Thursday, October 22

An autumn house tour

Julia at Hooked on Houses is doing a Tour of Homes, and I'm excited to participate. Here's a peek at our house, all dressed for autumn.

First, the front of the house. Our house is pretty good sized, but it's built on a hillside, so from the front it doesn't appear too big. This is one of the things I like about the house.




To the right of the front door is the seating area of my front porch, which I've tried to make into an outdoor living room. To see more of this space, click here.




Now come on in!

Here's the foyer. That's Cocoa the pound puppy pretending that she doesn't care that I'm taking pictures. Straight ahead is the living room; to the right is the dining room. On the left is my husband's study (that I failed to photograph in the daylight), the stairway, and a hall leading to the powder room and the master bedroom.



Here's the living room. I'll try to give you a 360 degree look at it.





This room is the trickiest room I've ever tried to decorate. It has lots of lovely elements. . . I love the fireplace and the built-in entertainment center and the built-in bookcases and all the French windows and doors. . . but all together it's a room with which I've struggled. If looking at the pictures gives you any wonderful ideas about space planning for this room, please share them with me! This really is an old-fashioned living room. We sit here and talk, or read, or watch TV together, or entertain guests. Definitely not a living room just for show, this is a room we live in. In fact, if you were in the room right now and could peek under the coffee table, you'd see my exercise stepper. I pull it out from under the coffee table every day and exercise while watching taped episodes of Designed to Sell. I don't want to sell my house, but watching the show keeps me motivated to cut down on clutter as much as possible.

From this angle you can see into the dining room to the right and into the kitchen straight ahead.


The kitchen is the thing that really sold us on this house. This is a working kitchen, believe me: I cook, my husband cooks, our middle son (an Alton Brown fan) cooks. Unfortunately, we have more cooking types than cleaning types, but oh well. To tell the truth, I've always kinda liked doing dishes. It's a good thing!




And from the kitchen/breakfast area you can make your way out to the screened porch, where we'll end our tour. I love the porch at this time of year--after a summer of keeping the door tightly locked so as to shut out the hot air, we can finally live on our porch again.



I wish you could come over for a cup of coffee or some apple cider. We could look at all my autumn decorations and enjoy this cool weather. Thanks for going on this little virtual tour with me!

54 comments:

  1. What a lovely house. I love those built ins. You have done a great job of decorating! It looks very livable.

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  2. What a lovely lovely home!! Thank you for sharing it with us. I love your wall of crosses! So unique!

    blessings
    mary

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  3. Beautiful! I wish I could come for a visit, too!

    Amy

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  4. Hi Richella and it's so nice to meet you! Your home is absolutely beautiful! From the front to all you've shown. I love your beautiful living room and all of the windows and light pouring in! Now your kitchen is to die for! I LOVE IT! I don't mean to covet, but mine is so tiny and old and yours is well, fantastic! You're truly blessed.
    Be a sweetie,
    Shelia :)

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  5. What a gorgeous home you have! Thanks for the tour. I really love everything:-)

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  6. Wow, you have done a fabulous job of decorating your lovely house. Thank you for sharing it with us!

    Christi

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  7. You have a beautiful home! Thanks for the tour!

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  8. it is fabulous.......love all that you've done to your home...and I love the layout of it as well.

    Suzanne

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  9. Your home is beautiful!! And it doesn't look small to me. Our house is a 1600 square foot ranch. Now IT appears small, and it is!! :) Thanks for the tour of your lovely home! Happy fall! :)

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  10. You have a lovely home! Thanks for the tour. I love the homey porches! And would DIE in that kitchen. ;-)

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  11. Your house looks so warm and welcoming for fall--and any time of the year! You have some beautiful woodwork. Love it. And I can see why the kitchen sold you on the house.

    I think I could live on your back porch. I like how you hung the lanterns on the posts out there. What a great space!

    Thanks for joining the house tour today. This was a treat! :-)

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  12. Wow~! Your home is absolutely gorgeous!!!

    I have three boys too-ages 18, 13, and 11. How do you keep your home looking so nice with boys? I find it a challenge..although my oldest just left for college, I am not seeing a reduction in the mess just yet ;-)

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  13. You have the most beautiful home and you have done a great job decorating it.

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  14. This is beautiful! I love the way you have decorated it! Very warm and cozy!

    Ijust found your blog and am following!

    Have a great weekend?

    Lou Cinda :)

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  15. What a beautiful home you have. You definitely have an eye for decorating. I especially love your kitchen/Dining combo. I'm in love with the valance in your kitchen window!
    (Stopping by from Julia's House Tour).

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  16. I so enjoyed the tour. Your home is stunning. Thanks for sharing. Hugs, Marty

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  17. You have a very lovely home! I understand your difficulty decorating your living room. We have an old home (100+ yrs old) and it has alot of built ins (window seats, wardrobe, bookshelves, etc) plus lots of windows, radiators and closets! While I love my home, it's sometimes difficult to decorate and know where to fit the furniture in! I think you did a wonderful job!

    Have a lovely weekend!

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  18. Your home is just beautiful Richella, I just love what you have done on the front porch. I just put a rug down (that was out back but we sit out front more in the Fall) on my front porch too. I'd love to add lamps like you did, but I think they would just blow over at the slightest breeze! Have you ever had yours blown over in the wind?

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  19. Oh My Gooshness!!! Could your home be any more bee-u-ti-ful??? I think NOT! I'm gonna go take me another peek at each room! Girl, you really need your own show on HGTV, seriously! Love it! Kim

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  20. Your home is beautiful! I love the beautiful woodwork, wood floors and porches. I bet you live somewhere in the Midwest. I'll see if my guess was right. Gorgeous!

