Stage Fright~~

So. Yesterday I realized that I could import my blog to Facebook where my old high school and college buddies could read it......I thought it would be a great idea........until this morning. When I got what can only be called stage fright.

This morning, as I sat down to blog, I went blank for a minute. Then, as ideas began to flow, one by one each of them was put aside. So I got up and did a few of my favorite things (you know, laundry, breakfast dishes, clean out the rabbits hutch). Then, I got a cup of coffee and tried again. And nothing was going to be just right.........then it hit me.

Most of you who read this thing don't know me personally....there's a safety in that that I didn't realize before. Those college friends and high school friends? They know me. At least they knew the old me. And I got stage fright. I got a fear of their judgement regarding just who it is that I've become in the journey since we all parted ways. When they read my words, they may be basing their understanding of them on that old girl they used to know and while I am still that girl I am no longer just that girl.

And then this revelation led to me thinking about just how much I differ from that teenager they all knew.... in a way I've actually come full circle and returned to the life I knew as a child - a child those high school and college friends didn't know because that child was an Air Force Brat who never stayed in one place for very long. A child whose parents always bought a house that was not too close to town and not too far out in the country - a place where their children could raise chickens, ride horses, and eat home raised pigs and pond raised cat fish...unless they absolutely had to live on or near a base and couldn't provide that for us.

Those old friends knew the teenager who pushed boundaries and sometimes walked on the wrong side for a while before getting it back together. They knew a girl who sometimes dreamed of being a "star".....but did I ever share the real dreams I had with them? Dreams that brought me exactly to where I am now.......and who I am now? I can't remember.

So I got a little stage fright. I got all those little butterfly feelings like I used to before I walked on stage to face an audience.....as I wrote this out though, that stage fright worked itself out just a little, just like it did in the days of performing.......

and then something else hit me......there may not be an audience.....they might not even read this thing...

Friday the 13th - five years on~~

Like a lot of folks, I viewed those superstitious Fridays' with a bit of wariness. I had my share of childhood memories of things happening on a 13th day of whatever month happened to be Friday...like a trip into town where my little sister had her fingers caught in the car door and my first thought was "we should have stayed home today of all days".

That was a lot of years ago; since then David's birthday has fallen on a lot of Fridays that carry that supposedly unlucky stigma... and we've made it through every one of them....and had a few really great memories and good times happen....

Like five years ago today....the day we actually closed on this little farmhouse. It wasn't the day we moved in - that happened on the 6th of February 2004....our closing got caught up in some title issues that took a while to solve and it was seven days later that this house became our home.

I have to smile looking back on it now and not just for the obvious reasons - you see in January of that year, when we first went into our lender to get the paperwork on this house rolling, our agent said "we can close on the thirteenth of next month" and David replied "what day is that?". When she told him that it was a Friday he said "no way" and so our closing was set tentatively for the 9th of February instead.....it looked like everything was going to work in our favor and we'd be closing on that date....

But I believe that God has a sense of humor....especially in matters of faith - faith that He holds us safely in His hands and that we should not worry for anything....and instead of closing on the 9th, we found ourselves walking out of the title agency having no clue as to when the title issue would be resolved....and on Tuesday and on Wednesday and on Thursday when we heard "we're sorry we can't close just yet"...David started rolling his eyes....and sure enough, late Thursday afternoon we were told we'd be closing around 4 p.m. on Friday.....the 13th. Like I said, I believe that God has a sense of humor......

The Email.....

Five years ago today I got an email that changed our lives. Five years ago today I kept that email a secret from my husband for a little more than 24 hours. Because I didn't want to even think about it.....little did I know that I would remember that email for ever!

In late October of 2003, David and I had put in an offer on a two story Florida Cracker home that had been built in 1890; it came with a little more then two acres and a pool. The foundation of the old summer kitchen and the old barns were still visable and caused visions of treasure hunting to dance in my head.

These photos were taken in May 2008 - the third (or maybe fourth) buyer since our 2003 offer was refused had finally made some progress on the restoration of the home. The whereabouts of our original 2003 photos is unknown.

Our offer for that house had gone to the seller along with two others...from investors who lived up north. We had a house to sell and neither of the others did. Despite our full price offer, the seller went into contract with somebody else and broke my heart. And on the day before Thanksgiving 2003, it was still broken.

So, I didn't want to get that email from the agent working for us down here. I didn't want to even think about another house at the moment....there was slight chance that the purchase of the Cracker House would fall through and if it did, we could maybe, just maybe, buy that old house with all of its history waiting to be re-discovered.

And so, I didn't tell David about that email until it somehow slipped out during our Thanksgiving meal the next day. I cringed a little as I saw his eyes light up at the news. I didn't want another heartbreak.....still I reluctantly nodded in response to his "we'll go down on Monday and take a look".

Little did I know that the "charming old house" written about in that unwanted email would heal my broken heart and fulfill a dream that David and I had shared for 22 years...............and be one of the things I'll be giving thanks for tomorrow (as I do every day!).

When God closes a door, somewhere He opens a window..............

During our house search, I had it in my head I wanted no less then 2 acres of land ....I wanted chickens, pigs and horses......just like we'd had when I was a child....! By 2003, I knew that I'd either end up with a house with no land or land with no house and I was resigned to it.....then we found the Cracker House and I had hoped we'd actually get both....but God closed that door.

Within six weeks, He'd opened the window on this old farmhouse sitting on less than a half an acre but charming beyond description..and I peeked into that window with objections already forming in my mouth....only to in the end, see His hand in it and jump through that window and open the door to my family's life changing move to the country.

Looking back now, I remember the conversation with Allison that took place on December 1 2003 as she and I stood out back of this house discussing whether or not I wanted to buy it....I was a bit offended by the then 52 year old's words as she brought up our AGE (!) and how land might be too much work for us in a few years.....

Now that we've been here for four years, I can see her point....albeit somewhat grudgingly (after all, I am still young darn it)......I used to paint a child's room in one day....move out the furniture in the morning, mud, sand, paint two coats, and move back everything in time for the child to sleep in his/her own bed that night.....and do what I call "the daily's" which includes a quick dust bust, making of beds, wiping down all table top surfaces, .....and cook a full meal!

Today mark's day two of Hunter's room......yesterday I got 90% of the ceiling painted (ran out of paint~), one wall double coated and trimmed...and that was it....I dragged while cooking dinner, cleaning up the kitchen, playing a bit of ball with Hunter, picking squash from the garden inwardly moaning as every muscle in my body complained.....and then headed straight for the hot tub......and then I crashed on the couch!

I see Allison's point now........and I'm seriously glad that God closed the door on the Cracker House and its two acres and its need for a total restoration; I am seriously glad that I peeked through the window He opened for me on this old farmhouse sitting on its little 1/2 acre! I'm quite content watching the fields around me being worked and harvested by someone other then myself.....and as for chickens...well my younger friend Jaime has plenty of them, and our younger friend Chuck is setting up to grow hogs for us and himself up in Georgia, and as for horses....well there are lots of equestrian facilities around here when I can ride if I want to......and if I don't, well I can just sit and wait for rainbows!

Termites and Tentings

If you live in Florida, you’ll eventually fight a battle with termites! And this old house certainly has had its share of those battles………our WDO inspection prior to closing revealed no present infestation but clear evidence of previous infestation(s).

When the previous owners took possession of the house in the late 1980’s, the house was in bad shape….like most of the other farmhouses of the area. On our first walk-through, they showed us before and after photos of the work they had done over their 11 years of ownership…..and they talked of sleeping under the stars that peeked through the ceiling of the upstairs bedrooms on their first night here. The living room floor was so badly termite damaged when they moved in that they tore out the worst of it, replaced what they could and then put plywood and carpeting down. But they had not done the same thing in the attic and in the eaves…..and this was what caught the eye of the WDO inspector.


David and I drove down on the day of the tenting to get some photographs….it is a scary site to see….the crows in the trees about the house didn’t like it all…they were “yelling” at us as if we were responsible…well, I guess in a way we were. Although you can't tell in these photos, the camellia bushes were in full bloom along the side of the house….this was our first view of them in bloom….each year now, I find myself looking for the buds just after New Years Day!

