Old House, New House

As you may know, if you read this little blog often enough, we just bought our soon-to-be dreamhouse. By that, I mean, with a little bathroom remodel, a brand new garage and some serious de-wallpapering, this will be our dream house. It's an old turn of the century home that will someday be wallpaper-free, hopefully in the near future. But the house is not without its eccentricities. But then again, neither was the house we moved out of either. We moved out of a home that was also a beautiful turn of the century home. But that house, well, let's just say it was a carpenter's nightmare. All the pipes and electrical were original, most of the walls had little to no insulation and the floors and the ceilings were no where near anyone's definition of level.

Needless to say, the house had settled quite a bit over the years. That house survived the Depression, the Great Flood in the 60s and many many harsh North Dakota winters, so I guess it deserved a few non-level floors. But like our fridge for instance, well, most mornings I'd wake up, get my milk and cerel ready and proceed with my morning ritual of moving the fridge back against the wall. (Argh, my fridge is attacking me!)
I eventually just put a block of wood in front of the front rollers, and the fridge no longer attacked me every morning.

Here's some more house craziness...
The light switches in the kitchen and in the stairway were on the opposite ends of the entrances to both. You'd walk all the way through the kitchen and all the way up the stairs before you could turn on the light. What's up with that? What's the point by then?
Oh, and the upstairs floors just randomly creeked every so often, like someone was up there walking around. I know, creepy.
Oh, and the walls were lath and plaster, so everytime you pounded a nail into the wall to hang up a picture, it sounded like there were maybe dead body parts falling inside the wall. I know, I watch way too many weird movies.


And in this house, (here's a pic to remind everyone what our pirate house looks like) while the fridge doesn't attack me in the morning, we are still wondering how to turn the light off in the stairwell to the basement. That light was on when we moved in, and we have yet to find the switch to turn it off. It is apparently G-d's lightbulb that he turns off and on whenever He has the urge.

And there's the crazy fabric going up the stairway to the second floor.



Can you see it stapled all around the window? It's like that going all the way up the stairway. Apparently the people who lived in the house before us didn't like the texture of the walls so they stapled pleated fabric to the walls, like in a coffin. My afraid-of-being-buried-alive-mother still has to close her eyes and hold her breath as she goes up the stairs.

Oh, and then there's the crazy dishwasher placement. See here's our dishwasher.




Here's our sink.



(Pardon all the dishes drying in the sink. Around here, the dishes drip dry.)


And here's all the stuff in between the sink.



Who in the world thinks that's where the dishwasher should go? Really.
And do you like my pumpkin colored cupboards? I don't know what's up with that, but I think I might just start living on the edge and leave them like that. I don't know, I'm debating.




Show Me Your Web Site and I'll Vote For You!!