Renovations

Around thirty years ago, Bruce's parents built a house in a suburb on the outskirts of Waterloo, Ontario.

Over the years, the house got to be too big and too much work, so they sold it and moved into an apartment in Kitchener.

The guy who bought the house likes to renovate and resell properties. He saw a lot of potential in Bruce's parents' place.

This is what it looked like on March 21, 2009, when Bruce and I got married there:

You can see in the picture most of the living room / dining room. The den is off to the left in the picture. You can see the colonial-style light fixtures over the dining room table and in the hall behind Bruce. 

The house was a two bedroom bungalow with a big, bright kitchen and a den with a fireplace. Two good-sized bedrooms were down the hall. The house also had a huge, unfinished basement with every bit as much square footage below stairs as on the main floor.

It looks a little different now. 

The original kitchen has been divided into a laundry room ...

... and a small home office with a window that used to sit over the sink in the kitchen.

The new kitchen is built in what was once the den. The reno guys added a door opening out to the back yard and closed in the fireplace. The kitchen counter is about where Bruce's aunt and uncle are sitting - on his right - in the photo above of our wedding.

The back yard has been transformed with a large multi-tier deck...

... the huge fir tees have had their bottom branches trimmed. Black mulch fills the space where bunnies used to hide.

What was once the hall closet has been closed in from the side that used to be on the right when you walked in the front door, and is now part of the ensuite in the master bedroom, which used to be the guest bedroom.

The old master bedroom, former ensuite, former guest bathroom and part of the old den have transmogrified into two bedrooms with a shared "Jack and Jill" bathroom. No, really, that's what the renovation guy called it.

The whole basement used to look like this:

Now most of it looks like this:

The former two bedroom, two bathroom bungalow now has three baths and four bedrooms, but, when you walk through the front door, there's no place to put your coat.

Thanks for reading! Stayed tuned for a special Sunday post-CN-tower-climb edition of This Week's Picture!

Karen