New Pella Door & Sidelights

Yesterday we had our new Pella front door, sidelights and storm door installed.

Let's look at our old builder's special door.

Here is our 17 year very old worn front exterior door, sidelights and storm door. 

 The old front door was painted dark green to match our window shutters.

Everything was worn out with wear and tear and some water damage and the door made a terrible loud noise everytime it was opened and closed.

The old storm door that barely would catch when closed.

The old worn silver aluminum threshhold floor plate. 

 The old storm door had pulled completely out of the wood frame twice on us.

The ugly cheap old brass door handle that I tried to clean up but was unsuccessful.

This is the third Pella door we've had and we highly recommend this manufacturer. 

 Three professional and very nice Pella associated carpenters worked on the installation from 8:30 AM until 4:00 PM.  

They didn't even break for lunch but worked steadily and carefully the whole time. 

 They were great and cleaned up the work site as they went.

Here they have removed the old door and sidelights and are installing the new frame with the new sidelights.

New storm door in black and door frame in white.

New threshhold door plate in black.

New Baldwin lifetime solid brass door handle. 

You can see the grass reflected in it it is so shiny.

We decided to go with a black exterior door - black goes with any color shutters. 

 We just had our shutters repainted last year dark green.

The Inside Baldwin brass door handle. 

 I know brass finish is "out" now and nickel is "in" but I love the look of the polished brass finish on the new exterior black door. 

 That shiny gold on the black door is just so stunning and classy. 

 Plus our fixture finish is mostly brass in our home. 

 I like the polished brass and I don't care what the current fashion is.

We moved our door bell from the side frame of the sidelight to the front. 

 Now it is very visible. 

 Before no one hardly ever rang our door bell because they couldn't see it very well.

A nice close up of our new stained-glass sidelights. At night the light sparkles off the stained-glass. It's so pretty.

I thought about having a black interior door but went with white again. 

 I sort of wish I had gone with interior black color but I think Hubby likes the white so I'm ok with it.

There you have it!  It's a beauty!

The Pella installers recommended we repaint our outer frame in Sherwin Williams "Pella White" so it more closely matches the new white sidelights.

Now can anyone explain why we were so pooped after the workmen left and we didn't do any of the work!

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Sidewalks Completed!

Let's start with the FRONT Yard!

Finished!

New plantings are done, accent lighting is in...river rock is completed.

I posted previously about this project (here).

Plantings and new 12 volt lighting going in earlier.  Old 120 volt lighting pulled out.

Let's show you the AFTER and BEFORE!

AFTER

New front entrance.

Still have to add stepping stones to water faucet / utilities on side of house.

BEFORE 2009

It's A Jungle Out There!

Sorry this photo is a little blurry but it's the only one I have that was taken just before we had everything pulled out last Fall.

AFTER

I love it!

AFTER

You can see our house now!

BEFORE 2008

The trees were cute when they were smaller but by 2008 all the plantings are overwhelming the house.

And here's the BACK yard.

New paver slab by back deck steps.

New sidewalk from driveway to screened in porch/deck.

They even coal patched the driveway to fill in the cracks!

This is where we put the old flagstone.  I love it in front of the shed!

The driveway hasn't been coal patched here yet.   

BEFORE

 The back yard didn't look bad, but we wanted a sidewalk from the driveway to the screened in porch/deck and a sidewalk around the driveway to the shed.

AFTER

Here you can see how we used the old flagstone to edge the driveway and lay down in front of the shed.

The contractor dug out cracked sections of the driveway and put down new coal patches.  

Please join me for:

Gina at The Shabby Chic Cottage for Transformation Thursdays

Cindy at My Romantic Home for Show and Tell Friday

Artie at Color Outside the Lines for Vignette Fridays

Courtney at French Country Cottage for Feathered Nest Friday
Wendy at The Shabby Nest for Frugal Friday

Donna at Funky Junk Interiors for Saturday Nite Special

Stephanie Lynn at Under the Table and Dreaming for the Sunday Showcase Party

Susan at Between Naps on the Porch for Metamorphosis Monday

Linda at Coastal Charm for Nifty Thrifty Tuesday

Hope you enjoyed touring our new yard! 

 From beginning to end the actual work took two weeks.  Of course, that doesn't count the time spent interviewing and selecting a contractor.  It was well worth the expense and we are very pleased with the results.  

