@Quentin Parker Oh my gosh what a huge difference! Love the countertop and the color you painted lower cabinets & trim around windows, doors & baseboards. I like the light over table, cabinet hardware & the black table & chairs by the doorway. I do think smaller (2 1/2“x 5”) subway tiles might be the way to go & with a simple running bond pattern. All the way up to light soffit behind the stove. This style of tile should be pretty reasonable & budget friendly. grout to match tiles I think. Match the shade of white in countertops. The flooring I think should be much lighter than current floor but definitely in grey tones to match cabinets & not a too busy pattern - the countertops should be the star. You’ll need to bring samples home to try. I’m sure the Pros will post ideas for you to think about too!

Quentin. Great job on kitchen. I love how you are preserving what you can while updating some elements. Love the colors. Especially the sage green trim! Fabulous choice. I am thinking about flooring. Bbl

Thanks, @cat_ky. Any suggestions of bushes that would work there?

I for sure have too many projects going at once! I don't know how that happens. The third floor could wait, but it's such great weather for being in that space since it's usually either extremely cold or hot. It could definitely wait and you're right it probably should. I started on the upstairs bathroom because my wife is pregnant and has been begging me to get it functional, haha. But I should really focus on the kitchen. It's just easier to work on out of the way areas where the mess doesn't matter.

Here is a product I am not personally familiar with but a couple clients and some folks here on Houzz have been touting it as low cost great solution.

It comes in various sizes and color combos.

@KW PNW Z8 thanks! It's nice to hear it looks good so far. We really haven't spent much yet. Thanks for the suggestions. Subway tile is pretty inexpensive. Do you think it would look too modern for the style of our kitchen? I'm still unsure whether I can tackle the tiling myself. This is why my wife just wants to cover the space with wallpaper now. I have done some tiling before, helping my dad and brothers with projects. But my lack of vision makes things much more difficult and time consuming. If it were something I did regularly I'd probably be more confident in my skills and have a better idea how to adapt.

For the floor we were thinking of vinyl tile in a large checkerboard pattern in cream and gray. The walls are off white (Behr Swiss Coffee), but the counter top is whiter. Does this matter as far as the flooring and backsplash are concerned?

@Flo Mangan Thanks! Marmoleum would definitely fit the style of our kitchen. So far we have only looked at vinyl. Is linoleum supposed to be more durable? We do have a large dog who is allowed in the kitchen.

When we moved into our new home it had a basic builder kitchen. We didn’t want to spend on upgrades because we knew we could redo the kitchen on our own cheaper than the upgrades. In the interim, my husband did put scrubbable wallpaper as a backsplash. So, that is doable if it’s what your wife wants.

I am told Marmoleum is very durable but I am not an expert on it. More research needed but I do think it has good possibilities.

@Gerry That's good to know! My poor wife is dealing with a lot very graciously and I know she just wants it to look pretty while we figure things out. I'm glad to hear that worked well as a short term solution.

We did a really colorful and fun peel and stick wallpaper as a temporary backsplash. Put it up just to bring some cheer to the room and your wife. Super cheap and easy. You can order great things in really small quantities off spoonflower or etsy. Doing a ton of self reno is hard and you guys have been through it. Grab the cheap and easy (and temporary) cheer. Imagine your wife's big grin.

Quentin don’t spend one penny or bit of energy on the yard this year. It’s unnecessary. It’s nice to be able to see the kids through the fence. Add a sandbox a swing and a picnic table and you’re good for now.

I vote for wallpaper over tile for now. Or just paint. Hang a picture there. A backsplash isn’t required for a functional kitchen. Mine was high end when it was put in and I don’t have one. I do have a stainless steel panel behind the stove— you might want to put some kind of one piece backsplash there (fire safe)! When your brother and dad can help, let them tile it.

With babies you need time to sleep and play with them.

One project at a time. Join your Facebook “Buy Nothing” group. I see great things there for free all the time. A sink. A patio set. Doorknobs. Bushes. Etc.

As far as the floor, I’d bite the bullet and have Lowe’s or whatever just put down vinyl and whatever carpet that’s on sale. Pay it off month by month. In 10 years when your kids don’t spill things any more you can do it again.

I mean, your baby is going to be crawling around on the floor next year and so will you. Just having the floor all fresh will make the biggest difference. The bathroom getting done is the other priority.

I'm very sorry for your experience.

