I’m In Love…With My Shutters

I wouldn’t say my little house was a fixer-upper when I bought it about 6 years ago, but it was the victim of “Do-It-Yourself” projects by the previous owners.  Still recovering from the shock of a ginormous down payment and the moving-in costs, the first couple of years I didn’t do anything to the house other than regular maintenance.  Over the last few years I’ve done, well not me personally because I’m not a Do-It-Yourselfer, a yearly project to upgrade things.  The slatted patio cover was roofed, the fluorescent lighting was removed in the kitchen and replaced with canned lights, and this strange kitchen vent that hung down right in the middle of the kitchen was made flush with the ceiling which opened up both the kitchen and family room.  Last year, I rescreened the house and put shutters on the two front windows. 

For this year’s project, I decided to continue the shutters throughout the rest of the house.  After saving for the year and anxiously waiting for them, they were finally installed this past weekend.  They are beautiful.  I love them!

The family room has two large and two small windows which had decent window coverings, but they were older and were hard to open.  They were also off-white/yellowish in color. 

The shutters make the room look amazing…
 
My bedroom had these hideous accordion shades.  They were in pretty bad shape as is apparent by the amount of light coming through them while closed.  The one on the smaller window was holding on for dear life.  It kept falling down so it was rigged to sit on the window but could not be opened.
And now?

The last window I had done is the one right by the front door.  It has not had a covering on it since I moved in. 
At night, if the light is on inside, basically the entire downstairs is on display outside, like a spotlight.  I’ve spent the last 6 years going up and downstairs in the dark in order to pass the window inconspicuously. The worst is when I’m getting dressed upstairs and realize something I need is downstairs…I can’t tell you how many times I’ve snuck past that window, missing one or more items of clothing, trying not to be seen out on the street.Now, I can freely move past this window without notice on the outside, even naked if I wanted!

Over the last few days, I’ve wandered around aimlessly just looking at these new shutters.  I open them and close them and lower them and raise them and “ohhhh” and “ahhh” over them.  They are just so pretty.  I think they my best home improvement to date.