Flipping a house

No, I'm not yet flipping a house, but oh how I would love to do that!

In the meantime, I'm going to "flip" this house.  We're not sprucing up and selling out, but instead flipping rooms around to make this space more usable. 

We're not formal type of people at all....if you've hung out with us much at all, you're more likely to be out on the porch picking some blue crabs, in inside with 50 of our closest friends sharing a bowl of chili in the winter...finding your own best spot to sit and eat for a bit. 

As much as we love this house, the front half of the first floor is not really lived in or used the way it's set up.   Here is the current scheme:

 I realize it's hard to see (for my first Floorplanner project though, I'm pretty happy it's even recognizable as a house!)  We live in the back of the house (kitchen and family room).

   The big takeaway here: see the huge green space bottom right?  That's the "formal living room" aka the big black hole of nothingness.  It's the largest room on the first floor and the most unused.   And the formal dining room is a Lego table/aka work table for mom/mishmash of some pretty nice family pieces that could be put to better use.  I have an office space upstairs, but I'd rather be down here closer to the "action" even when I'm working.  And if we put that space to better use, we might actually be able to have a guest room with a BED upstairs! 

So here's what I'm thinking: The living room is empty except for floor to ceiling bookcases and the piano.  By moving the dining room table into this larger space, guests that are at the table and in the family room can all be enjoying each other's company.  And if the boy wants to play Lego's, he will have plenty of table space to play and room on the shelves for storage.  Move in a comfy chair or tow, another small game table, and that room becomes functional.

Now what, you might ask, happens to the dining room?  That room is much smaller, so I'd like to move the 1000 pound piano in there (you think I kid, I don't), and then build in a desk/craft work area in the corner between the stairs and the kitchen.  The smallest room downstairs (and the most cut off) becomes of quiet office/music room, and the larger spaces that are more connected with large openings become more tied in and user friendly. 

That's the plan to flip this house. 

  Step one has already taken place: the divider/shelf that cut off the family room from the kitchen is gone.  I destructed that over the last week and it is either in the trash, the pile for the Habitat Store, or my pile to rebuild a new cubby shelf for the living room.   Pictures are coming!