When we moved into our new house, we knew from the beginning that we were going to renovate it.
We could see what we wanted it to become—but we also knew it wasn’t going to happen overnight.
We have initial plans, as you can see from the first floor schematics below, but they need tweaking. There are lag times in construction ready drawings, finding the right contractors and finalizing a budget.
Living in the In-Between
This has created an interesting in-between season.
We’re living in the before while planning for the after.
There are dated fixtures we know will eventually go, rooms that don’t function exactly the way we want them to, and plenty of plans still taking shape. At first, it was tempting to think we shouldn’t do too much because, Why spend time or money on something we’re just going to change?
But we’ve learned something since moving:
You can’t put making a home on hold while you wait on a renovation.
We’ve found that a few relatively simple things have made this house start feeling like our house—even though there’s still a lot we want to change.
We Hung Our Favorite Art
Yes, there is still a lot of stuff in boxes in a closet, but we picked our favorites and got them on the walls. This may have made the biggest difference.
It would have been easy to leave everything packed away because we know walls will eventually be painted and rooms will change. But blank walls made the entire house feel temporary.
So we started hanging the things we love.
Will everything stay exactly where it is after the renovation? Definitely not.
But we’ve decided that’s okay. A few extra nail holes are worth enjoying our home now.
We Brought in the Plants- Both Inside and Out
Plants are one of the easiest ways we’ve found to breathe some life into a space—especially a space that isn’t exactly how you want it yet.
A plant in an empty corner or something green on a table immediately makes a room feel warmer and more lived-in. They’ve also been a great distraction from some of the finishes we’re less excited about!
We may not love every wall color or fixture right now, but adding things that feel fresh and alive helps us focus a little less on what we’re eventually going to change.
We Unpacked (Most of) Our Books
We could have left books in boxes until we figured out permanent shelving and built-ins, but we’re glad we didn’t.
Our books are part of our home.
We’ve stacked them on tables, filled the shelves we have, put cookbooks in the kitchen, and worked them into different rooms throughout the house.
They’re not perfectly styled, and they’ll almost certainly move during the renovation. But that’s becoming a theme around here: it doesn’t have to be permanent to be worth doing.
We Incorporated Old Furniture with New
There was some furniture we just couldn’t part with from our old home and a lot we knew just wouldn’t work here. It wouldn’t fit or it didn’t fit a coastal modern look.
For example, we loved our smaller dining table and chairs and it fit perfectly pre-renovation, but our old china cabinet was too dark and bulking to bring. So we found a unique piece at a local furniture store on clearance and incorporated it into our space. The blue cabinet will help guide some decisions on colors in the renovated home.
We Decided We Didn’t Have to Live With Every Dated Fixture
When you know you’re going to renovate, it’s easy to tell yourself:
Don’t change that. We’re renovating anyway.
And sometimes that makes perfect sense.
But there are also things you look at every single day. If a dated light fixture, mirror, ceiling fan, or other relatively simple item is driving us crazy, we’ve realized we don’t necessarily have to live with it for the next year.
Instead, we’re trying to think ahead.
Could we buy a light fixture we love now and use it somewhere in the finished house later? Or, could we relocate it to another property we have at some point?
If so, we’d rather make the house feel better now than wait simply because everything isn’t finalized.
Here is one example of where, in a hallway that we know will stay post-renovation, we changed out the fixtures.
You can find these inexpensive fixture on Wayfair.
The Biggest Thing We’ve Learned: Don’t Wait to Live in Your House
We’re still very much in the beginning of this process.
There are rooms we walk into and immediately start imagining differently. There are projects on the list that we can’t wait to tackle. And there are definitely things in this house that won’t make it into the final reveal.
But we’ve stopped thinking that means we have to live in a holding pattern until construction begins.
We’re arranging furniture in rooms that may eventually have completely different layouts.
We’re replacing a few things knowing they’ll eventually move somewhere else.
And we’re enjoying the house now.
Because the reality is, life doesn’t wait for the renovation.
There are dinners around the table, kids coming and going, friends visiting, weekends at home, and everyday moments happening here right now.
Someday, we’ll get to share the big before-and-afters of Building at the Beach and we can’t wait.
But we’re learning that there’s an important part of the story between the before and the after, too.
It’s the part where a house that isn’t quite what you want yet slowly starts feeling like yours.
And maybe that’s the real beginning of making a house a home
