A Knock On The Door

This morning at about 10am there was a knock at our front door. My husband has a horrible cold but I have this policy about not answering the door if I don't know who is on the other side. So, he got the job of answering. It ended up being the second owner of our house standing on the other side of the door! She wanted to know if she could come back later today with her family to see the house. This is the lady who happened to be very good friends with my mother's best friend and we have emailed about the house several times. I had not heard from her in quite some time. So, we set an appointment for 2pm when they returned.

At 2pm the owner showed up with her daughter, husband, granddaughter-in-law and grandson. It was so interesting to hear what they had to say about the house. They seemed to like the things we had done to it. I am going to type some of the things they told us about the house so that I don't forget. We started in the living room. She said when they moved in, the living room floor had just been carpeted with wool carpet for the sale of the house. We speculate this may have been the same carpet that was in the house when we moved in. She said the living room windows had white sheer panels when they lived there. We think they were the same ones on the windows when we moved in. They also told us they used the fireplace. We were told by the inspector that he thought there was no liner in the fireplace and we shouldn't use it until we know for sure. We haven't had it inspected by a chimney sweep yet but we suspect it does have a liner!

The kitchen was still terrazzo when they moved in but they covered it in linoleum. She thought the kitchen cabinets were white when they moved in and they had been painted due to damage. I was told that the cabinet that divides the living room and kitchen was moved further into the kitchen by them because they thought it went too far into the living room. She said the kitchen had a gourmet freezer/ fridge that was very large and had wood surrounding it. It was not very efficient and when it broke they couldn't find anyone to fix it so they replaced it. We think that was the original fridge for the house. She said it was very tall and flush with the kitchen cabinets. That is what I had speculated. The original owners had a laundry off the kitchen with a washer/ dryer all in one unit. That was removed and the laundry was added in the basement by these people.

The hallway leading to the family room.
The laundry room is on the left. The laundry
room and door leading into the family room
were not always here.

The pink and blueish/green carpet that was in the two smaller bedrooms when we moved in sounds like it was here when these people lived here. The pink was added by them. One bedroom has funny marks in the floor and ceiling right above and below each other. (I have been meaning to do a post about these to see if anyone knows what they are.) All I can think is that some kind of tension unit was in this spot. Maybe a lamp or a shelf. They said they don't remember having anything like this. I had suspected these were the owners who put the wallpaper in both of the bathrooms but they said they did not. The basement bathroom has tile on the floor that was also in the entry way. They said they don't remember this tile. They think the basement hallway and bathroom had carpet when they lived there.

This is the same floor covered in white splotches
at the "floor problems" link  below.

They used our guest room as a den which is also what I think the original owners used it for. The biggest surprise of their visit was learning about the rest of the basement. The rest of the basement had originally been a dog kennel. I know these people had removed the dog kennel. So, I assumed they had also refinished the basement and turned it into the laundry room and family room. But, they were not the ones who refinished the basement. They left it unfinished with a cement floor. What is now the laundry room and family room were all one big room. At one time the entire basement had a long hall that went from one end to a door that went outside. They said that hall was still there when they lived in the house. This was a very big surprise to us.

When you walk in the family room this divider is in front of you.
We assume it's there as support instead  of the original wall. You
can see the door to the carport past this divider.

I haven't included many pictures of the basement. That is where a large part of our floor problems happened. (Remember the story about the floors that got stained purple on accident?) I figure it is about time to post some photos of the basement. I'm sorry I didn't take them in the day when there was more light. We are just about moved in down there. For those of you wondering, our other house still has not sold!! So, we aren't completely moved into this house. We still have furniture at the other house. We do have an offer on the other house. It is supposed to close on June 24th. Hopefully everything will go through without any hitches. We are now in the process of moving the last of our furniture to the new house.

This is the divider from the opposite side.
The right side of this divider was where there
was a wall that ran the length of the family room
and created a hallway.

At our old house we had a lot of built in shelving in our family room. We were wondering how we were going to make up for all of that lost space. This past winter we got a shelving unit for the family room that comes in two pieces. They are supposed to be stacked on top of each other but we separated them. One unit is being used as an entertainment center. The other unit is being used as shelving for books. The unit was originally a beverage rack. I will have more photos soon of our guest bedroom. It has also been neglected in my photos. A new bedspread comes this week and we should be about done with that room. We finally had our front yard repaired after the new sewer line. So, be watching for more landscaping photos. We also have some new patio furniture.

