 Well...you guessed it by the picture that I DID move...to a home I bought. After much consternation & some fabulous advice from one of my loa/energy groups (thanks everyone!), I bought the 1st house I originally looked at back in March! All the signs were there that that was the house, I chose to keep second guessing myself, but luckily got out of my own way & put in an offer. Albeit the offer was 10 days before I was closing on my then current house & I wanted them to vacate in the aforementioned 10 days so I had some time to remodel before moving my furniture & the doxie duo in....Luckily, they said YES! Hey, when it's meant to be it's meant to be. So, in those 10 days upon offer acceptance I finished packing, arranged for the dogs to be at the vet for their annual senior exam (more on that later), got the home inspection, RE-negotiated the offer based on the inspection & scheduled contractors for an HGTV-style 5-day remodel before moving day....which was the day before my birthday & 2 days before my Mom's visit. Stress how I love thee (apparently). ***A HUGE shout out of thanks & appreciation to Joel & his crew at All My Sons Moving & Storage!! They were professional, efficient, & moved quickly through the house packing & securing my belongings in the moving truck. Thanks guys for being the stress-free part of this experience!!*** I closed on both houses on 6/13 & took possession of the new SC home on the 14th....just in time for the flooring contractors to arrive. This go-round I used Empire Today due to the time constraints of the move. Again, Josh & Marvin (installers) were incredibly professional & courteous. Empire had fabulous color & flooring options & I'm loving the new floor! If you decide to check them out for your upcoming flooring project-tell them DeAnna from DeAnna On Design sent you! A last minute decision was to gut the guest bathroom due cleaning & code issues...It would have cost almost as much to fix the code/plumbing issues than to gut it & start new. I chose new. I'll post b/a pics as soon as the painting is finished. The master bathroom was a 90% gut...the structure of the shower stall is still there & the vanity (for now) is still there. Everything else is new & now up to code. ***One of THE most important things when moving to a new home is to go through the Home Inspection step by step & FIX the issues that came up to bring the home up to code, safe & healthy. In most cases, you can a) ask for a price reduction based on the inspection if there are a lot of concerns that come, or b) ask that the seller fix before closing. I always choose option A as I like to have MY people &/or myself fix the issues so I know the quality of the work is done is up to my standards. The choice is yours depending on your comfort level w/maintainence & contractor contacts.*** So, all of the plumbing has been addressed w/all fixtures replaced. Now on to the electrical. Like plumbing, this is imperative to a home running smoothly & efficiently. Any of these issues that go unrecognized and/or broken will only get worse causing you to spend more money on utility bills & increased repair costs. Fix them when you recognized them! I had to have the whole house re-wired as it wasn't up to code & would have blown circuits on new appliances. Appropriate outlets were made GFCI (outlets w/in 3' of a water source MUST be GFCI! This includes exterior, garage & basement outlets.), all ceiling/lighting fixtures were changed & properly braced (yea, THAT was a disaster waiting to happen! Not so good Feng Shui to have a ceiling fixture fall on a guest's head...). Bill the fabulous painter from Island Painting did an incredible job taking down wallpaper border (which ended up being 2 layers of border that were glued & then stapled on top of each other...seriously people, if you must have wallpaper &/or border PLEASE apply it properly! Not only do you add more work when you or new homeowner decide to take it down, but you can damage the walls & increase expense when trying to change/paint). All interior work is done now except for the living & family rooms. The family room is a total throwback to the 70/80s & has dark wood paneling. I'm living w/it right now until I decide if I'm going to take down or just paint over it. And as I'm going to be installing a fireplace in this room, I'm going to just do all at the same time to minimize my stress & mess. It should be noted that 2 of the big changes I wanted to make in the house I will no longer be doing. One was due to cost as some spindles I wanted to take down are actually part of the structure of the home & a load-bearing wall. As this isn't my "forever" home, the cost of doing this for aesthetic reasons is a budget buster. The 2nd project was going to be taking down a 1/2 wall to open up the entryway into the family room. The previous owners even had old track lighting fixture w/old commercial spot lights for "light in the living room"...yea, it was a BIG DON'T! I took down the spotlights & installed new track PENDANT lights w/beautiful glass globes. This "fix" adds beauty, light & instantly updates this homage to the 70s architectural feature. 
The "beautiful" dark brown paneling in the family room w/view of the 1/2 wall, bad track lighting & load-bearing spindles.
Before you start ANY major remodeling project or project that requires demo or re-working of electrical or plumbing work that isn't required by code, LIVE in the home for a couple of months to see how you actually USE & LIVE in the home. Even though I've lived in many homes & remodeled/designed even more, sometimes what looks good on paper doesn't work for how you actually live in the space. I've made the 1/2 wall work now & the new lights help to update & separate the space while still being open.
Well...I'm off to pressure wash the house in anticipation of Bill the painter arriving to work on the home exterior. I'll be posting more before/after & commentary as work progresses & I settle in more. During my Mom's visit, I got some bad news on one of my dogs, Libby, from their vet visit. She was diagnosed w/liver cancer & had a large tumor growing on her liver that was the size of an orange. She had surgery 2 weeks ago & thanks to the fabulous surgical team & lots of prayers, Miss Libby is now cancer-free as they were able to remove the tumor & 1/3 of her liver leaving only healthy tissue. She is recovering like a champ & one would never know that she (& Ossie) will be celebrate their 12th birthday in 2 weeks. So, in the midst of moving, remodeling & my Mom's visit, the new house also has been a triage center. Lastly, the decision was made to close Bante Design LLC & doing any more design/clutter/Feng Shui consulting. So anyone looking for the Bante Design website will no longer find it as I did not renew the domain/website. All info on any appearances, classes, books...will all be here at www.deannaradaj.com. I will still teach & offer workshops, write & contribute to teleclasses & other media, however, I will be refocusing my efforts on doing what I love which is rehabbing neglected, foreclosed and/or unmaintained homes to bring back to health, safety, security & beauty for owners to enjoy. Until next time...:)
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