With the onset of Fall one sets their sights on . . . planting!

When we purchased our previous home on York Way we were the worst house on the block, until we revamped the landscaping, which took a few years.  When we left the yard looked pretty darn good.  Well, here we are, back to being the ‘yard in most need of some love’, and I don’t care for being ‘that yard’.  Poor little White House on Westover Road, her front yard is in sad shape.  There was very little grass – mostly crab grass, clover and nuts edge.  The photos above do not do justice as to how bad it looked.

Time to take action!

My husband, God Bless him, worked one full day weeding, tilling, verti-slicing, seeding and fertilizing.  He is one hard worker!  Upon purchase of the house, we inherited one very old sprinkler system and one that is just plain old – neither of which work, which is very unfortunate when you are trying to get grass to grow.  Time to bring out the hoses, sprinklers and lawn tractors!  Oy Vey – I forgot how much I hated schlepping hoses around.  One does not fully appreciate their former sprinkler system until one is without.

Verti-slicing and seeding.

Little lawn tractor doing its job – grow grass, grow!

We also tilled up grass close to the house and laid out planting beds in order to get base plantings in the ground before winter.  I can’t wait to get out, plant and play in the dirt!  There is just something about seeing an idea and vision come together, all while getting your hands dirty in the process.

Now we wait.  After watering twice a day for a week, guess it is time to sit back and watch the grass grow . . . literally!

Enjoying our first fire in the fire pit!

As you know, for several years I walked past a home in our neighborhood and wondered why it sat vacant for 10+ years.  What did it look like inside?  What was its ‘story’?

It is hard to believe it has been one whole year since that very house went on the market and I walked through it for the first time.  As soon as I saw the entryway and the staircase I was in love!  Fifteen minutes later, in my head, I was placing furniture and by the time we left I was tearing down walls and opening up the kitchen.  Needless to say, my husband did not share in my exuberance.  It took three months and five more visits to convince him this was our ‘dream house’.  Hard to believe, but here we are, a year later and we are living in this house that I had admired from afar for years.  Many thanks to my Hubs for eventually sharing my vision and embarking on this journey to bring a wonderful, old home back to life.

And I found my Fall decorating bins and it is now officially Autumn on Westover Road!  It was so much fun decorating our new home for the first Fall season.  I gotta say, I’m loving these really high ceilings 🙂

My hubs is always on the hunt for hidden treasure (i.e. MONEY) in the houses we buy.  He looked and looked in our first home and he was just certain he would find a stash of cash someone in our new dream home.  Alas, no money was found only some old documents, a few dinnerware items and a like-new fly fishing rod.  However, while cleaning out the garage he did stumble across something interesting.

Under the garage stairs he found a box of trim.  Not just any trim, but the trim from our great room which we have discovered was an addition to the home in about 1960ish.  He took the box to the basement thinking maybe we will do something with it someday.

That day came in late March when we were making decisions regarding the kitchen.   The ceilings are 10 feet tall and I knew I didn’t want the cabinets to go all the way up to the ceiling, our trim would have to be pretty large.  And here is where the trim made its debut!  We thought, ‘if we have enough of the found trim, maybe we could replicate what is currently in the great room – Genius!  So we went about counting pieces of trim . . . and came up 8 – 10 feet short.  NUTS!

The Great Room trim

But my husband, being the smart guy he is, kept the packing slip from the original box in which he found the trim.  A quick Google search and the company was still in business!  He sent an email asking about the ‘egg and dart’ trim we were searching for and really didn’t think he would get a response.  The next morning, he did get a response from the President of the company himself!

We found out the Chicago Company had been in existence since the 1880’s and was a third generation run family company.  He said there were ‘thousands of the egg and dart molds’ so for my husband to send him a piece to find the exact match.  And match it they did, a very exciting day indeed.

The process to put the resin-like trip up was quite interesting and without my hubs talking directly to someone with the company we never would have known how to install it.  The all natural material must be heated over water to make it pliable and to be able to drill a nail hole through.  It was quite a scene to watch.

All of this process has taken quite some time, but it is nearly complete and I know there is no one else who will have this type of crown molding in their kitchen.  Thank goodness for hidden treasures!

Putting up the ‘egg and dart’ trim, only 20+ feet more to go!