Exterior House Tour

We invite you to enjoy a tour of some original and some current pictures of the outside of our home.

We replaced the original wood windows, which were in bad shape, broken, and drafty, with new ones. We also replaced the black trim with white. The home had three different types of white siding in both wood and aluminum. In order to add insulation and update the look of the house, we decided to cover the wood siding and replace the aluminum siding for a more unified look. Although we didn’t stay with the original white color of the house and went with a tan. We kept “White House” in our blog name, since it is what our house was when we first moved in. This spring, we’ll add the black shutters and at least PART of the name will be true!

Our house came had a gutter system that collected rain water and stored it in a cistern (cement room) in the basement. The water could then be used via a pump and the hose. As “green” as it was, we are on a well and the money saved wasn’t much. We decided to replace the obtrusive gutter system and empty the cistern, trying to avoid any issues that might arise with having 5 ft of standing water in a room in the basement.

Also, this is the side door of our house, but the main entrance since it faces the driveway and there is no path leading to the true front door. We’ll be adding landscaping, lights,and a path to both doors from the driveway.

The workers asked if we wanted to take down the large antenna but we kept it (they thought we were crazy). Although some may view it as an eye sore, that antenna brings in 50+ HD channels! It’s nice to have cable and I do miss it at times, but it’s something I can live without. We’re living a bit more simply and saving $60 a month without it.

Since we were replacing the windows and siding anyway, we found a patio door at a warehouse sale and installed it. Besides the back door of the garage, we had no true back door to the yard. Adding the new door gives us space for a patio, grilling, and eating area, which we’ll add in the future.

The yard was overgrown and there were small trees scattered in the yard. Although you can’t see it in the above photos, the perimeter of our yard is wooded, with long grass and wild growing plants/weeds/flowers in the center.  We have 1.08 acres and our yard goes back to the cornfield. Doug cut down some trees and cleared out a lot of the wild growing plants. It looks a lot more empty now that it’s winter and although we did a lot of editing, I promise we didn’t cut THAT many down.

The owners’ daughters were allergic to dogs, so the brown wooden house was for ducks! Although it’d be cool to have chickens or something, we don’t know if that’s allowed anymore and most likely we’ll be taking that out. While the previous owners let the yard grow to avoid having to cut it, we’ll landscape this and use it as more of a back yard. This spring, we’re looking forward to adding a vegetable garden and fire pit!