I suggest you contact the local chapter of Habitat for Humanity, and similar groups. Some of those groups do remodeling with volunteer labor, particularly for folks with special situations like yours. You might also contact the Remodeler's Council at the local chapter of the National Association of Home Builders. Ours routinely does large-scale service projects with donated materials.

Best wishes.

I wonder if you have the original linoleum in that kitchen? In your area you may be able to find someone who can rejuvenate it and remove the discoloration.

As for the crayon stain, try Krud Kutter (red and white bottle) in the paint section of hardware stores. It's a pretty incredible product. I might even test it on a spot of that linoleum.

First off. The kitchen looks INCREDIBLE!! You’re very talented wow!!
Secondly, the sound of a cream checkerboard tile is amazing. I think I’d do that in there. Not necessarily vinyl. But a pretty tile...

Quentin, I have had very good results with rose of sharons, in front of fences, or even just for regular privacy screening. They come in a variety of colors.

I have a Marmoleum floor in my kitchen. And I love it- warm, smooth, natural and soft on the feet. But it is not inexpensive. It is available in several formats including sheet, tile and click tile. I have the sheet which has to be professionally laid by a someone experienced with the material.

You can get a similar look with VCT tiles. They are relatively cheap, easy to lay and pretty much indestructible. But they aren't natural and they don't have the same warm feeling under foot. (I installed those in the kitchen of my first home).

Good sheet vinyl is much, much cheaper than Marmoleum. You can get an estimate from your local flooring shop- they will come out to measure. New sheet vinyl is easy to clean. There are lots of warm beige patterns that will coordinate well with your woodwork.

Prioritizing expenses and effort can be summarized into two somewhat different lists for staying and selling. I suggest you make a big list of everything you want to do. Make columns for priorities (high, medium, low), dollar cost, labor hours, who can do the work (pro or owners), and a column for notes. Make two copies, one for selling and one for staying. Edit them separately. You and your wife can go through the house looking for things to add. Use your inspection report as a guide.

After you have the lists, talk about priorities as perceived by each of you. If your real estate agent was sensible, ask them what they'd recommend spending money and effort on for selling in a year.

Your talking my language Apple_pie! I use spreadsheets for this type master planning. Very valuable tool. Keeps you focused, on track and if you need to course-correct, you can assess impact on overall plan quickly.

@kj s Thanks for the encouragement! I was skeptical when she suggested it but it sounds like that's an idea we should go with after all. She's been living with it looking like this, so I can understand why she wants a temporary fix. I think she's embarrassed when we have company over.

@mrykbee I think we'd like to put some trees/bushes in for privacy anyhow. I love working outdoors so that won't be much of a chore. :)

Sounds like wallpaper is a popular idea. My wife will be happy to hear that! I'd like to just get the tile done, but I think she's right that I keep stalling and it could be a while. My family lives halfway across the country from us, so it's unlikely they'd be able to help anytime soon. It is painted right now, but it was a sloppy, quick job done when we first tore everything out. We had originally painted the old formica countertops also and lived with them for six months that way before we could redo them.

I've never heard of a "buy nothing" group, but it sounds like it would be just our thing. My wife is very frugal and we basically never buy anything new.

I think I might have to do the floors . The big box stores won't do anything because of our tile. They want it tested for asbestos and possibly removed first. We really don't want to go that route. The smaller flooring places are a little more expensive but they don't seem to make a fuss about asbestos.

@Anna (6B/7A in MD) It definitely looks and feels like linoleum and it's been waxed like linoleum (this is the reason for all the discoloration, layers of old wax). We do like the floor and it's very comfortable. We've debated cleaning vs. replacement over and over and have been very torn, but I think it will probably be better to just start over with a newer and clean floor. There's also the possibility of asbestos, which we'd rather not have come up in an inspection and scare away potential buyers.

Thanks! We will look for that and try it out on the carpet. Crayon is especially tricky to get out of things. Really appreciate all the suggestions!

@HU-187528210 Thanks! Any credit for how the kitchen looks should go to my wife. She chooses the colors, and does the painting, and decorating. She's pretty amazing at doing a lot without spending a lot of money.

Is there a reason you wouldn't do vinyl in the kitchen?

@Jennifer K Yes, Marmoleum is a good bit more expensive. Our kitchen is fairly large too. Sheet vinyl is great also. The advantage of VCT is I can put it down myself.

Quentin - a few thoughts.

1. Based on that kitchen reno, you don't really need the help of anyone here. You added a whole lot of value to that house just with what you did in the kitchen. Very nice job.

