Our First House

You know the term "starter house"? Well, this was ours.

We had hoped to find a house in that neighborhood, and one day, I casually mentioned to Bob that I'd seen a house for sale there. But it was too small. But maybe we should look at it? We scheduled an appointment, went through it, liked it, but quickly pronounced it too small.

A month or two later, we resumed the house hunt and looked at a bunch of houses. Bigger houses, cheaper houses, different neighborhoods, the other side of the river, etc. We discovered that the little tiny house was the one we liked best. We thought it was crazy but decided to go through it one more time. And fell in love.



Here's what I'm learning about myself: when it comes to houses, I look for a couple of things. First, it has to be old enough, but not too old. The range I like is about 1910-1935. Second, I have to like the windows. Preferably, they're the original windows. And, of course, they have to let in lots of light.


Third, I see a pattern in my need for at least one old, established tree somewhere. Gotta have a tree. And yes, there's a section of the fence missing. What of it? [It was the neighbor's fence. And behind their garage. So they didn't really care.]


Fourth, it needs to have some fun/beautiful original details. In our first house, this was the butler's pantry. It wasn't a full room, just a sweet little pass-through. It looks like it could use a good clean-up. Pretty smudgy. Oops.


If the house has these things, I'm willing to overlook others ... like a "master bedroom" that's 9x11, with no closet. And a kitchen that was nicely (very nicely) remodeled, but not in my taste-- and too dark. There was only one window in the kitchen, and it didn't let in much natural light. And the fact that the house was 968 square feet (plus an unheated back porch and a basement). This house, the house we're in now, is bigger than that on each floor. I think each floor here is 1100-something, and we have a full basement, first floor, second floor, and full attic. This place feels like a palace sometimes.

We loved our little house so much! But... we had a Great Dane, two cats, a baby, then another baby on the way. It was time.

I drive by from time to time. The people who bought it are taking good care of it, and that makes me happy.

Bob put so much work into the garden out front, and that's gone, so he's pretty sad about it. But I see it as a chance to create something wonderful here. Our front yard is a blank slate. It could be beautiful! He could probably recreate what we had...