Theresa, I'm still chuckling at your suggestion of dating guys who work in the construction field. With the enormous amount of work I'm going to need to have done, that would include: electricians,plumbers,flooring ,tiling,insulation,landscape ,cabinet, and sheetrock guys..just for a good start. I'd hate to start out in a new community with the kind of reputation THAT would get me( deservedly,) Ha! I might as well put a red bulb in my front porch light! Thanks for lightening up my mood! :)

For those who suggested Techo Bloc, I looked at their site. Gorgeous! I'm afraid my budget may be too tight but definitely worth looking into! Thanks!

How about a pink bulb and a contractor?

Joannpb, I just looked at the Home Depot tiles. Since the porch is pretty tiny, and they are pretty inexpensive, THAT might be a very good option . Thanks!

The bluestone and flagstone suggestions are also good ones! Thank you ALL so much for taking the time to give me helpful ideas. Before I posted and asked for help, I had spent WEEKS looking for ways to camouflage the ugly slab and figured I had thought of everything possible but you have all given me possible solutions ,many of which HADN'T crossed my mind! I'm beginning to think that ,at some point, I'll actually LIKE my porch. And, while I wanted an old fashioned plank floor,it's true that some sort of tiles or natural ,hard flooring would require virtually no upkeep and would probably last as long as the house stands. I truly appreciate all your help!

Joannpb, stop! You're kill in' me! Haha!

lakehouse...I have a neighbor who is a bit of a "jack of all trades", but a master plumber by trade. He's been an amazing friend & neighbor.

Couple weeks ago I had a BAD clog in my drain. No amount of plunging was working. I gave him a call & he had been storing some things in my garage & went out there & got his snake...ran that thing about 50' & finally the water went rushing down!

As he was winding the snake up. he said....ya know that would be about a $550 Sat evening service call! So I said, yeah...but what's the "Mo" charge?? He said...hold the back door open for me! That's it! Nothing! :0)

I have another neighbor who is an electrician. Last fall he installed a separate circuit & ran it into my basement for my freezer. Again...no charge.

Get to know your neighbors!!!! You never know what they do for a living & how willing some folks are to help out someone who is taking care of everything on their own.

My next door neighbor was put in an assisted living facility 2 years ago. She's 97. I used to take her nearly every Sat morning to breakfast at the local VFW. She's their oldest living member. Had no idea her daughter was an accountant & works for H&R Block. I have a key to her moms house for emergencies & keep an eye on the place & she does my taxes for free every year!

Seriously....get to know your neighbors! It can be extremely beneficial! :0)

Bungalowmo, how kind of you to have spent your Saturday mornings with your 97 yr. old former neighbor! Since placing my 88 year old dad in a dementia care facility, I have grown to know and love many of the elderly people there. I think that sometimes, when people get old and have memory and other health problems, we often tend to forget that they once had such interesting lives and, are encouraged, love to talk about their pasts and relive old memories. I like to paint the ladies' fingernails while listening to their stories and they love a little pampering. :). Your idea of getting to know the neighbors is a very good one (especially since I tend to have a meltdown at the sight of water rising in a stopped up commode!). Maybe I can trade off services (like feeding pets and picking up mail during their vacations or cooking extra food and sharing.) Homes in the area used to be mainly vacation homes(as mine was) but,luckily, more people are living there year round which will make me feel less isolated. It'll be a big change for me to be 25 minutes from "civilization", since I'm used to being 5 minutes from grocery stores and gas stations. I'M definitely going to have to learn to change a flat tire and get some tools and a book on home repairs! It'll be a BIG change, but watching gorgeous sunsets from my pier and enjoying the tranquil life of lake living will compensate, I'M sure. :)

Thanks lakehouse! Yeah...she always had a ton of stories to tell. She was a medic in WWII & did a ton of travelling. Much throughout Europe. When I moved to my place in '07, I'd always shovel her walk & steps & clear a path to her car. She still had her license & I couldn't imagine her falling on the way to her car! Took a couple years for her to figure out who was shovelling & tossing the salt! :0)

If this is your first time on your own, a few tools I highly suggest...
Cordless drill & a set of drill bits & get the flat & phillips attachments.

Good set of screwdrivers are a MUST!!!

A good hammer

A box of multi sized nails.

A staple gun. There are different kinds & some have a tougher trigger than others. I had one with an easy trigger & somehow it came up missing ...my replacement is a PITA!!!

