It was ours though. And over time, we repainted, redecorated, replanted (after a weekend war on poke weeds), and re-outfitted the house to make it home sweet home; a perfect place to start and then grow our family.
The white house with the red door became the backdrop for so much of our family's life. We made countless meals in the kitchen, paced the rooms late at night with crying babes, danced across our sun room floor, snuggled by the fire, and played hard in the basement. We hosted parties and welcomed many guests. We planted and weeded, hid Easter eggs and found them, grilled and picnicked, ran through and sprayed the sprinkler, raked and bagged, cider pressed and sipped, sledded and built snowmen in our yard. We used the house to its full potential and cherished our time there.
Kid by kid, we outgrew it though. Mostly, the line for the bathroom got too long. So we looked and looked, until this Spring, we found a house and a yard that suited all five of us.
On Thursday, we packed everything up. On Friday, we sold the white house, bought the big house, moved out of the old one, and into the new one. It was an amazing day, filled with energy and excitement.
On Saturday, we started unpacking, and unpacking, and unpacking ... and I'm still unpacking.
That night, we went to bed, full on Nabuki sushi (the first meal in our new house) proud, exhausted, and satisfied. With all the stuff going on, I felt like I hadn't slept in a week, so I crashed and slept hard ...
... until 2:30 AM. Margaret had woken up, crying from a fever. I gave her Tylenol, attempted to rock her back to sleep, but noticed that I was rocking to the rhythms of water dripping. I got up, Margaret in tow, to investigate. It wasn't coming from the bathroom, it was coming from somewhere else. Bobby's room. I opened the door, and saw water dripping down, not in any small amount from the fan. F! I woke up Peter with the warning, 'we have a problem.'
Peter was up. I threw Margaret down in our bed. Lights went on in Bobby's room. Bobby was up. 'Hey guys, what's going on?' He got thrown in our bed too, welcomed by Margaret shouting 'hey Bubba!' The two of them laughed in bed together (at 3:00 AM) as Peter and I set out to get into the attic sans stairway to investigate the AC unit.
The ladder was in the garage, under the Guest House where Nana and Opa were sleeping, so thoughtfully we tried alternative methods of ascension. The original strategy was to stand on a chair and levitate into the attic. That didn't work. So we pulled out Margaret's dresser which gave us a little more height. Standing on top of it gave Peter the chance to dangle from the attic's entry way and pull himself up. He dangled, but then fell, like a cat, to the ground. I then offered to provide some cheer leading support, giving him a mount from dresser to my hands, into the attic. 1-2-3, that worked. He was up.
Yep, there is a problem. The condensation from the AC unit was filling up a drip tray and spilling over, so let's talk about next steps. We're going to siphon the water out.
Ok.
We need the hose.
The hose?
It was 3:30 AM and the new neighbor, moi, was outside uncoiling the hose and bringing the whole honking thing into the house. I passed one side up to Peter and I held the other. I followed his instructions from there.
Put that side into the tub.
Ok.
Now suck on it.
What?
Suck on it.
Umm ...
Are you sucking on it?
Ahhh ... yep.
Is it working?
Nothing is coming out, so I'm thinking no.
Suck again. The water will come out slowly so you'll have time to pull your mouth away.
Oh my God. YUCK! Okay, sucking again.
Glub, glub, glub ... the water started moving from the attic to the bathroom and we were in business. The water was out, the dripping eventually stopped, the kids had fallen asleep after their twilight party, and I crashed harder than I did at the beginning of the night.
So we have a couple things to do besides unpack. We knew that walking in. While it's our new house, it's actually older than the white house, built in 1926.
I'm still in love with everything about it though. We have space. And better yet, more than one bathroom. Peter and I aren't crashing into each other in the kitchen. We have a driveway that the kids ride up and down. And the yard, it's the best.
The house is beautiful, and to me, represents a decade of hard work between Peter and I.. It also means I'll be working for the rest of my life, but I wouldn't have it any other way. Now to plan the housewarming party.
Lo.
Some more posts over the years where the white house plays a central role:
http://theearlyriser.blogspot.com/2012/04/house-rules.html
http://theearlyriser.blogspot.com/2012/06/brewer-baker-and-mimosa-maker.html
http://theearlyriser.blogspot.com/2013/03/milk-maid.html
http://theearlyriser.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-twelve-hours-of-christmas.html
http://theearlyriser.blogspot.com/2014/03/party-girl.html
http://theearlyriser.blogspot.com/2015/01/survival-of-cutest.html
http://theearlyriser.blogspot.com/2016/03/my-little-princess.html
http://theearlyriser.blogspot.com/2017/10/another-year-another-press.html
http://theearlyriser.blogspot.com/2017/08/a-week-and-day.html
http://theearlyriser.blogspot.com/2018/08/margaret-x-one.html
No comments:
Post a Comment