Construction Artists

It is finished.

17 years after we bought it, and it is all done and ready to be listed.  We signed paperwork last night.  I am feeling all boo-hoo-y about the whole situation.  So let us go back in time, shall we?

17 years ago we had baby Kate.  She was about 6 months old.  We sold our first house that we had owned for three years.  Our first house was originally built in 1912, was 800 square feet, and we bought if for 67k.  Ha.  Who buys a house for 67k?  That is how old I am.

For reference:  The Titanic sunk in 1912.

Anyways, we had fixed up that house and made about 8k on it, which pleased us.  We refinished the wood floors in that house and made it all cute.  We lived there with our two golden retrievers, Jack and Mabel.  Jack and Mabel fancied jumping up in the backyard and eating apples off of our apple trees.  We had Kate and decided the house was going to be too small.

Now.  This is way back before digital cameras.  Or at least before we owned one.  So pictures will be hard to come by.

But here is a picture of Jack and Mabel in our first house.  Look at the wood floors!  We sanded those, too!

And here I am with baby Kate in her room at that house:

So, we sold it.  We moved into my parents house, with baby Kate and Jack and Mabel.  We were looking for a new house.  My wish list included items like:  New, finished, and definitely newer than 1912.

I remember being at my mom’s with Kate when David called me.  He was shouting, as we were new to cellular phones and we shouted to make them work better.

David:  Taylor!  I found our house!

Me:  Really?!

David:  Yeah!  Oh, it is a total dump.  But location, location, location!

We offered them about 15k less than their asking price and they accepted instantly.  Which felt concerning.

It was built in 1910 and completely trashed.  It was, however, located in an excellent spot in our town.  We were confident our 8k profit from our first home would fix it up just fine.  Please remember we were 22 and 23 at the time.  And please, please, please understand that this cost us much more than 8k.

We knew not what we were doing.  I truly wish I had pictures of what it looked like when we bought it.  All I could find was these two pictures from when we started tearing things down:

It took us about 11 months to get it “liveable.”  In the meantime, we had baby Hadley.  Also:  Jack and Mabel had to be evicted from my parents’ house because they exhumed the body of my childhood dog from my parents’ backyard, and my parents did not appreciate that.

We moved in and the house was NOT DONE.  There were no baseboards or trim or doorhandles.  The kitchen had not been done at all.  But we could live there and work on it.

In fact, we lived there during the kitchen remodel.  David had to completely gut it, story of his life, so it was down to the dirt in there for awhile.  Unfortunately, walking through the kitchen was the only way to get to the laundry room.  So he put a large plank across that I could walk over to do laundry.

Lucky for me, it was just the girls at that time.  And get this.  If I told them to stay-THEY STAYED.

Me:  Stay in the living room.  Mommy needs to walk the plank.

Girls:  Ok, Mommy!

Those were the days.

David had moved our fridge and oven to the living room during that time, and I did dishes in the bathtub.  I remember feeling particularly over life when I was bathing the girls one night and a pea floated by.

We weren’t planning on re-siding the house.  One night, David asked me how long until dinner.  I said 15 minutes.  Then he went back outside.  Moments later I heard a terribly loud noise.

Me:  What are you doing?!

David:  I am ripping off the siding.

Me:  I thought we were just painting the house?!

David:  Not anymore.

He ripped all the siding off and then we put Tyvek paper across the whole house.  And it stayed that way for over a year.  Just wrapped in Tyvek until we had the money and energy for new siding.

Here is a picture of Kate potty training at that house.

There are placemats across the ledge there because sheet rock was always crumbling off and I was broke.  And isn’t she cute?

Here is that bathroom now:

And the girls helping David with the master bedroom:

Master Bedroom Now:

It took us a long time to do finish the kitchen.  We had grand ideas to tile a backsplash and have under cabinet lighting.  I never got to live there with under cabinet lighting and tile.  I did get to live with wires hanging down ready for under cabinet lighing.

And-Kitchen now:

HD and the laundry room from way back when:

That OSB floor was the floor for about the entire time we were there.

LD in the entrance to the laundry room:

Check out those smoochy lips.

Laundry room now:

And remember those horrific remodel pictures?  Here’s what those rooms look like now:

David building the playhouse:

Playhouse now:

The house was in a great location for a stay at home mom, such as myself.  You could walk to the park and the lake and the library.  Here is an old pic of the dudes from a morning walk.

We moved out in 2010 and we finished all the projects so we could rent it.  We have rented it for the past ten years and just spent the past couple of weeks completing fixing it up.  I am not used to such manual labor. I never want to see another paint brush again for as long as I live.

Everything hurts and I’m dying.

Oh, here is something we did that was fiscally wise.

We paid the kids to paint.  But they mostly just spilled paint on the wood floors.

So then we paid them to remove the paint off the floors.

Money well spent.

And, yes.  I am feeling all glum.  Because I remember feeling so impatient for those seven years we lived there.  I hated living in a remodel and just wanted it to be cute and done.  I would just imagine how cute it would be and power through. And now it is cute and done and I never lived there when it was cute and done.  Poor me.

But at least I have my cows!

One night, in 2004, I was quite pregnant with Hadley.  We were still living at my parents’ house.  My parents watched Kate so I could go and “help” David at the house.  At this time, the entire upstairs was ripped out and he was putting in the floor joists for the second floor.  I feel like I need you to understand that he literally rebuilt that entire house.

It was dark and we heard a very drunk man singing and coming down the road.  He walked all the way up to our porch and looked inside the house.  He saw David sitting up in the joists.

Drunk Man:  Well!  Look at you, Superstar!

It was my most favorite moment.

He continued to admire our work.

Drunk Man:  You guys are, like, taking something old and making it new again.  You are like artists.  YOU ARE CONSTRUCTION ARTISTS.

Whenever David is feeling glum, I remind him that he is, and always will be, a Superstar.

We kind of were Construction Artists.

It was the house that Dave built.

I will miss it.