We’ve done some patching in the eaves and attic in our four years here…basically though, we’ve just made it structurally sound…you can still see where those little pests have eaten away at the hundred year old wood…..eventually, we’ll replace the floor boards in the eaves where needed and add some Antique Restore to the wood that can remain……downstairs, we’ve put in a new wooden floor instead of the carpeting that used to be there…...this place will last another 100 years with the right care and love and protection against those nasty termites!


This photo was taken in January 2008 by our friend John Binkley....he just started snapping as we all tried to pose for the shot....you can just see the Camillia blooms behind us!

Here's the final shot....only thing missing is Dallas who was in Georgia attending his senior year of college....

Bye Bye - Homeowner Associations!

We had a mental "best thing about leaving subdivision living behind us...." list that went something like this:

1. Nosey Neighbors
2. Loud Neighbors whose teenagers had fights with their boyfriends right in the cul-de-sac for all to see and share
3. Gossipping neighbors
4. A meth house across the street (renters who skipped out in the night~)
5. Homeowners Associations

The problem with Homeowners Associations is that they are not impartial governing committees...instead they are made up of your own neighbors and too often the ones who sit on the board were those who needed the position for the sense of power it gave them....therefore, if you are their friends, your infractions of the rules - your applications for permission to paint your house this color or that color are granted almost immediately...but if you aren't in their circle of friends you better look out!

Some of the things we were leaving behind were:

No Personal Mailboxes - Take for example the couple who had a sprinkler system placed in their front yard with one sprinkler head pointing directly at the communal post office box unit....for weeks, all of us who got our mail in that particular unit found our mail soaked, our keys not working because of rust etc.! Calls to the H.O. were ignored, knocks on the perpetrators front door to show them the soaking wet evidence resulted in zip, zero, nada, thank you very much. In the end, I placed a call to the Federal Post Office to report vandalism to the unit....finally, the H.O. that was supposed to take care of things like that got off their duff and got those residents to fix their darn sprinkler head.

Parking Rules - Okay, I understand the rule about tractor trailers not being allowed in the driveway and boats needing to be parked off site - I mean if you can afford a huge boat, then surely you can afford a boat slip.....but these power hungry committee people again pick and choose which neighbors seem to be able to get away with something for weeks at a time and which ones get a "DO IT NOW" letter in the mailbox and hung from their doorknob....how about the disabled vehicle parked on the main drag of the neighborhood for so long that it had thick spider webs and other hideous things growing from it - it wasn't just an eyesore it was a traffic flow hindrance and a hazard to the neighborhoods children....yet there it sat weeks into months with nothing done about it. Yet, bring in a small trailer filled with sod or mulch and park it in front of your house for the one night it needs to be there for you to complete your job and Bob's your uncle, there's that nasty gram in the mailbox and on your door....hey what about the part of the association rules that say we have to beautify the neighborhood...did you power hungry, nosey Nellie's happen to see the mulch and sod in the trailer and notice that there were no cobwebs six weeks or more old on it? Nope! 2 weeks after we moved out of our house, and paid off the pro-rated association dues, we got a nasty gram forwarded to our new house because of the POD and the trailer that we were moving our things out and into................both were in our driveway for less then 16 hours! Somebody needs to get a life......we got out of dodge and into the country!

Trash Cans and other unsightly necessities - These folks were so good at what they did that 6 weeks after we moved out we got another letter forwarded to us telling us that we were breaking the rules leaving out our trash cans over night...now this was something that we never did - it was our neighbors to the left of us who put their cans right beside ours and left them out.....we'd written several letters to the association about the harassment to no avail...this proved that it wasn't us who was doing it because 6 weeks after we no longer lived there, we were still getting letters....I so enjoyed the letter I sent to the association about THAT!

The problem, as I said, is that these things are run by small minded, bored, lonely folks who have nothing better to do with their time then drive around the neighborhood looking for folks to harass....the really major things like traffic hazards, broken park swings, meth houses...well those things seem to habitually escape their attention....if you aren't part of the gossipping, tupperware and candle party attending in-crowd..and I chose not to be....then you were targeted by these folks.

You can now find me in a place where the only folks I see are those I want to see and where if I don't feel like mowing the yard anymore, I can get a goat or two to take care of that for me.....and I love it! (BTW, we still don't leave our trash cans out overnight! LOL)

This is it, Lori, this is it!

As we made the right turn into the driveway of the old farmhouse, David actually stopped the car and breathed "this is it, Lori, this is it".....! I said nothing for a moment ...."She's waiting for us" I finally said. David touched the gas pedal and drove on up the driveway, stopping beside a little foot bridge that crossed one of the two irrigation ditches that lined the driveway..............as I got out of the truck I was hardening my heart....no way was I getting emotionally attached to this house, not as long as there might be the slightest chance that we could get the Cracker House.....

By Thanksgiving of 2003, I had decided that I didn't want to be driving around looking at old farmhouses and placing offers that were not accepted...in other words, I was discouraged. Having tried to place offers on two historic farmhouses, I was tired of having my heart break just a little each time we were unsuccessful. David and I had even been discussing possibly waiting until June of 2004 and changing our search to one for land only and buiding our own "old" farmhouse...... well I was broaching the subject and he was being a good husband and listening to me.

Thanksgiving morning 2003, I took a break from preparing for the arrival of my rather large extended family to check my email. When I saw the one from the Real Estate Agent who had shown us the Cracker House, I tried not to hope that she was writing to tell us that the accepted offer had fallen through and that we could try for that old house one more time. Allison was writing to tell us that the owners of a partially restored farmhouse had come into her office the night before and asked her to market it for them.....she had requested permission to show it to us prior to placing it on the MLS as she felt certain it was "the" house for us......but she added the following "there is no real acreage with this charming old house, but you owe it to yourselves to give it a look".

I kept the information to myself for most of the day....remember, I was discouraged by this point and didn't want another heartbreak so soon after the other one....and I really had yet to let go of the hope that somehow we'd be the owners of that Cracker House with two acres. Then suddenly, sitting down with the family at dinner, the conversation came around to our search....and there I was, telling everyone about that morning's email. Looking across the dinner table at David, I saw his eyes light up and I knew we'd soon be driving down to see that old house....but I was determined not to fall in love with this one....just to get my heart broken a little bit more.

David had to work that weekend and I put that house out of mind, not even returning an email to the agent. But on Monday morning (Dec 1), David wanted to drive down to see the place and I reluctantly agreed; we drove around looking at other properties before finally heading into our agent's office to tell her that we wanted to look at the "charming old house".....as we waited for her to get the keys, her phone rang.....we heard her giving directions to the same house we were there to see. She explained to us that since we hadn't contacted her over the weekend, she had proceeded to market the house to other agents and that one was "getting lost" trying to find it.....That agent's inability to find the house was to prove to be a lucky break for us in the end.....

As we followed our agent down the country roads we realized that the area she was leading us into was very familiar. Over the three years we spent driving around looking at old farmhouses, we'd passed several that made us take a second look and say "if only"......not only because they were in great shape (from the exterior's anyway) but also due to their close proximity to 95.....this was important for David's drive to work.....!

Some of these photos were taken by johnbinkleyphotography@yahoo.com
other's were taken by me or members of my family. The difference is obvious!

The "Charming Old Farmhouse" - some of these photos were taken with my little camera both before we bought the house and through the years since - some of them were taken this past January by a photographer friend of ours using a wide lens.....it almost feels wrong to include my photos in a slideshow with his, but I wanted to give you an idea of just what it was we saw as we drove up the road to see the inside of this place for the first time...the interior shots were taken a few days later when we brought Hunter down to see what was shortly to become his new home. If you'd like to see the photos full size click on the box and then hit "slideshow" when you arrive at the album.