I also have & have replaced from constant use...wagner heat gun & Porter Cable palm sanders. (and more paint scrapers than you can possibly imagine!!!)

Takes time, but from flea markets & craigslist ads I've acquired a table saw, set of hole saws, air compressor with nail gun attachment & the ends for inflating tires, my favorite...the silent paint remover!! http://www.silentpaintremover.com/

Totally agree with architectrunnerguy's recommendation. Irregular bluestone would be beautiful.

Back when I invited my sweat-deficient ex to vacate our sweat-equity property in northern New England, he took most of the tools with him ("the man" you know) and I started collecting anything I could find from flea markets, yard sales, auctions, even the dump. There were a lot of old farmers in the area who would sift through their barns and cellars looking for junk to fill a cardboard box. Those boxes generally sold for a dollar and contained everything from a big brown jar of 1800's horse liniment, to toilet seat hardware, to civil war union uniform buttons, but it was the occasional tool that kept me bidding. My favorite find is still a heavy, old farrier's pliers that I have used for ever.

.

When my husband passed 2 years plus ago his children wanted all of the tools in the garage (even the ones that I had prior to marriage). My brother said "keep one of everything". I did. Since my husband often bought more tools when he couldn't find one, I thought there was more than enough to go around. I've been glad to have them when I had some repairs to do.
It is mind boggling to learn to do some of this stuff, but with utube, and internet downloads of product instructions, I've been able to learn.

Wow,Grover, I wish I knew how to do what you did ! That IS PRETTY!

Bungalowmo ,thank you for the tool list. My family( all males) have tried to keep me away from power tools since I made the mistake of telling them about the incident with the high powered stapler and my one and only chair /seat covering experience. I thought that the grip was really awkward but put the "business end" to the seat and pulled the trigger. It didn't staple so I shot again. The heavy duty staple flew over my ear. Turns out.. I was holding it backwards...a mistake that anyone could make..right? That ended my unpholstry work. I'm even en a threat with a hot glue gun. Sigh... I''ll probably be ok with hammers and pliers, maybe. Ha!

Joannpb and motupeg, sounds like I need to start collecting tools. I can't say that I'm looking forward to having to learn to use them,though. I've never HAD to learn about tires or commodes because there has always been a willing male around to do whatever for me. Schools ought to offer a class that teaches basics like that. It would have been a big help to me in my future.

lakehouseredo - I hear you about the knowledge gap. Many people haven't had the opportunities to absorb knowledge from friends and family members and find the work intimidating. One good aspect of working on your own projects is you can spend all the time you wish researching the project and reading directions and helpful hints.

If you have a local affiliate of Habitat for Humanity, I recommend volunteering with them. I've met wonderful people at ReStore and on building sites and learned quite a bit along the way. If you can get involved with a WomenBuild project, you'll be able to learn many new skills.

Linda, that's a fantastic idea! A combination of volunteering AND picking up skills from people who know their way around power tools!

Grover, could you possibly use my ugly slab photo and create. either an old fashioned porch with the basic (white) handrails, balusters and(I know I'M pushing it..) some sort of covering UNDERNEATH, which would also work for the entire front of the house, where the siding stops. Thank you!

what I expected:

Arg! Photo still doesn't show wood plank floor!

How about this?

Our front concrete steps sunk to a dangerous level, so this past summer, instead of jacking them up, we gave the whole front porch a makeover with pavers. The company just put the pavers right on top--not on the steps--those they tore out and put in the blocks, but over the porch. It looks great and really improved the curb appeal--I have always loved our porch, but now it's so much prettier. We had wood as well as a composite priced out--they would basically build a mini-platform because the wood/composite couldn't sit right on top of the concrete--and then they would put the planks down. I love the look, but it was at least double the price. This way we got the walkway and the whole porch!

From the picture with the three different paint colors, I am going with the top right. Best, by far!

groveraxle, that looks amazing!

Groveraxle, YES! That's the look I'm going for! You are awesome! I hadn't thought about putting steps on the side, but I love it! Since its a lake house, this is the entrance and my circular drive can be modified with landscaping and a walkway to the steps!
I'm going to print this photo and use it to explain EXACTLY how I want it to look so I'll avoid any more problems with miscommunications! Thank you, again!

