This Old House

For those of you who have been following this story about our home, you know that we are removing a layer of siding that was put on there in the 1950's (probably), then a layer of black paper, and uncovering the original siding put on the home in 1904. In a few hours we will soon be finished with PHASE ONE of this project. But there are several things, of personal interest that, I will show you in these next days. Why remove the first layer of siding you may be asking? Well, underneath it I am finding things like places for plants to grow, places for furry little critters to hide and lady bugs and spiders to raise their young! It's just time to give this old house a face lift. When the attempt was made to turn the home into a "modern 1950 salt box" almost all of the original decorative trim was taken off. In phase one, as far up as a 16' extention ladder will safely reach, we've removed two layers, revealed what is underneath, cleaned and scraped and painted, so now we see what repairs need to be made and where new trim needs to be added. We're not adding the new trim just yet.
Here is a picture of the front corner of the house. On the right side you see the siding we are taking off. On the left is a section already painted and in the middle is the outline of where the porch was taken off. I have all of that painted now. Isn't it interesting how you can tell what was there? I took a picture of where the porch was on the other side too before I painted over that. When we bought this home, the mayor's wife told us that when the front porch was taken off the people put the pieces in the carriage house. In fact there is a stack of wood pieces in there that we've never gone through. I'm anxious to go look. I'll let you know how that goes. What if, just what if...everything we need to get our front porch restored is in there? The mayor's wife always wanted the porch back and now we want it back. I just can't figure out why it was taken off in the first place, unless it was to make this home look modern with all straight lines. You see we need our very OWN romantic porch! However, we aren't adding it in this phase. That will come!

But back to PHASE ONE...I'm taking off small sections at a time, and fixing it as I go...of course my husband and sons help as their schedules allow too. And little princess is there, right by my side (or at the bottom of the ladder I should say) always there. I see her growing as I go. But this project isn't hard. ANYONE CAN do this. It's just time consuming, yes TIME consuming!

And TIME...I feel like time is a gianormous yawning mouth, coming to me at break neck speed just waiting to swallow me up, as I tumble to the dark abyss of wasted moments. I don't want to waste any time. I don't mean, just being busy. I want to be busy on the right things. The things that matter most in life. There is not enough time...there is not enough time...life is so short, it goes so fast! Does anyone else have this problem?

Do my family and friends know how much I care as I chase through the duties of everyday? I can't keep up, I can't get it all done, so I'll just stop, pause, say I love you and maybe if I say it often enough, and show kindness, over and over, everyone will know.

I better go get breakfast ready...pancakes are a huge ILOVEYOU around here. That sounds like a great idea!

Talk to you soon, and I hope to have fun pictures and great news!

Love, Rachel