I thought a good way to kick off the blog would be to start off with a good old house tour.  

So… I’m starting you right at the beginning.  

Welcome to Valley View Abode.  I named this house Valley View Abode, because it has the most gorgeous view of the valley that we live in.  We can see for miles and miles, and on most evenings we are privy to the most beautiful sunsets off our back porch. 

This house is a house of Dreams.  I have always wanted to build a home start to finish.  That means drawing the plans, coming up with the design, and seeing it all the way through to the end.  Jonathan was the most wonderful husband, who shared the same dream; and went along with my vision.  When we moved into this house, I gave these 2 prints as a gift to my husband.  I designed the prints, then framed and printed for them for his office.  They are a rendering of our blueprint from the design of our home.  It’s funny, because our house didn’t exactly turn out how we had it first designed.

This print says:

This house was built on Dreams and Love.  The love of a husband for his wife, and the dreams she had to build a home.  It was all possible because of his hard work, and then he made her dreams come true.  After being married to her for 18 years their dreams are one in the same; building a home that reflects the path of the last 18 years.  Living in the Caribbean for a time was part of that path.  You may see that this home is based on coastal influence.  We hope as you join us here in our Valley View Abode you can feel the love and dreams that it was built on.

And so we welcome you to our Abode:

You may be able to see just a portion of the beautiful valley behind our home.

…and probably recognize that these pictures were taken in the summer.

I am already looking forward to planting flowers again.  I miss having a porch full of beautiful flowers.  

Can you spot the little puppy in the window?

When we were building our house, the one thing I knew I wanted was a chevron door.  I had seen one on Pinterest, that I just loved.  This is the image that I found:

When I showed the picture to my builder, he was like, “Sure, I think we could create that!!!”  He was so awesome about it.  I actually love the way it turned out.  The best part about the door is that he was able to do it out of a fiberglass door, so it will stand up to the harsh Utah weather.  Sometimes the wood doors don’t handle the weather so great around here.  I seriously had the best builder.  He came up with some great product that would work on the fiberglass door to help give it that chevron look.  Seriously people!!  I’m telling you, no creative idea is out of reach.  

 

This is the Winter porch.  Just a little less colorful.  

But… please come inside…

One of my favorite parts about our entryway is the four sided transom that you see when you come in.  It’s built in to the upper portion of the columns here, and my staircase that is off to the left.  Here is a peek of what you see if you were coming down my stairs:

See… this is one side of the transom.  So fun huh!!  It was custom built by our builder so I could use seeded glass in the transoms.

Here is another view looking back at my front door.  It gives you a good visual of all of the four transoms, and  all the beautiful finish work.  Of course, we did the chevron door on the inside.  I also think that doorknobs can make all the difference. 

So if you were coming in my front door:

You would see my husbands office off to the left:

and our dining room off to the right:

Just beyond that is our staircase off to the left:

….and right in front of you everything opens up into our great room, kitchen, and eat-in-kitchen area.  This is the heart of our home.

I hope you have enjoyed this little portion of the tour. I’m going to share more soon.  Thanks for being a part of this new blog. I’m excited for all the fun things to come.  If you have any questions about any thing you see here; like lighting, flooring, rugs, anything at all… don’t hesitate to email me.  

Thanks for stopping by,

Andrea