Eleanor, your new porch is SO pretty! (And the bricks won't be slippery like some tiles would be.) Unfortunately, I don't have enough clearance from concrete to my door's threshold for bricks,otherwise they'd be a great option. Thanks!

Jsreams, yes, the sample on the upper right is what I picked. I had to see it in the daylight and on the house because those little paint samples from stores just aren't the same as actuallySEEING it on a house. I'm just hoping that it still looks grey and not blue once it's all over the house. The light sample on the lower left LOOKED grey until I saw it on the house. Then it appeared to be sort of a sky- blue. I'm glad you like my choice. Thanks!

I assume you're painting the trim white. Here's what it might look like:

Maybe stamped concrete

Groveraxle, yes, white trim. You are good! What kind of software are you using? I'm actually getting excited about my tacky little slab, now!

Rob, I thought about having a thin,tinted layer of concrete poured and stamped but I'm guessing it would be pretty costly. I even thought of having the existing concrete scored into parallel lines to resemble wood planks, then applying a stain. Thanks for the suggestion. I'm not ruling anything out, just yet. :)

lakehouseredo, I use Photoshop Elements. Your place is going to be super cute when you get it painted and landscaped. You won't even notice the concrete slab.

Grover did a great job! Totally cute! :0)

Grover, you're making me think it's really possible! Bungalow mo is right. You've made it cute and inviting!

Groveraxle, just for kicks, I played around with the photoshop on my PC and added a sidewalk. Ha!

Nice work, lakehouseredo. I see you're starting to love concrete. ;-)

Thanks! Well, it's there now, so I might as well ....especially now that you've shown me how it can be "prettied up." (Still thinking of staining the porch surface., maybe a dark gray or with a wood grain look.)

lakehouseredo...been with my husband for 36 years....Not my sister, alas, still a striking woman.....I send my husband to local bars as he's a big Irish boy. Last worker he found is an AWESOME drywall guy who's brother is a plummer and his best friend has a carpet business.....The husband can pretty much do it all, but we are getting older so he's much slower. The last house took 12 years. You can still see my finger nail gouges on 95 going north. The new house has a fantastic 4 acres but is a 1981 hamster habit rail and nothing has been really done yet....and it's been six years....sigh......

• .Well..a year later and my ugly porch was put on the "back burner." I got rid of the builder after he accused me of "changing my mind" after supposedly KNOWING he was going to pour the ugly concrete porch ( which wiI DID NOT!). Also, he took the entire top of my house off ,then shut the entire job down for 10 days( which left my house vulnerable to ttheft, arson, vandalism and torrential rains that soaked and ruined a basement room that I had no plans to until MUCH LATER. Many more horror stories with the builder but am having problems with this site so, I'll just post update photos..

Welcome back lakehouse . . glad you are able to show us where you are now, and hope that 2016 will bring you much happiness in the lakehouse .. living is easier without construction ongoing! Let us help you make your final decisions to get busy living instead of building.

ARG!. can get photo to post!

Thank you, Libra!

Off topic but I would say that if you do decide to buy tools; don't buy used. My husband is our cook and I am the carpenter. I find that old tools can be dull and that can make them more difficult and in some cases dangerous. Buy what you need and the best quality you can afford.

Glad that you got rid of that builder....he should have been willing to meet you at least half way.

I was wondering how things were going.

I'm back. I still haven't done anything with the ugly concrete but I'm definitely leaning towards some kind of tile or slate. Things have slowed to a snails pace because of my "marital situation." I'm wondering if I'll live long enough to see the house finished! I'm still going with white handrails on the porch (after the floor is done), a hexagon vent -white trim above the porch and lots of landscaping. My question.. there is not space enough to put light fixtures on each sides of the door. STBX ( it's complicated) who is living there and working on the house on nights and weekends informed me that he ran wiring for a ceiling light IN THE MIDDLE. of the porch. I'm thinking that the light should be over the doorway. Please, give me your thoughts.

Like this:

I have a porch very similar to yours and my light is in the middle of the porch. On your porch in particular, a light over the door would have to be flush or semi-flush mount to keep from bumping your head. How about a pendant in the center and a single wall sconce on the left side of the door?

Update?

What did you do?

If you add stone or brick facing to the sides of the porch, that would change the look without changing the slab itself. Having had both wood and concrete, I can tell you with certainty that plain concrete is lower maintenance.