David parked the truck and got out much more quickly then I did. As I crossed the little footbridge to join the already chatting David and Allison, I looked at the overgrown flower gardens that ran all along the ditch and as usual I began to think about how I'd get in there and sort out those overgrown plants, trim this up a bit, and that rose bush.....then I shut down the thoughts by reminding myself of the old Cracker House and the gardens there. As I walked up, the back door opened and out came the owner of the farmhouse and we spent a few minutes discussing the landscaping and the history of the house, learning in the process that he was a grand nephew of the original builders who had come over from England cr 1905. And of course, as a genealogist, I was intriqued...this was the first house we'd seen where anyone knew the complete history. We also learned that old barn that had so excited David as we entered the driveway no longer belonged to the house (when the fields had been sold, the barn was sold with them); David's disappointment was evident and I added the first con to purchasing the house to my mental list....the second con I added was the lack of acreage...so much of the original 40 acres had been sold to the farmer across the street that not even one acre came with this house.....but, then the owner said that the farmer just might sell us an acre or two...........

The whole walk-through of the house went just like that....upon entering the back of the house, we saw unfinished flooring (a pro - we'd get to choose our own) but a too modern kitchen for the age of the house (a con)....then a lovely dining room with the beautiful staircase rising upwards to the second floor (a pro)...an enclosed side porch (a con?...maybe), a long and narrow living room and a beautiful front porch (couldn't find anything wrong with that)...upstairs, it looked like it was only a 3 bedroom house (con - we needed four), a beautiful little landing (pro) etc.....Upstairs all the floors were still original to the house, some of them refinished and some of them not, but my mental list of reasons we couldn't buy this one was still going strong...after all we needed four bedrooms and two baths and this house only had...... As we walked into what I thought was the third and final bedroom, I saw a door at the far wall and as we entered into that door, there was a fourth bedroom....cross the lack of bedrooms off the con list!

This lovely partially restored home was filled with antiques and heirlooms in shadow boxes, it smelled like an old house (love that smell) but not one that was neglected...it smelled lived in and loved. We moved downstairs and out onto the front porch where we stood and admired the view for a minute or two....only one neighbor on the whole road....about 300 acres of potato fields and cypress trees and oak trees with spanish moss flowing in the breeze; twelve pecan trees lined the exterior boundary lines of the property...I had to admit that the setting was idealic....

I latched onto the only real objection I could make to this old house....the lack of land. I excused myself from the little group as they began to discuss pricing and continingencies and walked around the side of the house into the back yard....I wrestled with the idea that I would not have the land to get a horse or two, we wouldn't even have enough land for pigs or chickens. Soon, Allison walked around to join me, leaving the men to discuss the restorations that had been done to the old house and those that remained undone......she asked my thoughts and I laid them out so she could play devil's advocate and remind me of all the reasons I should want this house...the biggest one being that most of the other farmhouses in the area were so deteriorated that we'd be litterally camping out with three children until they were made ready to live in; another big factor being that we'd be able to get a straight line mortgage with this house where other farmhouses would likely require construction loans etc. And she mentioned again that there was a possibility of buying some of the surrounding land from the farmer. She also reminded me that another agent was at that moment, driving around trying to find this house prior to letting her out of town clients know of the availability of this house...time was short, we'd have to make a decision today..!

Allison and I walked back to join the men on the front porch and I suggested that David and I go and have lunch somewhere to discuss all the pros and cons and we'd get back to Allison within two hours to let her know our decision....we got in the car and drove into town for lunch discussing it all through the long drive......Allison had done a good job of helping me get past the disappointments of the past year and David finalized the process not only by his words, but by his excitement over this house.

By the time we pulled into our driveway, we'd decided......we'd be putting in an offer and if we got the house, we'd then approach the old farmer across the street to attempt to buy an acre or two from him......we called Allison at 3 p.m. and made our verbal offer. By 6:30, our offer was accepted and we were finally in escrow....our dream was actually coming true....! Goodbye Subdivision Living and all that that intails.....David and I are dropping out!

Cracker House = Haunted House?

After finding the 1900 house in January 2003 and our unsuccessful back up offer, we continued to take drives down Hwy 17 South to our search area, but there wasn't much on the market at the time and if an old house did become available that wasn't in need of a total restoration, they were snapped up either by other old house enthusiasts or out of state investors...the competition was becoming more fierce by the day. And I was getting very discouraged.....

The photos above were taken April 14 2008 - somehow we've lost the photos we took in 2003....the house looks much better now, but its missing some of it wrap-around porches, the "welcoming arms" staircases, the fish kitchen and the summer kitchen...likely termites had feasted for too long to salvage any of that....the porch on the back is new......!

In October 2003, David was reading the paper over breakfast and suddenly he began reading an advertisement out loud to me....."1890's Old Florida Cracker Home on 2 acres" ......he ends his reading with "once Hunter's on the bus, we'll head down to see this place". About an hour after putting Hunter on the bus, we found ourselves turning onto the road where the Cracker house stood. That dirt road meandered its way through trees past several trailers each sitting on about an acre of land until at last we turn a corner and see the house.

David pulled up in front of the house and I hear him say...."no way" and suddenly he's about to turn the car around and leave .......but something about the house calls to me.....! I can "see" the potential in the wrap around double decker porches that were falling off the house...after all David was a carpenter for a few years and he was taught by his father who was a master! And didn't we own a home repair and remodeling business for a while? We could make this house beautiful again.....I just knew it.

We walked around the back and there was a "summer kitchen" still standing along with a "fish kitchen" on the back porch and believe it or not, a swimming pool! The back acreage was almost completely fenced..... We called the agent and she met us at the house for a walk through....

The inside was worse then the outside of this house -through the years, additions were made and exterior windows had been left in interior rooms, the original hallway had been removed to allow for a larger living room (where once were a hall and two rooms, now there was a L.R. and a bedroom)....the original staircase to the second story had once been outside the house and walls had been built around it to enclose it, but the exterior doors were still there....three of them! The kitchen was barely large enough for the two of us to be in at the same time....but wait, that wall could be removed and ...................

Upstairs there were four bedrooms and a long hallway with two doors at either end leading out onto the falling down porches.....all the rooms were completely paneled in bead board (including the ceilings) and stained a dark walnut making it appear very dark....sanding and some light yellow paint would take care of that.............

We learned from the agent that the home had been in the same family since it was built in 1890; the trailers that lined the dirt road all belonged to relatives who had been parcelled out shares of the land throughout the years. The matriarch of the family had recently passed away and left the house and 2 acres to one of her sons who had no desire to live there. None of the other relatives were in a position to purchase the house and make the renovations neccessary (installing central heat and air, upgrading the electrical system, making the wrap-around porches secure again etc.).

Saying thanks to the agent for meeting us, we head on home to discuss this house and whether or not we could afford to take it on and to consider whether we wanted to live in what amounted to a "family compound" where we could possibly be forever considered interlopers and shunned (at one point as a child, I had lived in just such a family compound and the shunning can be a real issue especially where children are concerned, believe me).

The asking price was $30,000 more than the January house and this one was in much worse shape......we'd have to get a construction loan to purchase this one and would probably not get permission to live in it until certain things had been accomplished......That night we decide to go down for another look before we put in an offer.

The next day we drove down with Nikki along to see the house....she stopped just inside the front door and said "I don't like this place" and then she shivered....I coaxed her through the downstairs and then prodded her upstairs....where she kept saying "I don't like this place.....I won't live here with you if you buy this house"....! I laughed it off telling her that a few coats of paint, the removal of this wall and that wall, a french door here will take away those feelings...it can beautiful again..."just you wait". Once outside, Nikki was crawling out of her skin...even the crow of a rooster made her jump two feet off the ground and although I laughed so hard tears rolled down my face, I have to admit that I wondered just why she was having such a heightened reaction to this old house....!

We once again headed home to discuss the pros and cons of buying this house. Unlike the 1900 house, this one had had very little updating done over the years; previously land rich, the family had little to cover their day to day existence, let alone keep the house in good repair. This one would be a very big challenge and we needed to be very certain it was one we wanted to take on.....

In the end, by the time we decided to go ahead and make an offer, there were three other people looking to do the same.....all three offers were submitted at the same time...ours was the only full price offer, but we had the contingency of needing to sell our home in order to purchase that one. The seller decided to take another offer due to that contingency. And my heart broke a little .....

I was so discouraged by this point in our search, that I told David I didn't want to even look at another place until Dallas had finished that year of school....I began to think of buying land and building our own house based upon an historic design plan....and it was December 1st before David talked me into heading down south to continue our search..........

