2023 House Tour {Four Years!}
Happy house tour day! Every year, this is probably the blog post I look forward to writing the most. I’ve said this before and it’s worth saying again – for me, house tour posts aren’t all about showing off how beautiful our house is or even really showing off the progress we’ve made. They’re about documenting a moment in time. This moment – the fourth year we’ve lived in this house.
I don’t do any special styling for my home tours. I don’t change how our house would look if you were to come over for dinner. All I do is make sure it’s nice and clean, then I snap some photos. Because, to me, these home tours aren’t about impressing anyone or ending up on Pinterest – they’re about capturing our home in this phase of life. I love looking back on past home tours and remembering old iterations of various rooms in our house. It’s fun to see what stuffed animals Jackson had on his bed, which dog managed to sneak into the frame, and what rooms were going through an awkward phase (spoiler: it’s always the game room).
I don’t think yearly home tours should just be for bloggers like me. They’re for everyone. I don’t think you’ll ever ever regret taking the time to clean your house up, snap a few photos, and preserve that moment in your home’s life. Our kids love looking back at old house tours I’ve done and marveling over how different the house looks. They love to see our old houses that they don’t remember all that well and hearing all of the stories that come with doing life in a home.
It’s cheesy, but I like to think of our home as a friend. She’s been here for us for four entire years and we plan to keep hanging out with her for a long time to come. She houses chaotic birthday parties, gives us a comfortable place to land when we’re sick or tired, and she’s quite literally always here for us. So, I think she deserves a little special treatment every now and then, don’t you?!
In fact, we gave our house a birthday.
Yup. She’s got a birthday. It’s the day we moved in, and it feels extra special to me because we’re the first people to live here. So, really, she didn’t become a home until that day we moved in four years ago. And that’s worth celebrating!
Here’s what we do on our house’s birthday:
- I always do our house tour photos right around our house’s birthday (it’s tomorrow!) and share them here.
- On the actual day, we never cook. We give the kitchen a little break! We always pile up in the car and head out for a fast food smorgasbord – everyone in the family gets to pick dinner from their favorite place, and we bounce around to all of them. Even if everyone wants something different.
- We, of course, also have some sort of dessert. Most years we tend to run to Dairy Queen and grab blizzards, just because that’s what we did year one and it stuck!
Is it anything fancy? Absolutely not. In fact, it’s all a little silly. But it brings us so much joy to celebrate our house in this intentional way. It also always forces us to take a second and be really truly grateful for our beautiful home.
But, that’s enough about our cheesy little traditions. Let’s get to the tour!
Previous Tours
Want to catch up on some old tours before you see this one? I don’t blame you – it’s more fun that way. Here are all of the old house tours:
- This post is the first time I ever showed our home, before it was even fully constructed.
- Here, you can see how she looked right after we moved in.
- This is the year one house tour.
- Here’s the year two house tour.
- And here’s last year’s house tour!
2023 House Tour – Four Years in Our Home
The Exterior
Things out here are looking mostly the same as they did last year, just with a little bit of growth on all of our landscaping! We prioritized planting a few trees in the first couple of years we lived here, and I’m so glad we did. They’re growing so well already, and I can’t wait until they’re a little more mature. This is the first home we lived in that didn’t already have really large trees, so it was definitely an adjustment at first!
We still have lots of plans for the backyard, but nothing set in stone enough to get started. Corey and I change our minds constantly about what exactly we want, which is always a sign to us that it’s not time to start yet! We know we want more hardscaping back there (maybe a paver patio?), we want a place to eat, and we need a cover for our patio extension. I also want a lot more landscaping to happen!
But, for now, it serves us well. The boys still love their play camper, the patio is a great place to sit and watch them play, and I love decorating the front porch steps.
The Entry, Powder, & Laundry Rooms
For the first time ever I can FINALLY say the powder room saw some change! This room was the last space I touched in this house and I put it off for a long time. But this year, I finally took some steps to give it a little zhuzhing and it makes me so happy. I added a shiplap ceiling, lots of trim, and a massive gallery wall. Oh, and new lighting, a vanity, and even a new toilet! It’s not done yet – I want to extend the gallery wall around the entire room – but it looks totally different and it feels like us.
