Our House. Part one

I want to tell you the story about our house.  This is the first part of that story.

There was no bidding on this house, nobody but us wanted it, we could not believe it. This was 3 years ago , when house prices were still high. But this was not considered to be a dream house (by any others than us) in fact the neighbors called it “the drug addicts house”. It had a rough past. A lot of people had moved in and out of this house, and it needed a lot of work. It was not going to be a walk in the park. But after looking at it twice we sealed the deal. And it felt great! after a whole year of house-hunting we were sick of going to open homes. And we absolutely loved the price on this house. It was going to make it possible for us to stay home with our daughter Viola a bit longer.

Before that, we lived in an apartment in Malmö and Jens rented a pricey office downtown where he spent many and long days away from home. We did not like the situation. We wanted to spend more time together and work from home, buying a house would make this possible. Even though Jens would still be working a lot, we could see each other more. When we finally found our house Viola was one and a half years old.

Being a romantic (some would call it being a fool) I looked trough all of my interior magazines and dreamed about our to-be perfect house. The house had not always been a mess. The Family who built our house, in the 1940s, lived in it for many years, and back then it was cared for and the garden was beautiful.When we bought the house the garden was awful. It had nothing but mud. We were going to have to sow grass, but not until spring.

We got the keys to our house on the 1st of November, and on the 11th we had to hand over the apartment keys to it´s new owner. This gave us some time to renovate. The house was not big (it has gotten bigger), the only bedroom was upstairs, and that is were Jens was going to work. The first floor was where we were going to live: A living room and a kitchen. We decided to get the living room ready before we moved in. It was painted dark red and had laminated flooring. We were hoping that it had a wooden floor underneath and we were right!

We spent all of our free time working on this room. We got a lot of help from our family, who came to babysit and paint.. On moving day the floor still smelled from paint and we were almost afraid to put furniture on it. Jens moved his office upstairs, but as Viola got older, it got harder for him to concentrate. So he started to look for an alternative and found a tiny modular house, on blocket.se. Blocket is an online marketplace, for secondhand furniture and beyond. One rainy night we hauled the house home to our front yard and that is how Jens got his new office.

To be continued…..

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11 Comments

Join the discussion and tell us your opinion.

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Heidi
April 21, 2009 at 05:10

Va coolt!

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Cim
April 21, 2009 at 12:47

Spännande att höra hur det hela gick till. Undrar om vi själva vågar göra en sådan “resa” i framtiden. Renovering är inte vår grej. Tillräckligt svårt att få upp tre lampor i vår stora hall…

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Jenny
April 21, 2009 at 13:12

Heidi: Tack! det kommer mer snart. Då blir det köket och det är ju rosa precis som ert.

Cim: Jens trodde inte heller att renovering var hans grej, men det visade sig att han kunde en hel del.

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AprillAprill-Johanna
April 21, 2009 at 18:12

Vilket superinlägg, längtar tills part two.

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To-Do-list | DosFamily
April 22, 2009 at 07:01

[…] April: Jenny will start blogging about her renovation. Step by […]

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How I Lost Thirty Pounds in Thirty Days
May 4, 2009 at 02:12

Hi, nice post. I have been thinking about this issue,so thanks for posting. I’ll certainly be subscribing to your posts.

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I Shed T h i r t y P o u n d s in Under a Month
May 6, 2009 at 14:01

Hi, nice post. I have been pondering this topic,so thanks for blogging. I will certainly be subscribing to your site. Keep up the good work

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christina
September 16, 2009 at 09:56

alltså, du är verkligen en inspirationskälla! verkligen. fortsätt så, fortsätt förgylla min vardag och ha nu en fin dag!

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Hanna
September 16, 2009 at 16:22

Blir lite skrämd när du säger att ni letade i TVÅ år, jag vill ju ha hus NU, gärna förra veckan! Hur som helst, coolt montage, och så himla spännande att få följa er resa! Ser fram emot nästa inlägg! Kramar

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Jenny at Dos
September 16, 2009 at 21:07

Hej Hanna! Jo men det är sant. Men det var när huspriserna var jättehöga och det alltid blev budgivning. Vi ville verkligen inte betala för någon annans renovering (sällan i vår smak) och de hus som ej är renoverade är svåra att hitta. Var vill ni bo?

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Orange Pop
October 16, 2009 at 22:23

I love the scrapbook-pictures; it bubbles (and so does your house and not to forget this blog!) with creativity, passion and fun! Keep it up! Love from Amsterdam :-)