I didn't know it yet, but God had a plan for us and it didn't include that house....! We were in our 1909 Farmhouse before that house was actually sold.....( we put our house on the market on Dec 1, sold it on Dec 21st and were in our house by February 6th!) and it took more many months for the seller to go to closing....!

The contract the seller accepted in October 2003 was withdrawn in January 2004 due to illness in the family; a second contract closed around May of 2004 but the buyer almost immediately turned around and sold it after only a few weeks of attempted renovations.

When it came back on the market for a third time in July, I was working at the office of the agent who had shown us the house...she had been asked to market it again. One afternoon, she and I went to lunch with the person who had actually placed the third offer presented along with ours the previous October....we had contacted this prospective buyer to see if he was still interested in the old Cracker House. During that lunch, he and I discussed our October offers, and I learned that he just happened to be a ghost hunter (!)and a reporter for the local newspaper.....he had heard that the house was haunted and that was why he had wanted to buy it. He never did buy that old house; I think by July of 2004 he had realized that haunted or not, that house was having a hard time being owned by folks other than family.........

So perhaps that was why Nikki had the reaction she had to that house......

a few months ago, David and I drove by to see what progress had been made on that cracker house by its new owner...only to see that not much had been accomplished at all, at least from the outside. The owner appears to be living in a trailer beside the house....! We spoke to a neighbor, a grandson of the previous owner of the house......and "yes, ma'm, it shor' is haunted"....!

1900 Farmhouse

Beginning in 2001, David and I began to take steps to make our dream of owning an old farmhouse a reality....we spent 2001 - Dec 2003 searching the area where we now live. Although we saw many abandoned farmhouses, in the end we placed two offers before we actually found the house meant to be ours.....the first offer was placed on a house built in 1900.

Although our three year plan still had 18 months left to go (target being Dallas' graduation from high school) we began to realize that the real estate market was changing; house prices were rising rapidly and interest in renovating old houses was on the rise as well. Although the rise in house prices was good for us in selling our house, there was a possibility that we would be priced out of the market for an old farmhouse. So after Christmas 2002, we stepped up the pace............

In January of 2003, we began to drop into the Real Estate Offices in the area we were hoping to buy and putting them to work for us. One day we stopped at a huge steel building used to house farming equipment that also housed a tiny little office of a local agent. We had a nice little chat with him....but he didn't seem too interested in finding us a house and spent most of our "visit" talking more about his race cars then he did about real estate; he did eventually mention that he had sold his grandmother's 6 bedroom farmhouse on 10 acres for $80,000 last year (2002 - and this was a comment inserted into a dissertation on where he garaged his race cars~ )......David and I both inwardly groaned and then as we nodded and smiled at the agent through our disappointment, he eventually stopped talking about driving his race cars and got around to talking about an old house just down the road. The house was in foreclosure and might be available.....we asked him to take us to see it but instead of driving us there, he just gave us directions...!

Luckily, they were good directions....the drive took us past pastures with horses and cows, scenic fields with lovely ponds and several old farmhouses; the area was perfect for us...exactly what we were looking for. And when we finally caught a glimpse of the 1900 farmhouse we couldn't believe our eyes- standing in a field all by itself, the red metal roof was the first thing that caught your eye, then the third story came into view and slowly a little more of the house became visible, until suddenly, the whole thing was right there....and it was beautiful.

Unable to locate the photos of the house we took in Jan 2003, David and I drove by this house today to snap some new ones....the house has been totally renovated - new roof (not metal -sighing as I write this), the original white siding painted, windows repaired and/or replaced - and the owners are now living in the house...

The three story farmhouse came with a detached concrete garage and a shed; it was surrounded by fields and majestic palm trees lined the drive...it sat on just under an acre. That acre was all that remained of the original 80 that the original owner's had farmed. An old barn sat to the right rear of the property but we later learned it was no longer part of the deal....we were to find that this was the case in every farmhouse we looked at save one. When the original farmers became too old to farm their cropland, they sold off the acreage to younger farmers and included in the deal any outbuildings pertinent to the farming operation.

We knew the asking price was only $114,000 which would leave us a great deal of breathing space for renovating the house; this was a deal we could make...easily. The upper level windows were mostly missing or broken and boards were covering them; we could see that the electrical system would need to be addressed.....

While we couldn't get in the house to see the upper levels, we were able to see in all of the lower windows and through the windowed front door which opened onto a wide hallway with a staircase and a view straight out the back door! Four rooms were downstairs and each had a fireplace including the kitchen....which was basically a square room with no cabinets, no stove or fridge and the sink was actually on a wheeled cabinet base. I was excited to think about designing that kitchen....imagine being able to begin with a blank slate.....

The 1900 house was in really sad shape but we wanted it and we wanted it badly - we knew that we would be "camping" in that old house for a few months as we repaired/replaced windows and built a working kitchen but we were prepared to do that....so in the truck we get and drive back to the agent's office...where he says.......

" well, I don't know what bank has it! When you get home you can look on the computer and try to find that out"....

do I need to tell you that THAT agent was crossed off of our list of agents to work with? On the drive home, we're already planning the marketing of our house so we can get out of it and buy the 1900 house.....Dallas could finish out his senior year living with his aunt Karen (David's sister) and then move down in the summer.....arriving home, the first thing I did was get on the computer, find the bank that had the house and then tried to contact the account executive....who'd already left for the day.

The next morning at 9 a.m., David called the bank and we learned that the house had a contract on it already....the 6th contract in 12 months! The executive was very interested in us as potential buyers and took our name and number and a verbal back up offer. She made it clear she had her doubts regarding that contract as the buyers had already been denied once already.............Those ten days were some of the longest we'd ever experienced and in the end, the contract went through and the house was sold.

We later learned that the buyers were direct descendants of the original owners and that took some of the sting out of not being able to buy it ourselves - especially for me as a genealogist....I would love to be able to buy the home of one of my ancestor's ...the family that now lives in that old house realized that dream for themselves and worked very hard to be able to do so.

David and I still drive by that old house from time to time and wonder what life would have been like had we been able to buy it and fix it up ourselves......

The search went on.......... 1890 Cracker House = Haunted House

Back Story

FRIDAY, APRIL 11, 2008

I thought it might be time to give a little history....here goes!

David and I were married in 1982....aged 22 and 23....that seems really young now, but apparently it was the right decision because here it is 26 years later and we're still married....we're each other's best friends sharing many of the same interests, but perhaps more importantly, sharing even the interests of our partner that really don't interest us individually! Take for example my obsession with genealogy....David really could care less except of course when I find out that one of my ancestors fought in the War between the States and was at Appomatox...then his interest perks up! Even though he's not all that interested, he travels every summer with me to Sumter South Carolina where we spend two or three days in dusty courthouses looking at documents hundreds of years old or putting on our steel toed boots to hike into dense woods to search out abandoned cemeteries...and well, he's really into fixing up old boats and although my eyes glaze over and I really want to get back on the computer and dig up some more records, I go outside and ooh and awe over this or that! And when he's ready to hit a boating yard sale or visit a boat yard and dream, well I'm right there with him! And when he was into RC racing, you'd sometimes find me there at the race track, sitting in a chair while he and Dallas went round and round and round...............David also endulges my love of go-carting and even bought me one this spring...

Me (driving) and a friend taking the new go-cart for its first ride!

One of the interests that we share is a love of old houses and finding damaged previously cherished furniture and bringing it into our home and restoring it.....and that is why we find ourselves now living in an almost 100 year old farmhouse surrounded by potato fields and spending a whole lot of time saving money to put into it all.

David grew up in what could loosely be termed "country" - his childhhod home was inside the town limits, but it sat on two acres of river front land.....and it was 60 years old when his folks bought it (1966)....that house had quite a history as it had been built for the Mayor of the town at the turn of the century and had a spot being a Retired British Soldiers Home before his parents purchased it and made it a single family residence once again...I grew up an Air Force brat with a South Carolina Farmer Boy father and an English School Girl mother....we never spent very long in any one place, but whenever we could live off base, Dad made certain we had an acre or two (or three) and that those acres had hogs, chickens and horses. During my childhood we lived in two old farmhouses, one in South Bend Indiana and one in Canton Ohio.....!