2. The outside is adorable. Tidying up the landscape, putting in a few pretty plants, and mulch don't cost a ton of money and do wonders for curb appeal.

3. I'm sure you've heard the old saying that kitchens and baths sell houses. If you put your combined talents to work on the bath in the same way you did the kitchen, that should go a long way toward a future sale.

4. I have an optic nerve disorder that has wrecked my vision in 1 eye. I
live in fear of it involving the 2nd one. You are my hero for your
"let's roll with it" attitude and can-do spirit. I know how hard it is
to do visually-detailed work with just one good eye. Kudos. Seriously.

Thanks, @apple_pie_order! We have a lot of lists, but we should be more organized about it. Having separate lists for selling vs what we want done is a great idea.

It's hard to be sure what is a priority for selling. For instance something like the kitchen sink and faucet. We still have the old ones, but they're passable. I don't know if that's something which makes the kitchen seem newer and more finished or if it's not a big deal so long as it works and is clean. We don't mind having old things, so they're not always a priority for us, personally. Maybe more so for my wife.

There are peel and stick wall tiles...scrubable, more durable than wallpaper. Ceramic Tiling a wall isn’t a project I would undertake with poor eyesight, maybe not even with good eyesight if you aren’t experienced.

If you have original linoleum, it probably is something very similar to marmoleum. And it can be stripped. You need a floor polisher (rentable) and wax stripper. And given that it's ancient, you'll probably have to do it a number of times. I grew up with a waxed kitchen floor. Mum stripped and rewaxed it once or twice a year. It took a couple of hours. The floor always came up looking beautiful. It was original to the house and installed in 1918.

@User Thanks for your compliments on our kitchen! It doesn't take too much to make it better than it was. I can't believe someone was actually living there before we bought the house. It was pretty grimy and decrepit: the sink didn't even drain. About a 3 ft section was completely clogged with thick black grease. It was just an old man in his nineties living here all alone. I don't think he'd been upstairs in years.

I'll post pictures of the bathrooms later. I'm working on the upstairs one so the downstairs one we've left alone for now. It's not as bad as the one upstairs.

I'm sorry to hear about your eye. I can definitely sympathize. When you only have sight in one eye it's hard not to worry about the other. Thank you for your kind words. It's for sure a struggle, though honestly I'm thankful to have any vision left. I wasn't so sure that would be the case earlier last year. After surgery I had almost no sight in it for a few weeks and that was frightening.

@Jennifer K We've debated trying that. The floor is in decent condition, with a few marks and a lot of gunk in the wax around the radiators. If it is linoleum asbestos would be unlikely, I think. I didn't think they used asbestos in linoleum, but maybe I'm wrong? It's 9x9 mid century tile, so definitely the kind inspectors tend to mark as suspect for asbestos.

@liasch Would peel and stick tiles look too fake or cheap? The one benefit of wallpaper is that it's not trying to masquerade as anything better. It's not going to look "fake". There are cheap wall panel tiles in the downstairs bathroom that are pretty bad. If there's a groutable peel and stick that would probably look better.

Groutable peel and stick I came across at Lowe's:

@liasch I might agree with you that ceramic tiling a backsplash isn't a good idea for me, but I'm curious what in particular you think would be a problem. I have managed to figure out a number of decent techniques for doing a lot of different projects already.

I am not a tile person...I only know neighbours hired someone to tile bathroom and he made a mess of it. This despite him insisting he was experienced. The tiles were not lined up (spaced) properly, and were uneven. With an older house (I live in one so I know) things are often not level or square to start with. Then, removing tile that is improperly laid is a pain. They had to have their bathroom redone. However, I myself have never laid tile...if I do, it will be someplace not very visible so mistakes won’t show...lol. I have seen peel and stick backsplash look good, but it depends on the size of area. You could also hire a professional to do the tiling if you want real tile. Your bathroom looks like tile board. That is different. I have that in my bathroom and it can look okay stencilled or stamped for a vintage look.

I have Marmoleum in a bedroom and I vote against it. It takes maintenance to keep it looking nice, and we find it scratches very easily just from a desk chair rolling smoothly over it. I would not recommend at all. Apparently you need to buy a special polisher to keep it looking nice. Not going to happen for me. Sheet vinyl is much better.