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  21. Okay, so the South would've been my 2nd guess. ;-)

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  22. Hi Richella :)

    It's so nice to visit again! Your home looks absolutely gorgeous and yet cozy at the same time. Thank you for the tour :)

    Happy Fall!
    rue

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  23. I love your house! You've done a fabulous job of decorating. This layout is exactly what I'm dreaming of for our future home!!!

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  24. Your home is AMAZING and beautiful and so inviting. Do you have land? You have it decorated so nice (saw the wall with all the crosses you collect - remembered that from a previous post). Your furniture is great. And I like that you like ambiance and use dim lighting. It's a must in my home. Thank you for posting those pictures. You must feel so peaceful in your home.

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  25. What a warm and inviting setting you've created in your home!AND outside on that front porch- that is just too cute and comfy.
    Your home is both lovely AND liveable. Glad to have found your blog- off to peruse some more...
    :-) Sue

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  26. Oh my goodness! You have a beautiful home. I love those porches! How comfy and cozy they both are. I love that little nook in your dining area. Is that a little corner desk area? That's a great idea! Thanks for sharing!

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  27. Beautiful! Love your cross collection!

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  28. I found you from Hooked on Houses! I love your porch. Its sooo inviting. Your home is lovely. Your Autimn Home is right in line with my design giveaway. All that’s needed is a picture of a Halloween or Fall vignette to enter and you (or one of yiur readers) may win a design for one room! Not just advice ~ a complete design. Check it out! This is the final weekend to enter ~ http://paulagracedesigns.blogspot.com/2009/10/final-entry-day-for-edesign-giveaway.html

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  29. What a great home and I didn't realize you were close by. Durham huh? I live in Sanford, NC.
    Check my tour out too.

    tammy

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  30. I want to curl up with a good book on that front porch -- beautiful!

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  31. Thanks for sharing your lovely home. I was wondering if you could tell us the paint color of your living room and also tell us something about the type of blinds you have on the windows?

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  32. Thank you so much for your kind comments!

    We bought this house as it was being built, and we were just in time to choose paint colors. The painter asked that we choose Sherwin-Williams colors, since that was the provider with whom he worked. The living room is SW 2835 Craftsman Brown and the kitchen/breakfast room is SW 0042 Ruskin Room Green.

    The blinds in the living room are simple matchstick blinds. At first I left these windows completely bare, which was very pretty--the windows look out onto our backyard which is surrounded by woods, so there were no privacy issues. However, these windows face south, so there were heat and glare issues. So I finally chose simple matchstick blinds without a liner. These let in lots of light but block much of the heat and glare. I also like them because they add some nice color and texture but you can see through them quite a bit, so we can still see the trees. We ordered these from Budget Blinds and they were very reasonably priced, but I think you can get them even more cheaply from do-it-yourself sources. You should find them with the "woven wood shades."

    Thank you so much for asking questions! I appreciate your looking at my photos and being interested!

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  33. Your home is beautiful. Thanks for giving us a tour. Love your foyer and the kitchen is wonderful. Love the two islands/counters. All those windows are fabulous too.

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  34. I am visiting via the link at Traci's.

    I enjoyed seeing your gorgeous autumn home! Absolutely wonderful!!

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  35. Just beautiful!!

    We are dreaming of redoing our kitchen someday and I am going to show my husband your kitchen - it's gorgeous and inspiring!!

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  36. You have a lovely home and you have furnished it so beautiffully! All the details are charming and the kitchen-love it!
    ~Nancy

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  37. Lovely tour! I'll be having a silver cross (on pedistal) giveaway soon. So check out the blog! Followers get a second add! :)

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  38. You have a beautiful home. I love all the space.

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  39. What an absolutely lovely home!!
    Just found you from Traci's blog and am looking forward to getting to know you. Pop over for a visit sometime would love to have you

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  40. Thank you for sharing your lovely home! It inspired me to dig out some fall decor!

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  41. Great home. I have no idea where you are located but do your wood pieces on the porch get any damage from weather elements? I live in East Texas and mine take a betting. If you have a sercert please share...

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  42. I do take special care of the wood elements on the porches. The front porch does well, because it's protected from the elements on three sides, and the "wicker" furniture is actually a synthetic that's weatherproof. On the back porch, the painted pieces do best. The other pieces have to be cleaned occasionally with a bleach solution to remove mildew. My hope is to finish those pieces with marine varnish to protect them better from the elements.

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  43. Your house is beautiful!!! Thanks so much for sharing with us. I had no idea you were so close to me! I am in Willow Springs...10 mins from Raleigh. So when are you coming over to help decorate??? :)

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  44. Your home is gorgeous and if I had walked into it certainly would have called home to me too! I was reading your more recent post abt being ashamed of having a new home that you did not DIY. The bones no but the rest you sure did! Without your touch it would not look soo inviting! Again just love it and love all the outdoor living space. We are working on that here.

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  45. You have a GORGEOUS home! I can't believe I almost missed this post!

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  46. Richella, I am not sure how I ended up on your blog, but I am so glad I did. You have a stunning home and I just love everything you have done with it. It is gorgeous, but more importantly, it looks lived in and comfortable. Thanks for sharing your space. I LOVE everything about it (especially that kitchen window treatment!)

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  47. You have a gorgeous home, Richella! And you can tell that you make every guest feel so welcome~I can tell that without even coming through the front door. :)

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  48. You have a beautiful home! I love, love, love the wall of crosses and that big mirror!

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  49. Hi There.. we are just in the process of siding our house.. what colour is your house?

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  50. We are just in the process of siding our house.. what colour is your siding??

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  51. Just wondering what your siding colour was?

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  52. Hi Melinda--

    I'm so sorry that I don't have the name of the paint color of my siding! It's a light khaki color. Benjamin Moore's "Shaker Beige" (#HC-45) is a very similar color. I wish I could be of more help!

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