Our Biggest Adventure Thus Far

I am a sucker for "before" and "after" pictures. 

Anything from people, to living rooms, seeing what it looked like before compared to after is always amazing to me. So, as the title of this post suggests this is the "before" picture of our biggest adventure - remodel of our house! This was taken on the day we closed on the house (Aug 2009)

Notice overgrown bushes, cracking stucco, mismatched windows (and this is only the outside)...it had hard work written all over it and was exactly what we had been looking for (I know, I know, we are crazy!)

This adventure is still in progress, but looking at the "after" pictures makes me smile

Picture it without Christmas lights, and with green grass and flowers.  

Also, photography skills are something I hope to develop as this blogging adventure unfolds!

Some of the outside improvements we have made are: 

new windows (still working on exterior window trim), 

new stucco, new exterior lights,replaced shingles, 

replaced gutters and installed facia (white stuff under the roof line), 

and my most favorite feature of the outside: the front step banisters custom built by my wonderful hubby! 

Well, he did most of the other work too ( the only thing we hired someone to do was the stucco), but the 

banisters are my favorite. (They took forever and a day to paint!)

Had I been thinking of blogging at the time, a picture tutorial on how to build these banisters would have been in order...but alas it was not on our mind at the time. 

What is the favorite part of the outside of your home?