Front and Back Sidewalks WIP

I love the new pavers!

New view out of our front door with new stone pavers in place.   We are so pleased! 

Check out previous post to see BEFORE photos (here).

Nice and wide walkway!

We added about a foot to the front slab all the way around.  

Now we don't have to step down onto the sidewalk when we open the front screen door.  

We used Sandstone pavers with Autumn Red pavers as outline pavers.

I'm lovin' it - how about you?

We put Mr. Pumpkin out for Halloween night.

Heavy equipment - finally started on the back yard.

Laying the gravel sub base for the walkway to our deck.

Burying another downspout.

Laying down the pavers on the back sidewalk.

Hurray... all the hardscaping is done now and I'll be showing more photos soon.  

Yesterday the crew put in the low voltage house accent lights for the front landscaped area.  And the landscaping plantings went in yesterday too...but the crew didn't finished....they ran out of river rock.  

Today we are having solid rain all day and all night.  But that's good for the new plantings and the seeded yard areas.   

Please join me for:

Gina at The Shabby Chic Cottage for Transformation Thursdays

Cindy at My Romantic Home for Show and Tell Friday

Artie at Color Outside the Lines for Vignette Fridays

Courtney at French Country Cottage for Feathered Nest Friday
Wendy at The Shabby Nest for Frugal Friday

Donna at Funky Junk Interiors for Saturday Nite Special

Stephanie Lynn at Under the Table and Dreaming for the Sunday Showcase Party

Susan at Between Naps on the Porch for Metamorphosis Monday

Linda at Coastal Charm for Nifty Thrifty Tuesday    

Front Sidewalk - BEFORE and WIP

 BEFORE

This is the before of our front yard - old, overgrown trees (2) and too many overgrown shrubs in the planting area were pulled out last Fall.  

This is the flagstone walkway that the builder put in with no sand/gravel sub base.  Only one person can walk on it in single file - it is so narrow and way too curvy.  I think a drunk person must of laid it down.  

See the ugly white drain spout!  It drained right out on the sidewalk - what dummy did that!

BEFORE

Not very welcoming is it...you should have seen it when the shrubs and trees overwhelmed the little pathway.  And see how the flagstone walk had sunk down.

Over the years I tried everything to stop the weeds from growing between the flagstones...black weed mat...gravel....nothing worked.

The landscaper removed three of the flagstones so we could mark in orange paint where the new walkway would be.

The work begins - out with the old flagstone!

Hurray the old flagstone is finally removed!  We are saving it to use in the backyard.

New pathway marked in Orange 

I wanted the entrance to the walkway from the driveway to be nice and wide!

New more gentle pathway marked in orange

We don't mind having a smaller planting area.  Less plants to worry and care for is our plan.

Preparing for the gravel sub base

Our poor grass is being trampled with all the heavy equipment.

This is going to be WIDE too

Lots of work went into preparing the gravel sub base - they packed it down good.

Now we won't have water seeping under the driveway

It's the little things like this that make me so happy - downspouts out of sight and out of mind!

Burying the downspout...no more ugly white drainpipe

Ditto!

New gentle curving walkway subbase

Packing down the gravel sub base. 

There's the huge tarp they used

Nice and WIDE 

Putting markers in to level gravel sub base

Looking better 

Our grass is a mess - look at the packed down mud where the downspouts were buried

This is our Mountain Green Maple tree just starting to change colors!

The landscaping crew started laying the stone pavers today - they are about 3/4 done with the front walkway.  Of course, the landscaping has to be done and new lights installed before it is completely finished.  We are having a walkway put in the back too so this is an on-going project for another week or so.  Stay tuned for more.

Please join me for:

Gina at The Shabby Chic Cottage for Transformation Thursdays

Cindy at My Romantic Home for Show and Tell Friday

Artie at Color Outside the Lines for Vignette Fridays

Courtney at French Country Cottage for Feathered Nest Friday
Wendy at The Shabby Nest for Frugal Friday

Donna at Funky Junk Interiors for Saturday Nite Special

Stephanie Lynn at Under the Table and Dreaming for the Sunday Showcase Party

Susan at Between Naps on the Porch for Metamorphosis Monday

Linda at Coastal Charm for Nifty Thrifty Tuesday