Although David and I never really talked about old houses while we were dating, we realized it was a shared love shortly after we were married and had purchased our own first home, .....we just had never really realized it until we found ourselves living in a subdivision on a 90 X 120 lot with neighbors on all sides and found ourselves shutting the windows whenever we had an argument.........! Suddenly, an old house in the country was being discussed.....often.

But, if you're over 35, then you know how life can get in the way of your dreams for awhile.....soon we were parents of two children and had to consider schools and proximity to grandparents etc. and "country living" was disappearing from our area which meant a real move to find a place we'd feel comfortable in.....and I didn't want to move too far away from where we were then living. I had moved around all of my childhood, I had never felt I had a "home town" and I wanted that for my kids. David, who had lived in our small town since he was 6 years old wasn't quite as set on staying put.....and so we talked, and we dreamed, and well...life went on.

We lived in a little starter home purchased just after we were married....and there we had our first two children born in 1983 and 1986.....it was a typical ranch house in a neighborhood where three versions of what was pretty much the same house was all that you could find. As I wrote earlier, we knew shortly after moving in that we were not happy with subdivision living....other than base housing, neither of us had ever had neighbors close enough to hear you argue......we shut the windows a lot those first couple of years.

But, it was more than just the issue of privacy during heated discussions...i.e. it was little neighbor boys who snuck into your backyard while you were at work and took your german shepherd off the run line to wander about the neighborhood where said german shepherd took to doing his "business" in other folks yards.....not a good thing. In fact, one of our neighbors thought it was so far from a "good thing" that she shoveled up the evidence, stomped her way across her yard, then the street, up across our front yard...knocked on the door, and when David opened it, she threw the evidence at his feet! (she was thereafter referred to in conversation as the "shit lady".....)

A 6 ft privacy fence became absolutely necessary for two people who'd never been fenced in before...with bolted gates.....and then blinds went up in the windows after Nikki was born to keep the old couple across the street from commenting on the fact that we rocked her every night for several hours! (Nikki had crying spells lasting 3 hours every evening until she was about 4 months old....rocking was our survival technique!) - need I go on?

We discovered the shared dream of an old house in the country on a drive back from my parent's place (which was on 3 acres in the country btw~)......we took a back way into our subdivision and saw an abandoned farmhouse sitting back about an acre from the street. We pulled into the overgrown drive and discussed whether or not we should call the real estate agency listed on the for sale sign or just stay where we were for a few years. We decided that we weren't financially in a position to purchase such a neglected old home....but for the next few years, we took that back road home from mom's just to look at it and dream. Eventually that old farmhouse was torn down and a shopping center soon took its place....and the "country" began to disappear in the area where we lived.

1990 - 2002

With two growing children, our small starter home was rapidly becoming too small for our family...and as happens in a lot of starter home neighborhoods, as the original owners moved onward and upward, the area began to deteriorate....and there were reports of gang activity circulating....it was time to go.

But where to go became the question....I was firmly entrenched in child rearing by this time and my biggest consideration was the school system...at the time, the one we lived in was one of the best in the state and I feared placing our kids in a lesser system. Although we discussed moving north a bit, I was very leary of the areas that could still be considered as "country" AND still be close enough to allow David easy access to work....and for myself, I wanted my children to have easy access to their grandparents, something that I'd never had as a child.


Before we knew it, we'd found ourselves in a new house in a new subdivision.....I'll admit now that I'd been shortsighted in that I never really thought about how a new neighborhood was going to change as more houses were built in it....when we moved in...it felt almost like the counry- a farm lay across from the entrance - we even woke up one morning to a pig in the backyard - there were only 11 houses and ours was on cul-de-sac bording a nature preserve....even with a larger lot, a bigger house....it became obvious over the next 18 months that it was still a subdivision with all the yuck that comes with it.

But, the kids were in a good school system; we had neighbors we liked; our church was just down the road from us; and we began to get settled. The dream continued to be a "some day we'll...." dream....one we talked about but never really made any attempt to achieve....

Time went on.....Nikki and Dallas completed elementary school, Hunter was born, and then suddenly, Nikki was graduating from High School......and we were staring our future in the face...! It sounds so silly to ask "where did the years go" but believe me, it does get asked...! Although it seemed David and I had just gotten married, only begun to be parents suddenly, our kids were growing up, looking at colleges and talking about getting their "own" places. We realized that the time to make our dream of owning and renovating an old farm house had arrived....or it may end up never coming true. But still, where could we go to realize this dream? Our parents were now aging and moving too far from them would have been selfish....but God had a plan for us.....


"Children pass through a marriage - they are not the marriage!" A friend of mine had once told me that and we were staring the reality of that in the face. The realization that time was passing us by and that we needed to start thinking about OUR future aside from our children woke David and I up and we began to really consider our options. David worked with a few men who lived in Georgia and actually drove into Jax for work each day....we began to consider that. David's sister had moved back to Florida and my sister Amy was now a grown up so the idea of moving a little more than an hour or two from our folks wasn't as big a concern.

Dad and Jan had moved to South Carolina back in 1990 and in 2001 had returned to live in Florida; they had purchased a home in Deland, roughly a two hour drive from our place....shortly after they moved into their new house, I put Hunter on the school bus and drove on down to spend the day with them. Dad had suggested I drive down the "back" way through Green Cove Springs and Palatka.....and as I drove, I was amazed at what I was seeing. David and I had been thinking our only option for a move to the country would be to go to Georgia and here were acres of land with horses, cows, and crops almost under our noses.....and farmhouses....lots of them!

The Three Year Plan

Suddenly, I completely "divorced" my house....I was ready to leave right that minute....but Dallas was a freshman in high school and I had made a promise to myself that I would never cause my children to change schools in high school unless I had no choice in it.....I'd come to Orange Park as a Junior and had a very difficult time fitting in with kids who'd known each other all their lives. We'd have to plan this out.....and so in 2001 we came up with a three year plan...........

Dallas would graduate in May of 2004; we'd put the house on the market that month of that year and hopefully be in our new place by the fall when Hunter would start third grade.....We began to look at our house in terms of its selling points and made plans to start making the neccessary upgrades to market it quickly......we knew we'd need a new vehicle soon and so we cashed out some equity and paid cash for a trail blazer.....paving the way for additional cash flow to fix up the old farmhouse that we now could believe we'd actually one day own.

And about once a month David and I would put Hunter on the school bus and head down to the area we'd chosen .....we bought a road atlas and with a highlighter and pen marked the locations we liked and those we disliked (think county dumps etc.). We trekked through abandoned homes and properties and called Real Estate Agents on others, trying to guage the cost of the houses in the area.

About 18 months into our plan, we noticed that the market was changing - house prices were rapidly going up and we had to start thinking about the possibility that we would soon be priced out of the market...houses on the market (in our search area) had been about $100,000 for a four bedroom brick home with a pool.....one example sold in 2001 for $99,000 and was back on the market in late 2002 for $145,000 and as we took a second look, we knew that absolutely no improvements had been made to justify that price increase.....it was simply the growing real estate bubble that would eventually burst.....

And suddenly the interest in old houses was high and the number of old houses was low - HGTV had contributed to that.....and prices were going up accordingly. An article in the Sunday paper highlighted the scenic nature of the exact area we were looking at and we noticed many more sight-seerers than we had previously......we began to get a little nervous about our three year plan.

In the fall of 2002, we knew that it was time to talk to the children and let them know that we needed to change the plan - we instinctively knew that we had to move.....soon....or we'd be priced out of the market for almost any home we'd been interested in let alone a historic house. So we decided to let the kids know......but before we did that, we spoke to David's sister Karen......bless her heart, she agreed to let Dallas stay with her during the week if we had to move before his graduation from high school. Nikki's drive to college would actually be about the same distance so there was no issue with her moving with us!

Stepping up the pace.....

On our next drive, we dropped in on a Real Estate Agent and explained what we were looking for; MLS was just taking off in her office and so she began to send us new listings on a daily basis.....and we had a new issue....we were looking for an old farmhouse with a couple of acres included but were slowly realizing that the cost of land was rising so rapidly that we were unlikely to realize that part of the dream. We knew that we'd be more likely to find an old house without land then with it and began to think of possibly purchasing land and building a house to look like an old house....

