Reskinning the House

The house we live in was built in 1978. We moved into it in 1983. We are the second owners. The house still has the original siding and windows. As anyone knows, new construction does not always use top of the line building materials. Our siding was looking old and faded. It also contained a number of dents from soccer balls and street hockey balls being banged into it. It was time for an update. We finally took the plunge and after getting a few bids accepted one. Last week the new siding arrived. Below is the siding being stored in our garage waiting for the installation crew.Before you can put up new siding, you have to take down the old siding and create quite the pile of junk on our lawn.

We tried to match the color of the original siding as close as possible, but it apparently doesn't exist anymore so we chose something as close as possible. We also went with a beaded siding. You can see the difference in the picture below. The old siding is above and new siding is below.

We also sprung for new windows. Most of our old windows no longer opened and were drafty as all get out. In the picture below, you can see the finished siding including new shutters and how all of our windows have been removed.
It was an interesting sight seeing all the windows out. Below is the old bedroom of Daughter #1. Hanging on the wall are her commemorative oar blades from her high school and college.

We also replaced the two sliding glass doors. The one leading out to the deck required superpowers to get it opened and closed and the screen had been missing since the kids were toddlers. Withe the new door you can open it with one finger.

By the end of the day, voila! new windows.

I'm interested to see what the difference is in our cooling and heating bills now that we replaced the siding and installed the new windows. It will be nice having windows that actually open now that fall seems to be coming. Our house seems all new and shiny now.