Old Houses
So as most of you know I live in a very old house. It was built in 1924. And yes....it is a continuing project. When I was on the market for a house in March of 08 I looked at dozens of homes. My secret hope was that I would be able to buy a home in Ardmore but the reality was that all of the homes that were big enough for our needs were out of our price range.
Towards the end of my looking I started to accept the fact that I was going to have to buy a newer home (1990+) in a newer neighborhood. While perusing a real estate magazine I came accross this house and saw it was a duplex (2 bed 1 bath downstairs and 1 bed 1 bath upstairs. I thought it might work because the upstairs 1 bed could be Brad's office but didn't really like the fact that there were only 2 beds downstairs but I thought I should take a look at it anyway and maybe the bedrooms would be large enough for me to cope. Well, when I walked in I saw that there in fact were3 bedrooms downstairs! I was so psyched and well we'll just say, I was possibly blinded to the condition of the house by my sincere desire to own an older home and this one was in the neighborhood I wanted for the price I wanted. I grew up in a very old home and my dad was always making repairs so I suppose I didn't really see all of its issues because that's what I was used to.
Well you all know how that went down. Even with all of the hardship I am more than thrilled to be living in an old house. There are still projects that need to be done of course and to me there is just something great about that. I am sure that is because my Dad always had a project going, well multiple projects actually and was infamous for leaving one project half done to go work on another project. I thought I would include some before and after pictures here because I thought readers might appreciate the differences. There are about a million improvements but I that might get kinda boring looking at after a while. The ones that say they were taken 03/24/2006 were actually taken in September of 2009.
I love the idea that there have been many families before me living in my house. Old houses have this smell about them, the old wood perhaps, or maybe it's the plaster that just gives me a good feeling, a lived in feeling, a feeling of home. I would venture to guess that it reminds me of my childhood home so it just feels like home when I smell it. Old homes also have little eccentricities as well. Way back before the whole burst pipe business Brad and I were under the house looking for a leak in one of the pipes and we saw a tree stump under there, yes still rooted in the ground. The builders of the house just chopped that tree down and built the house right over the stump. I thought it was hilarious (Brad, not so much) and I could just picture how that would have happened. I have also found lots of old things like a receipt from 1940 something for oil to fill the oil burning furnace the house used to have. I know plenty of people who would never in a million years live in an old house. I am sure they think I'm crazy but, seriously, it's hardwired in me or something. I hope I don't ever have to live in a new house.
Towards the end of my looking I started to accept the fact that I was going to have to buy a newer home (1990+) in a newer neighborhood. While perusing a real estate magazine I came accross this house and saw it was a duplex (2 bed 1 bath downstairs and 1 bed 1 bath upstairs. I thought it might work because the upstairs 1 bed could be Brad's office but didn't really like the fact that there were only 2 beds downstairs but I thought I should take a look at it anyway and maybe the bedrooms would be large enough for me to cope. Well, when I walked in I saw that there in fact were3 bedrooms downstairs! I was so psyched and well we'll just say, I was possibly blinded to the condition of the house by my sincere desire to own an older home and this one was in the neighborhood I wanted for the price I wanted. I grew up in a very old home and my dad was always making repairs so I suppose I didn't really see all of its issues because that's what I was used to.
Well you all know how that went down. Even with all of the hardship I am more than thrilled to be living in an old house. There are still projects that need to be done of course and to me there is just something great about that. I am sure that is because my Dad always had a project going, well multiple projects actually and was infamous for leaving one project half done to go work on another project. I thought I would include some before and after pictures here because I thought readers might appreciate the differences. There are about a million improvements but I that might get kinda boring looking at after a while. The ones that say they were taken 03/24/2006 were actually taken in September of 2009.
I love the idea that there have been many families before me living in my house. Old houses have this smell about them, the old wood perhaps, or maybe it's the plaster that just gives me a good feeling, a lived in feeling, a feeling of home. I would venture to guess that it reminds me of my childhood home so it just feels like home when I smell it. Old homes also have little eccentricities as well. Way back before the whole burst pipe business Brad and I were under the house looking for a leak in one of the pipes and we saw a tree stump under there, yes still rooted in the ground. The builders of the house just chopped that tree down and built the house right over the stump. I thought it was hilarious (Brad, not so much) and I could just picture how that would have happened. I have also found lots of old things like a receipt from 1940 something for oil to fill the oil burning furnace the house used to have. I know plenty of people who would never in a million years live in an old house. I am sure they think I'm crazy but, seriously, it's hardwired in me or something. I hope I don't ever have to live in a new house.
Comments
Post a Comment