It is our hope to paint the exterior of the house this summer. Choosing colors is not fun!! I wish someone could just tell me what will look great.

More to come soon!

This is the new storage unit we got in the winter. The piece on the left is actually supposed to stack on top of the piece
on the right. The top of the piece on the right is actually from our old house. My cousin built it to serve the same
purpose it serves now on top of a built in shelving unit where our TV sat. The two pieces on the right are not attached.

The Sister

The man forwarded my emails to his sister who was a wealth of information! She told us that the shelving units on the walls in two of the bedrooms and the den are System Cado. These are Scandinavian designed highly collectible floating wall units. Some of these wall units have metal brackets but these have more desirable wooden brackets.

This is the unit in one of the bedrooms. The desk at the left of the picture is NOT a part of the unit. It was left by the owners and will be moved.

The top of the unit in the above picture. This is the part above the desk.

This is the other top corner of the above unit.

This is the shelving system in the den.

This is part of the shelving unit in the other bedroom.

The last time we were at the house we noticed one of the shelving units was actually not part of the shelving system at all. It was a speaker! We couldn't figure out what in the heck it was for. The woman finally cleared up that mystery and told us that her parents got new speakers and decided to use this one as a shelf in her bedroom. It is STILL there over 40 years later. It is the coolest idea ever and doesn't look like any speaker I have ever seen. Old speakers were so much prettier than the ones we have today. I think we will continue to use it as a shelf!

Speaker shelf

I like to sew and had wondered where the lady of the house would put her sewing machine in 1960.  I know many women did their own sewing back then. There was a master bedroom, one bedroom for each child. A den which I feel certain was the husband's office. A very nice living room which surely was no place for a sewing machine. There definitely would not have been a sewing machine in the bathrooms, kitchen or dog kennel! I came to the conclusion that if the lady had enough money to have a custom built house she could have someone else do her sewing for her.

I forgot about one room! There is a butler's kitchen or prep kitchen next to the kitchen. It is a small room like a pantry with some counter space and kitchen sink. A place to prep your meal without dirtying your large kitchen. On the plans it is listed as a laundry room. The laundry is currently in the basement. The woman confirmed that the prep kitchen used to be the laundry room. There is a little "desk" in there with a telephone jack that looks like the perfect place to sit and pay your bills. She said that little "desk" was for a sewing machine! I told her my husband is the cook and I don't think he would be very excited if I told him that my sewing machine was going to be in his kitchen! This all brought about a new mystery. What did the current laundry room used to be?? It is the only unaccounted for space. It is next to the space that used to be the dog kennels but I don't think it was part of the dog kennel though it is possible.

The little desk in the prep kitchen that was made for a sewing machine.

Mother's Day Weekend 2013

My husband and I have been keeping our eyes open for a mid-century house for sale in our home town. It was our hope to find a house that someone had appreciated and not decided to paint all the beautiful natural wood white or any of the other 100 things you can do to screw up you mid-century modern home. On Saturday of Mother's Day weekend 2013 I looked at Zillow on my phone before I even got out of bed. There was a house that had just gone up for sale. Our realtor was available so we got to take a look within hours.

The house was on the edge of town at the end of a long drive with 2 other houses on it. On one side is a nice row of trees that separates the house from a church. On the other side is neighbor who has been a friend of our family for years. The other house was owned for a very long time by a popular local veterinarian. At this time we don't know who the owner is since the vet has passed away.

When we got inside the house was full of beautiful paneling in a huge great room with a beautiful floor to ceiling fireplace There was more paneling in the den. (Why would anyone want to deal with painting when you could have gorgeous natural wood that hardly requires any upkeep?) It has unique wooden wall shelving units in 2 bedrooms and the den. There is plenty of space with a family room and a second bathroom. But.......the master bathroom is pink AND blue. (More on that later.) And, we were not thrilled to see that every floor surface was covered with carpet.

The realtor was convinced that there was nothing of value under the carpet since carpet was most likely the flooring of choice at the time the house was built. That was a bit of a disappointment. We talked to the realtor and she told us that if we wanted a house that still had as many original components as this one we might as well make an offer because the chances of us finding something else like this in our town would be slim. So, we were making plans to put in new flooring in almost the entire house if our offer was accepted.