Front Porch Project

 Going to start with the after photo because I don't have a good before and the before was hideous.

I haven't ever really used by front porch for a couple of reasons. My house sits at the front of the property so my porch is very close to the sidewalk and the street. It seems odd and uncomfortable for some reason being so close to the sidewalk. But mostly the porch has been kind of skanky. The floor was awful and it just felt abandoned -- because it was.

Spending the Spring, Summer and now Fall in the house, I decided to spruce the front porch up. I got vinyl plank flooring at Menards way back in the early summer. It was either too hot and humid, raining or I was too tired to work on it.

Finally when it cooled down in the late summer I got at it. Once I really started work on the project, it went fairly quickly.

The old floor was a linoleum tile squares. A few were completely loose but most took some effort to get up. Once I came up with a technique, it went fairly smoothly though I did get a nice stigmata like blister in the palm of my right hand.

The biggest decision was which direction to lay the flooring in. I did some research and decided that having the planks "guide" toward the entry was the way to go. Once that was decided, laying the vinyl plank flooring was not bad. However, I can't tell you how many times I cut the wrong end of a plank but that just became the next row.

I re-used the quarter round after repainting white. I added a piece of furniture that Kelly gave me - I think I'll white-wash it so it is beachier - and added a lamp. I already had the two-seater.

I super pleased with the end results and feel like I could actually sit out here and enjoy.

After with staged furniture

After with planks drawing you to the front entrance

In progress. Once I got around that corner, it went quickly

All the nasty linoleum gone

Maggie on the nasty linoleum. My only before photo.