Our rental house was undesirable plus it was on a busy road. We wanted to find another house of our own again however, having gone through several job changes and moves, we were hesitant. My husband lost his father that spring. Soon after, I discovered that I was pregnant with our second child. Ken’s job was looking more promising, so we decided to look for a permanent home in the area.
With the help of a realtor, we decided upon a 3 bedroom, 1 and 1/2 bath brick ranch in a moderately priced neighborhood. It was outdated so we knew we would have to do some work to it. There was no garage or car port but there was a big yard. There was lots of paneling in the house and some hardwood floors. The bedrooms were small but adequate. The house still had the 80’s feel with country themed wallpaper in the kitchen and cornflower blue trim throughout. The carpeting in the bedrooms was also country blue.
We got to work making changes right away. We painted the baby’s room first in a neutral yellow. We put in a new sink and pretty cabbage rose printed wallpaper in the main bath. We had a shower installed in our bathroom enlarging the space by taking the closet space and converting it into a full bathroom. We had to build a new closet in the bedroom which made it smaller. Having a larger master bath took priority, we decided, over the size of the bedroom.
My father helped us by painting the maple cabinets white in the kitchen. We installed a new stove and removed louvered shutters from the windows. We put in new country blue laminate countertops to match the existing color scheme. The linoleum floors still had a “brick-look” pattern and were dark but otherwise the space was quite updated and much brighter.
We planted some foundation plantings and trees. We built a swing set in the back yard. We attached a child-sized swing for our daughter and a baby swing for our son.
We did all this work over the course of several years. While in this house, my husband made a career change and trained to become a real estate appraiser. He finally found what he was meant to do and started his own company.
Some years after moving from this house, we learned there was a fire started when a warm grill was stored in the outside hot water heater room beside the back kitchen door. A large portion of the house on that side of the house was burned and had to be rebuilt.
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