First Offer.....January 2003 - we dropped in on another one of the R.E. agents in the area and had a nice little chat with him....although he didn't seem too interested in finding us a house, he did eventually mention that he had sold his grandmother's 6 bedroom farmhouse on 10 acres for $80,000 last year (2002)......David and I both inwardly groaned and then as we nodded and smiled at the agent through our disappointment, he eventually stopped talking about driving his race cars and got around to talking about an old house just down the road that was in foreclosure and might be available.....but instead of driving us there, he just gave us directions...!

June 2004

After the last e-letter, I didn't send any for a while....I wrote a very melancholy update in June, but never could bring myself to send it....empty nesting had hit me pretty hard that month. I've since lost that letter and a few others due to a computer crash which took place in July, here's what I remember about that summer......................

June marked the fifth month in our new "old" house and it also began a new chapter in our lives - Although we were the parents of three children, only one of them was living with us that summer and while our hearts still were overwhelmed by our good fortune in finding and actually buying our little farmhouse, our lives were changing in more ways then just our area of residence.

Dallas graduated in June of 2004 and finally moved into the house only to begin packing right away to go live and work at a camp in Keystone Heights...Nikki was working there as well so now both the older kids were no longer there for dinner in the evenings and coffee in the morning. Quiet now abounded throughout the house and I wasn't too sure if I liked it.

I'd been feeling this melancholy since we moved in February but only during quiet evenings when Nikki was out with friends and Dallas was still at his Aunt's house for the weekdays....After Hunter and David went to bed in the evenings, I would have time to think too much about how the parenting part of our lives was changing. I felt guilty for moving the older kids out of their childhood home (Nikki had been 6 and Dallas only 4 when we bought that house) and wondered if they'd ever feel a "connection" to this house that would make them feel it was home to them as much as it was becoming to David, Hunter and me. Dallas sensed this sadness in me and in his own sweet way said to me that "home is where you and dad are, mom...don't worry so much!" and while that helped, it didn't quite take it all away.

So, as you can imagine, I enjoyed the two weeks after Dallas graduated immensely what with having all three of my children home finally.....but to be honest, by the time Dallas had packed up and loaded Nikki's car to head up to Keystone with Nikki I was ready for a bit of peace and quiet...but I was not ready for what came next.

You'll remember in my earlier posts reading about our two labs....one was a 2 year old black male that we had adopted just three weeks prior to our move in February and the other was our 15 year old yellow female called Shanna. The day after Nikki and Dallas left for camp, our Shanna went to the Rainbow Bridge....the following is a tribute written for her and placed on a lab lovers message board...............

Read The Entire Post

May 2004

May 2004 This one talks about the empty nesting that started soon after we moved into this old house....Dallas was a senior in high school looking forward to graduation and then going on to college .....he's now a senior in college...how time flies!

Sunday, May 09, 2004

Hello All,It is hard to believe that three months have passed now since we have moved...the days have just flown by with us hitting the ground running on most of them. We are truly in spring with all that that brings; mosquitoes and gnats and snakes included! We even had a visiting snake in an attic eave hiding all snug in the insulation. I have chased a few snakes with the lawn tractor and one off the front porch with a water hose and even had one make its way across my foot as Dave and I stood outside discussing one of the projects on our unending to do list (ladies, I'll have you know that I did NOT scream, no matter what Dave may say!). None of these snakes have to date been venomous which is lucky, but we are sure those ditches have a few moccasins in them, so we venture there with great caution.

The amaryllis bulbs have finished blooming and some of them have been transplanted out of the ditches and into gardens where they can be more easily enjoyed. Many more remain in the ditches peeking out from the fern and hurricane lilies and other plantings too numerous to name as yet. I will slowly move those ditch residing amaryllis up onto the bank tops throughout the coming weeks. A gorgeous hydrangea has begun to bloom out front; funny but I never realized how beautiful a plant they were until I have watched this one come back to life this spring. I took a few cuttings and hope to successfully root them and would love to plant them all around the edges of the yard. A lovely honeysuckle vine was discovered in the front ditch two weeks ago and has been trained around a trellis to allow it to share its blooms with who sit on the front porch and visit.

We are beginning to see evidence of the early landscaping as areas of the property start to reveal their until now secret plantings. Caladium are now popping up and I've been told they hadn't come up for the past several years so perhaps my turning over the old soil has allowed them to grow again. The sad azaleas that required such extensive pruning are beginning to show new growth on previously sun deprived branches. And although we we were warned that we would be completely shading in by the pecan trees, our removing as many of the low hanging branches as possible have allowed us to have dappled sunlight all through the front and back yards.

The potatoes have been harvested and sent away to make Lays chips; the fields lie empty for the time being. Luckily we've had enough rain so far that the ever present winds from the coast have not created a dust storm...yet. The cover crop should go in over the next week or so and we are praying that this continues. I miss the green of the potato plants and am anxious to see the cover crop begin to grow. The dogs have gotten curious about the fields now that they are nothing but an expanse of brown and we have to remind them that those are out of bounds....the few potatoes left behind by the harvesting do tend to lure them out there from time to time though.

The shed has arrived so work on the house has been postponed until David has his work shop organized...then the major carpentry work will begin in earnest. The eaves which are located in Hunter's little room and our room are unfinished, with the insulation exposed. Although we have been using them for storage even so, the discovery of a five foot long rat snake curled up and shedding his skin in one of them has made me eager for the hanging of plywood and trim pieces.

Now while snakes don't really scare me too badly since we had one for a pet for almost 6 years however, he was kept in an aquarium and not to be found slithering his way through the storage areas of our house. After discovering our little visitor, a thorough search of the outside led to the discovery that a nice sized gap was left near the roof of what is Hunter's room and apparently Mr. Rat Snake made his merry way in through it and took up residence inside our house ...that little roof hole will be a priority to have repaired! But in the meantime, each eave smells of the moth balls that have been spread on the floors....although the moth balls won't kill our snake, they will make it less likely he'll feel as welcome in our eaves!

Our cats are loving the country life; mice and snakes and other critters abound and they spend hours hunting. So far, they haven't brought anything live home to share and that is just fine with me....I don't mind seeing a dead mouse or two, it's the live ones I have issues with. Roxie, a beautiful Calico that was apparently left behind during a move by another family in the old neighborhood who subsequently decided to adopt us two years ago (cat lovers will know that we Had No Say in this adoption whatsoever), appeared very timid for the first month we were here....she rarely ventured down the staircase and spent most of her time in Hunter's room. But, it has now become obvious that she sensed that snake in the eave because as soon as he was removed, she began to explore the house and outside in earnest. It is reassuring to say the least that her protective instinct is so great....and needless to say, if she now hangs out in any one place in this house for an extended period of time, David is sent in to investigate...........immediately!

Work on the upstairs has made a start; Nikki and Dallas decided that they wanted to change rooms. Dallas had the larger of the two and as he is less a "pack rat" then his sister, his room looked very empty while Nikki's looked over stuffed! Friday was spent moving them and actually placing furniture and wall hangings in the right places instead of haphazardly putting things someplace until a later date. The new bedroom arrangements will work better for all three children; Hunter and Nikki share a personality style - both need little sleep and read or watch T.V. late into the evening.

Dallas on the other hand, hits the bed about 10 p.m. each night....and as Hunter's room is reached by walking through what is now Nikki's room, the two night owls will not bother each other as much as one night owl and a morning person did!

It is amazing how a little change can make such a huge difference....both rooms look infinitely better and now need only to be given a fresh coat of pain on the walls and the trim. Although Nikki talked about a bright purple (yuck!) earlier, she has now decided that it "wouldn't fit the old feeling of this house" and she will settle for a light blue or lavender color. A believer in letting the children have a great deal of say over how they decorate their rooms, I am relieved that she has come to this conclusion on her own. (At one time in the old house, her room was a different color on each wall - a deep scarlet on one, a deep purple on another, a deep blue on the third wall and a mustard color on the fourth (which David said looked like baby diaper fillings...I secretly agreed! - four walls of lavender or light blue sound wonderful to me!). Her request to paint the 90 plus year old floor boards was denied! Loudly.....!

