I really wasn’t into spending $400 on a slipcover for an 8 year old sofa that we may just decide to replace any day now anyway.. That just didn’t quite work out.

I’ve been living in distress over the state of my house pretty much constantly for the last 2.5 years.And before that, in the old house, I was like that for a long time too.

I always find a lot to love about my home, but the bad kind of outweighs the good a lot of the time.There’s just a whole lot of ugly going on in terms of old finishes, damaged walls and floors, half started projects and things that just need love.The fact is though, when you’re renovating, you’re going to have to live with all kinds of ugly when you run out of time to get something done right away.

If you learn which state of ugly you’re most comfortable with, you can plan a little bit for where you can stop and take a brake without losing your mind and feeling like you need to give up sleeping to get a project done.I’ve discovered that I’m really comfortable with walls ripped back to the bare studs, or even just plain drywall and plywood floors.

Some might find that they can live with the old ugly finishes for a long time as long as a space feels “done”.

Others might be happy to paint over old finishes, which I’ve done, as a happy medium for a little while.My mother-in-law has a little place right on the beach, just a short drive away from our new house..

This is how we’ll spend our Summers.. How did we ever get so lucky?I’ve shared some of these photos on my old blog before, when we were going through the home inspection stage of buying our house, but I thought I might just show off a bit again for any newbies out there..So this is where the magic will happen:.

The view from the back yard..Looking in the other direction..