Curb Appeal

There's no doubt that our house looks much better than when we bought it.

We've painted, added slate veneer and built a porch 

But the house still needs curb appeal.  We're doing the best we can to get the lawn going but while we wait to see how much of it survived from last year I need to work on other projects.  Right now the biggest eyesore in the front is this area under the front window.  In this moving-day photo you can see that this little space was a patch of grass with a scraggly juniper bush.

I managed to remove most of the grass and the juniper bush last summer but for the last year or so this area has been my spot for cleaning out construction buckets and washing my tile saw.  It could use a little attention.

Speaking of needing attention, take a look at the porch.  When I built it last fall I used Thompsons water seal because I did not want to darken the cedar.  Huge mistake.  The finish it left on the boards actually collects dirt and makes everything look older.

And the cedar post just isn't right.  It needs to be white to balance the colors on the front of the house.

So last weekend my brother helped out by sanding and staining the porch and painting the post.  So much better.

 

 I'll save you the hassle of scrolling up for before and after photos.  August 2011

June 2013 - Maybe we know what we're doing after all.

The lawn is still pretty patchy.  We've seeded again and thanks to the sprinkler system we should be seeing a lot more green in a few weeks.