As far as the crayon stain on the carpet, that's easy to fix if you have even a little bit extra or some in a closet. I cut off the stained fibers first so I can more easily see what I am doing. Then take a box cutter and cut out the little piece of the carpet that had the stain. Cut a same-size patch and just glue it down. (Or use tape as suggested in the link below). If you really don't have any extra, then cut a few pieces here and there along the edge of the room and glue them down individually to replace the stained piece. https://www.carpetcaptain.com/care-repair-guides/carpet/how-to-repair-carpet-hole/

@partim That's good to know, especially since sheet vinyl or vinyl tiles are a lot cheaper anyway. Marmoleum seems really popular right now, and it's more expensive, so I figured it was probably more durable. We have a large dog and unfortunately our toddler likes to bang things on the floor.

Wow, cutting out a spot in our brand new carpet seems a little daunting. Does the patch shred or come loose after a while? This is a fairly small piece. I could give it a try if nothing else works to scrub it out.

@liasch I don't know, subway tile doesn't seem too difficult. I wouldn't do sheets or mosaics or anything. I wouldn't use a wet saw either. We have three outlets and some window trim (not sure yet what's happening with that), no corners to turn, just wall to wall. I'm not sure how you get drastically uneven lines unless you're not using spacers. I would use leveling spacers. My wife can see fine and so I wouldn't be doing this completely on my own with no one to see the big picture. Leveling is the big issue. I put in the cabinets and countertop so I know things aren't totally level. It's an old house and nothing is totally straight. The biggest concern is where the tile would meet the top of the wall behind the stove.

I had 95% convinced myself not to do it, but all the doubt really motivates me. Hopefully this isn't a bad thing. :)

@liasch I think we're going to replace that tile board in the downstairs bathroom with beadboard. Whoever put it in did a terrible job, lots of caulk gobbed on everywhere. The downstairs bathroom was apparently redone only two years ago, which is hard to believe. It's in bad shape already, shoddy materials and shoddy work.

Love the idea of beadboard in your vintage house bathroom. And, I’m still rooting for the subway tile in your kitchen for backsplash if you think it’s a manageable project for you and your wife together. I do think it’s an investment that will pay off if you do sell your house. Another idea I just had while looking at your kitchen pictures is, instead of subway tile, what about small sized hexagon tiles? When I looked up images of them I see that they are sheets of small hexagons - they’re attached to a netting. I wondered if they would be easier to manage with less cutting of tile pieces to fit around moldings and such. The look of them is somewhat vintage too and they are budget friendly also depending on the material. A simple white would work. Here’s a link to hexagon used as a vintage look tile Hexagon tile in kitchen And a link to a YouTube video installing hexagon tiles Video. There are a couple videos at this link on how to cut small tiles without a tile saw also. I‘ve never installed tile but maybe the videos could help with a decision about whether it’s a manageable project.

The carpet patch does not shred or come out. I have done this many times with no problem. There is no way you will get that dark crayon stain out.

Oh wow what a lovely home!

I personally like the fence. If it is older (I'm guessing it is) it has a different look and feel of current chain link. We had some at our 1958s home.

And cattle fencing it is not. At that same home (15+ years ago) we needed to fence in the back pasture area on three sides that was about .5 acres. CLF would have been over $2k in just materials. Cattle fencing was under $400.

@KW PNW Z8 Thanks for the ideas! I like the hexagon tile. Might be more forgiving and less likely to look slightly off or not straight. It's also more interesting than plain white subway tile

Thanks, @partim. It's good to know there's a solution and our new carpet is probably not ruined forever. We do have a small closet in there we could take a piece from.

Thanks, @aziline. Haha, yeah, I grew up on a farm and helped put up many fences for different things. No one uses chain link for live stock. It's pretty much ubiquitous here in the city though. I'm sure it would look better with more landscaping. One of our neighbors has the same thing but it's painted black and we thought that looked good too.

How is your reno coming along? I saw this thread for the first time today and wanted to say that Ive used wallpaper for a backsplash with no issues, but not behind a stove. i used the beadboard wallpaper since it fits with our decor style.

Thanks, @nan-nan! Things are coming along slowly, but we're getting there. My wife did order some brick look wallpaper, but when it arrived she hated it and returned it. So, we figured we might as well get moving with the backsplash and we've been working through samples and ideas.

Quentin

We have renovated a lot of old houses over the years and have found it to be a mixture of joy and pain! just do what you are doing — experiment and decide together on the many, many, many choices inherent in renovation. It is ok if it takes longer than you expect and if you change your mind down the road.