As long as I can remember, I’ve always wanted to buy an old house. You know…one with a story. I always thought you’d have to find a house that was 100 years old, or at least 70, to get that story, that character that I ached for. Of course, the house would be small and cute and would be in complete shambles.
Little did I know that, when we purchased this home, we would be getting the house with a story that I had always wanted. No, this house isn’t small or cute, and it certainly isn’t in shambles, but it has a story and a character all its own. As Andy and I strip away more and more layers of this kitchen, the story and the mystery starts to take shape.
I had hoped that under the laminate flooring in the house we would find beautiful wood floors. The beautiful kind that only old houses have. When Andy pulled up the floor cabinets yesterday and found no wood floor underneath, I was disappointed. That was, until we started unraveling the story. Under the cabinets against the oven side of the kitchen was old linoleum…obviously original. We also found a second layer of linoleum, probably from the 1970s, that was placed right above the original. And then above that is the present laminate.
Over against the sink wall we discovered even more to the story. Under these cabinets there was no linoleum, only beautiful pine planking, which Andy says was the predecessor to plywood. For being 50 years old it was in amazing shape! We concluded that the original kitchen must have only had cabinets along the wall with the sink.
We discovered even more secrets when we pulled off the strange mirror that was above the sink. (Who wants to look at themselves in the mirror while they do the dishes, anyway?) Behind the mirror was a window casing in beautiful red pine planking…the really high quality stuff that they only used a long time ago. Andy says they probably even had a portable saw mill on site while they were building the house.
On the outside of this planking we found the original wood siding! So, this house not only had been added onto with a garage and a master suite, but also with the third bedroom. That means that originally this was just a teeny little farmhouse, and that those two tiny bedrooms in the back were once the only bedrooms! Boy, how times change. Nowadays, most people would think those rooms were too small for their children, let alone for themselves!
And then the story started to take shape. You could just see the family living here. Building a little home for their family. Living in a rural area, when the road outside probably wasn’t even paved yet. And then a few years passed and they added on and changed the flooring. Other owners came and went, and with them the house changed and grew. And now it’s our turn…our turn to mold this house. Our turn to be a part of the story of this house.
Yes, every house has a story. You just have to find it out.
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