The entry and laundry room are still pretty much the same as they were last year. I didn’t even snap a photo of the laundry room because it still looks like this. Both are spaces I’d like to update a bit at some point, but there are no solid plans yet. The entry table needs a refresh (I want storage!) and the laundry room has always bothered me (I don’t want open shelving!). I have a feeling 2024 will see some changes to the entry, but I’m gonna have to work up a little more courage before I tackle the laundry room – it won’t be a small project!
The Living Room
I think this is the second year in a row that I can say our living room looks more or less the same. We added a full-length mirror by the entry and a large bar cabinet between the living and dining rooms, but that’s about it. And you know what? I’m good with it!
To me, the fact that our living room has stayed pretty static for a few years now is just a sign that we’ve landed in a place that feels right. That being said, I did just decide to replace the coffee table – the new one is sitting in a box in my entry as I type this blog post! And, after weathering a toddler and two puppies, our living room rug is looking a little worse for the wear. So, I have a feeling this view in 2024 will be at least a little bit different!
The Dining Room & Kitchen
The biggest change in these areas this year is for sure our new lighting! I’ve wanted to add a statement chandelier to our dining room since the day we moved in, and it feels so good to have it done. We also swapped out the smaller pendants in the kitchen for something that makes way more of an impact.
These weren’t particularly difficult or elaborate changes, but they made a huge (huuuuuge!) difference in both spaces. It’s impossible to overstate the power of good lighting, y’all!
Other than that, the only other big change in these spaces is the new dishwasher. Ours bit the dust a few weeks back and we replaced it with this KitchenAid one. It feels like a massive upgrade, and I love the look, too!
The Primary Suite
This space was the first area of our home that we put any effort into, and it honestly hasn’t changed much since a few months after we moved in! I’ve been itching for a bit of a refresh in here for a while now, but I haven’t decided exactly what I want to do so it stays the same. I could see us making a few small swaps in here next year – maybe some new art, a new dresser…we’ll see!
The big thing that did change in this part of our house in year four is our closet! It got a complete overhaul and it’s been incredible. I couldn’t possibly love it more, and I’m so grateful every day that we took the time to give it a makeover! You can see the big makeover here.
The Game Room + Upstairs Hallway
Ok, let’s head upstairs, shall we? Other than the powder room, the game room is definitely the space in our house that saw the most change this year! Corey and I had been dreaming of a big wall full of built-ins since before we even moved into this house, and it finally happened!
I can say with confidence that getting those built-ins done really got Corey and I excited to make some more changes in here. We’ve been planning on installing vertical shiplap on all of the walls and have been sloooowly adding more – I think 2024 is the year we’ll finish it off! I have lots of ideas for this space now that the kids are a little bigger and it isn’t always a total wreck. Stay tuned for that, I guess!
Our upstairs hallway also got an overhaul this year, with some board and batten! A confession about that project? I don’t love the paint color. I was really excited to get started on this project and as a result I neglected to actually test any colors. And that’s almost always a mistake. So, I think there’s a solid chance this entire hallway will get repainted in the next few months.
The Boys’ Bedrooms & Bathroom
And finally, let’s discuss the last section of the house – the boys’ bedrooms and their bathroom! Al of these spaces look largely the same as last year. The only exception is Jackson’s room, which got a little refresh earlier this year. He was ready to upgrade to a full-sized bed, and it’s been one of the best changes we’ve made! He really loves having a little more room. Not for himself, of course. For all the stuffed animals.
Every year I feel like Jackson’s room gets a little more him, and it’s really fun to watch him put his stamp on it. Grant still is more or less completely unbothered by what his room looks like and doesn’t have much of an opinion. But, he’s definitely not as into dinosaurs as he used to be, so I think there’s a chance he’ll end up with a refresh soon, too!
And that, my friends, is how our house is looking at year four.
We don’t have any other non-holiday-related projects planned this year, so it’s safe to say this is exactly how it’ll look as we head into the new year! I’ve already got a lot of ideas about changes I want to make once the holidays are over, though, so it’s gonna be a fun year five!