Nikki also voluntarily placed quite a bit of her belongings into one of the eaves instead of crowding up all the surface areas as she has been known to do in the past (she was able to enter the eaves with peace of mind as she was never told about the earlier resident rat snake!).

With the arrival of the new shed (and the somber burning of the old one!) David's toys (RC cars and all the corresponding paraphernalia) were finally removed from the laundry room. I spent two days cleaning the walls, mudding and caulking the trim and the lovely old window (one of only four that are "old") and then got it ready for the painting.... we decided to remove some of the plastic tile paneling from a portion of the room to give it a cleaner look. We had never really been able to figure out why the paneling had been placed so randomly throughout the small room, and had just came to assume that at one time all the walls have been covered with it but some had fallen down through the years (remember, it was once the bathroom for this 90 plus year old house). We soon discovered though that the arrangement was strategically placed............to hide four huge holes in the walls!

Close investigation into these holes revealed nests from various critters and even a corpse or two (not human thankfully, just a lizard or two or three)....A screw driver and a vacuum soon cleared the holes and stuffing them with newspaper, we mudded them up and applied some paint to await the real overhaul of that room at a later date.

It is now heaven to do laundry (well, sort of!) without tables hitting me in the backside every time I move; shelving around the room has provided much needed storage for bug sprays and sun blocks and spa chemicals and has enabled me to hang up dress clothes and cut down on the need to iron.....that alone is bliss!

As you've probably come to realize, every new project becomes an adventure or a hunt for treasures. The farmer who owns the barn has given us permission to use an old mule stall to store plywood and lumber that David has collected to do his future carpentry work. After checking the safety of that stall's structure, David gave us a cautious "okay" to enter despite the clear evidence of termites enjoying a previous feasting there....he plans on shoring up some of the loft area but feels that it is safe enough for the time being.

The farmer told us to keep anything that interested us and it has been a great adventure clearing out that stall...we have found moonshine bottles, old canning jars, vases, and some antique tools. The most interesting discovery was two sets of fire log holders (can't think of the right term for them at the moment). The scroll work is lovely and although they are covered with rust and corrosion, we hope that some light sand blasting will bring them back to beauty. Although the previous owners of this old house took out the chimney as it was beyond repair and we have no fireplace, I will find a place to display these wonderful items somewhere, if for nothing other than the history of them.

(4/10/2008 - I remembered shortly after sending this out that the fire log holders were andirons! They are now shown off in our outdoor fire pit along with a handmade iron spit from my dad)

Taking a day off of restoration last week, I spent time on the computer preparing graduation announcements and invitations for Dallas...that was tough day. When Nikki graduated, he was only a sophomore and Hunter still only six years old....It seemed that Dallas' graduation was a long time off and many years of parenting remained, but suddenly graduation is only days away. Nikki and I spent last evening putting together his scrapbook and had a time laughing at all the wonderful photos and his early artwork. It has hit me over and over again these past months that he will never truly live here with us but will be a visitor in almost every sense of the word. Although he will be leaving high school and his Aunt's house permanently at graduation, he will only be home a week or two before leaving to work at an overnight camp for the summer months, again returning on Fridays and leaving on Sundays....some parts of this new life we lead are sadder than others.

His final band concert was last Monday and was bittersweet for many reasons...as Drum Major, he conducts the band and is quite good at it...he throws in interesting moves to make his conducting appear to be a part of the show and was awarded Best Drum Major in Class and Second Overall at competition...seeing him conduct that band for the last time was sad.

It was a typical Dallas event in that after marching out looking suave and handsome and pulled together in his tuxedo, the audience was treated to his shirt tail hanging out below the jacket as he turned to face the band and raised his arms to conduct it! It was hard to keep from laughing out loud seeing that, it was just SO Dallas....! When time came to lead the band out of the auditorium, he made it last as long as possible by leading the 80 plus members in figure eights and circles, known to band members as the "snake", slowly making his way out the door. The grin on his face was a beautiful sight and let me know that he is ready for this chapter of his life to end and the new one to begin....A parent really can't ask for more now can they?

His college plans have changed ...again....he has decided to attend my college (Brewton Parker College in Georgia) and will be leaving home on August 12th to begin his freshman year. As this is a four hour drive, he will not be able to come home every weekend...empty nesting is really staring us in the face now.

Dallas plans on becoming a high school or college band director...being Drum Major gave him the knowledge that as much as he likes to perform, teaching is what he is called to do. Like many high school music directors, he will be able to perform during summers and school breaks, giving him the best of both worlds. Now, if he can just remember to go to class without his mom or his Aunt Karen reminding him, we'll be set.

Nikki is out of school for the summer, officially a college sophomore...after a slow start due to difficulty in algebra (takes after her mother there!) she finally got enough credits to qualify as a second year student. She will be home for another week and then off to Camp where she will serve as the Art Director for the summer (Dallas will join her a week later.)

She bought her first car last month and spends most of her time scooter-pooping about town with friends. It is nice to see her have some free time since while in school and working at the restaurant she is normally too busy to just be a young person. She has plans to move out next summer and get an apartment in town with most of the other college students in town. She talks of finding an apartment in one of the old homes in town; funny how she dreaded moving into this one but now talks of how charming and "homey" an old house feels.

Hunter is ready for school to let out and each morning counts the days down. We are a bit concerned about the lack of children around and hope to make some friends for him in church and be able to schedule play dates. Most of the children he attends school with will be in daycare for the summer. He has only complained once or twice about the lack of companionship and fills his evenings with learning to skateboard on the road and learning to ride his bike well. He and the dogs have a fun time together, but I fear it will all get old soon enough when school lets out. We may hit the beach more than I care to this summer just to cut down on his computer game time.

David and I are looking forward to a McLeod Family Reunion in South Carolina that will take place the end of June. It will be our own min vacations as Hunter will be with Dallas and Nikki at camp for the week....hopefully, we'll see many of you in Sumter!

April 2004

Here's the second letter I wrote from the new old house - as I post this, the yellow crop duster is doing its aerobatics over our fields.........and after four years, the novelty still hasn't worn off.....after I hit publish, I'll be running from window to window and floor to floor......by myself this time cuz Hunter's at school.................

These photos were all taken during the first year in the old farmhouse....you can see the changes slowly taking place making it more our home and less the previous owners (February 2004 - Feb 2005)

April 14 2004

We've been in the house for just over two months now and it is feeling more like Our Place than Someone Else's everyday now...the hot tub arrived two weeks ago, the new aluminum sided shed that will have to do in lieu of a garage arrives in just a little more than a week; the living room, dining room and kitchen are all painted in beautiful shades of yellow with the 90 plus year old wood trimmed in a soft white; the front door is now a wonderful shade of red AND we had our entertaining debut on Easter Sunday!

The family all arrived Sunday afternoon for an Easter Cookout. Mom, Amy and her husband Darrin and Dad and Jan had all been to visit (in fact, Mom helped set up the kitchen and Jan helped me with the living and dining room painting jobs!) but Kirk and his family had only seen it in video at Christmas time. Since he was in concert with the Jax Symphony the weekend we moved in, he had only heard about our adventures over the phone. We were very excited for him and his family to see our new home....and Hunter could hardly wait to introduce his cousins to his baby rabbit....called appropriately....Easter!

It was wonderful to have room for the children to run and play and be as loud as they wanted, with no fear of disturbing the neighbors. We all played croquet, flew kites and threw horseshoes and Darrin, Josh and the kids had a water gun fight (waterguns and kites courtesy of Nana). David and I were a bit embarrassed at our lack of organization; dinner was about two hours late. One of the things we will have to adjust to here is the very different layout of an old home versus a new home...our last house had a very open floor plan with the kitchen and dining rooms flowing on and out into a screened patio which had a huge brick barbeque built by David. On it we could cook all the meat at once and begin serving as soon the first guests arrived and we had plenty of room for an easy flow around tables filled to the brim with side dishes.....Not So Here! We had forgotten to adjust for the tiny kettle grill borrowed at the last minute from Mom. The meat took ages to cook and most of Jan's delicious deviled eggs were eaten by the time we served the meal. The kitchen left little room for guests to fill their plates. Not to alarm anyone though, I sat down on Monday and made some plans for the next party we'll throw...probably a combination house warming/graduation party for Dallas in May!

