,
these were just taken right before packing and moving for the demolition.)
you can say it, it was pretty bad.
but i’m going to miss this green room. 🙁
 
and now the comparisons of the before/after:
 
 
 
this is the wall of the dining room but he broke it down to make the kitchen bigger
and to open up the dining room to the kitchen.
 
so instead of a wall now, there’s a kitchen island and the whole place is open!
 
and he painted the walls, took the carpet out and replaced the floor with a wooden floor in the dining room.
and some more pictures of the after:
 
 
 
my mom picked out the colors and and my husband designed the layout and executed the whole thing.(oh, i do have to give a shout out to my brother michael who learned from the master and helped out or he’d give me a hard time. :D)
 

 

i call him the DIY king.
my husband that is, not my brother. hahaha
 
 
 
 
 
 

jay is the MAN

~ Etc.

this week i want to showcase how talented my husband is. one of his favorite hobbies is to purchase old homes and renovate it himself.  he learned it from his talented dad who built his first home by reading a book when he was just in his early 20’s. yes you read that right, by reading a book on how to build a house! talk about a genius, right? and the house still stands strong today and someone else lives in it now. so jay helped his dad build their 3 houses in Hawaii when he was growing up so he can do pretty much anything; plumbing, electrical, you name it, he can do it.

so this is our house #1.  we used to live in this townehome until last fall and as you’ll see from the pictures it was really outdated.  to see a more detailed video of the before see here.

the backyard before:
 the kitchen before:
i helped a little too haha. but i was 4 months prego so i couldn’t help out much.
the after:
just omit the mess of the kitchen in the pics below. 😉
the wall by the entry door was shortened a lot so it’s more open
and look how little miss A was with her two teeth on top and bottom!
she was excited for the renovation too.
and jay’s friends/cousins/family came to help in the process too.  thanks guy!
we’ve now moved into another house because jay was getting the renovation itch again but my dad retired recently so my parents moved back to their house here from Korea(YAY!!!) a few weeks ago and jay graciously offered to renovate their whole house before he gets to ours. so i’ll have to post pictures of my parents’ home too when they’re all done!
the backyard before:
the after:

the fireplace before:
the after:
then he broke down the huge wall upstairs
and built a new wall/doorway facing the other way
so the bedroom would be connected to the bathroom(which it wasn’t before)
the bathroom before(after we painted the stripes):
the after:

(and the closet you see with the clothes hanging used to be the hallway.
but now it’s being used as the walk-in closet.)

i wish i could find more pictures of the before/after of this house,
especially the bathroom on the main floor, bummer.
but as you can see, he is amazing.  i’m so proud of him!