I've mentioned the changes to the house itself, so here's an update on the yard. The azalea bushes, whose ages we can only guess, bloomed beautifully all through March. It was so lovely to see them in all their colors. They've finished now and have been pruned for what would appear to be the first time in many years. We've cleared out the trees that had spontaneously grown up in the middle and all around them. The bank in front of the house is now adorned only by two huge pecan trees with an aok in the middle and the azaleas. It looks more like a gentile southern home read of in books and seen in movies now. In the evenings we try to hurry through dinner to watch the sunset from the front porch. we can see it through the spanish moss which hangs from the massive oak tree.

A majority of the plants we have brought from the old place are now in the ground. The rose bushes that have followed David since he was a child are now safely in the ground alongside the sidewalk that I uncovered on what used to be the front of the house. And the rose bushes that have been separated out from a tiny little stem Dad gave me years ago are also in the ground, one on each side of a little bridge that covers the ditch separating the driveway from the front yard. All of these rose bushes carry sentimental value for us; David's roses because he had the chore of caring for them as a child; we had these bushes at our very first home in 1982, moved them to our second home in 1990 and here they are with us at our new old home in 2004. My little rose bushes carry historic value for me as well as the little stem they came from were a cutting from a rose bush planted by my great grandparents at Whites Mill in Sumter South Carolina.

There remain some plants to be planted - among them three sago palms that are the great grandchildren (huh?) of one that was planted in my family's first home in Florida (1975). Dad took cuttings of it when he left that home and he had made sure that we all had at least one of its offspring. We can't quite decide where to plant them as of yet since they grow so big so quickly and we don't want to have to transplant the monsters in the future.

As to the original landscaping here, the previous owners warned us that it would take our breath away. The corner of one ditch is filled with beautiful amarylis bulbs that are presently in full bloom. The farmer's wife across the street says that at one time, about 40 years ago, the entire ditch was filled with them. When they have finished their blooming, we plan to transplant a few all down the ditches to bring back that former glory. Many of the other bulbs that abound in the ditches have yet to bloom and we don't yet know what they are. I can hardly wait to see.

The pecan trees are finally beginning to bud and get their dressing for the summer. We were told that once we saw that begin, we would know that warm weather was here at last. But, we had a cold front come in last night with winds that sounded as if they would blow in the front door and today it is only in the middle fifties, so we can only hope this is the last of the cold weather.

We are still finding old bricks and paving stones buried in all the gardens. We have quite a wall of brick around the pump house now are planning to use them for a courtyard affect in the back yard. We have weeded and feeded and are surprised at the amount of grass that is actually still alive. In a few years, the croquet games will be a little better served with a much smoother yard.

Each week, there is a pile of tree limbs and branches that line the front near the road awaiting pick-up by the yard waste men. We wonder if they bear us any ill will yet....the tree line beside the driveway had been allowed to spontaneously grow for years, obscuring the view of the house from the street. We have spent hours with a chain saw and clippers and wheel barrow clearing out vines that wer choking the trees and cutting away the hundreds of little trees and bushes that were growing all around. There is still a lot of work to be done there but when we are finished, it will be a lovely driveway lined with stately cypress and pecans instead of a little forest!

This is a newer photo..in fact, taken on Easter Sunday 2008 - but you can see the potato crop in the background and the white flowers covering them!

Did you know that potato plants bloom? We didn't until we woke up one morning to lovely fields of green and white. We are told that soon they will harvet the crop and we will have to pray for windless days and rain or we will be housbound because of the dirt that will fly through the air. Even so, we will only have to deal with the dirt for a week or two before the cover crop is planted. When it is in, it will be a matter of a few weeks and we will be surrounded with 6 - 7 feet tall plantings that will afford us an even greater privacy than we experience now.


We had planned on building a garage here, but after hearing the story of the almost 100 year old barn that stands just alonside the place we were to build it, we changed our mind. It seems that when hurricane Dora came through this area, the house was hardly damaged at all but the barn was blown down. The farm and his sons jumped on three tractors which had ropes tied from them to the barn's frame and just pulled that old barn right back up! With a couple of hammers and some old boards, the "sort of" replaced the support beams damaged in the fall. From that time to this, that old barn has remained just that way - propped up by nothing more than its original good workmanship and the ingenuity of an old farmer and his sons.


With this mind, we decided that to put up a new garage of wood beside that interesting but vulnerable barn just might be a bit foolish.....the stength of the winds around here, the termites that even now feast upon the ancient wood of that structure made us think our little garage might be in danger from a falling barn at some point in the future...at the very least, termites might just like having another wooden structure to munch on.....hence the ordering of a steel framed aluminum sided shed!


For those of you wondering just what that old barn might be hiding, well, let me just say this, although Dave and I long to explore inside due to the barely visible treasures peaking and down from its loft, we have decided that prudence demands we leave it along....the antique lanterns and steel works we catch glmpses of may intrique us, but common sense makes us wary of any real exploration inside.

Inside the house, there remains a lot of work to be done....the kitchen floor and the sun room floor (formerly the back porch of the house) desparately need to be replaced. No amount of scrubbing can get them clean and the lack of a real yard off the back door (the weeding and feeding killed the weeds and left mostly dirt) means lots more dirt is carried in on the feet of the family guests and two dogs and two cates.....and the little rabbit that runs around from time to time.

The laundry room (formerly the first bathroom added to the home in the 1930's) is filled with David's toys....RC cars which he races every chance he gets, and the card tables he takes with him when he does and all the overflow items that would normally be stored in a garage......leaving little room for what is supposed to go on in there...laundry!

When the shed finally arrives, I will be able to do said laundry without a table falling over and htting me in the backside every two minutes....I will have shelves to to hold the laundry detergents and spot removers and a place to hang closet items instead of folding them to carry them upstairs and then having them wrinkled beyound belief....what joy that will be!

Although almost every window in the house (26 of them!) was replaced by the former owners, the downstairs bathroom ones were not (this bathroom was the "modern" one added on about 30 years ago (1960's) and the wind whistles through the two windows in this room; they're covered with paint drippings....these will be replaced with new windows that we found in the old shed on the property when we moved in...we wondy why they were never placed...hopefully, this is one of our summer projevcts - to put in those windows (and burn the termite ridden shed they were residing in prior to being re-discovered!).

Upstairs, well let's just say that we have done almosts nothing up there to date...most days, we can hardly wait to get outside to work in the yard and since are only up there to sleep, it has taken a back seat to the yard and downstairs. Only two of the four bedrooms have actual closets, Nikki and Dallas' rooms....Hunter's room and the master bedroom have none so one wall in each room is lined with free standing hanging racks. I will eventually buy two armoirs; oh the hardship of actually having to shop for a beautiful antique armoire for each of those rooms (smiling sheepishly!)....

It is beautifully sunny upstairs and some days I do regret not having the time to just sit on the blanket and pillow covered hope chest that sits just under the landing window....I can just see myself sitting there, gazing out over the potato fields..~ that too will come in time - after we paint the walls and clean the windows properly and hang curtains over the blinds and finally arrange the furniture and hang the photos and mirrors that now line the floor......

With all the work that has been done and that which is still left to do, I did finally take a day of rest yesterday. The children were all at school and David at work and Isimply sat and read for most of the day. I even spent some time on the genealogy research that has been so neglected for the past several months....mostly though, I just moved from room to room downstairs with my book (a lovely find in the Dollar General, it is about a couple moving into an old home and finding outs its mysteries....are you surpised that I chose that book? :) ....I spent as much time gazing out the windows as I did reading.....

Things are returning to normal in our family; we are no longer feeling the pressures of moving and are beginning to truly enjoy our life here. As the house is feeling more and more like it belongs to us, and as it takes on some our personalities, David and I feel are feeling more inclined to relax and less pressure to work on something every minute of each day. We still find ourselves walking about the yard and looking at each other saying "can you believe THIS is ours?"....now, we see the changes we are making bringing it all back to life and with our plants outside and our colors and possessions inside and our first family gathering under our belts, it is truly our home, truly a dream come true for us.

Thank you all for letting me share this with you in writing.....here's hoping that all of you find a dream that comes true for you as well...
Love to you all, Lori