I’ve been wanting to make my blog a bit more personal. In addition to the usual afternoon tea party ideas and recipes, I thought I’d post a bit about my world. So I came up with the title, My World Wednesday. Catchy, isn’t it?
I’ll start by showing you where I live. As you can see from the picture, it is a Queen Anne Victorian that was built in 1902. A Victorian paint color expert, John Crosby Freeman, helped us to pick the colors for this painted lady. We chose sandy pink for the trim, slate blue for the shutters and a rosy pink for the trim details.
We were really fortunate that only three families lived in the house before us. The builder’s family occupied the house until the 1970s at which time it was still all original and quite run down. The next family updated the kitchen and did cosmetic work but they didn’t remodel or remuddle. The third family moved into the house in the 1980s and only lived there 5 years. I remember that they referred to it as a money pit. They also did no damage but the quality of their work, roofing and wallpapering and painting, really left something to be desired.
I fell in love with this house when I was a teenager. I used it drive by it each day on my way to school and I dreamed of living there. It wasn’t a dream I pursued though. My husband and I built a new home and were quite happy living there. That is, until I saw an open house sign. I wanted to just go look. I really had no intention at all to buy. We’d only been in our new house a couple years. I couldn’t believe it but my husband fell in love with the house too.
We moved in about 16 years ago and the previous owners were right, it really is a money pit. But we still love it. Most of the architectural and decorative details are still intact. There are three sets of pocket doors, a beautiful oak entryway and staircase, some original light fixtures, parquet floors and lots of stained glass. Like many Victorian houses, it was built on a main street. In today’s heavy traffic, that is a bit of a drawback. Nevertheless, we hope to have many more decades here.
The old photo was from our town’s anniversary, in 1930. While we do have some flags for July 4th in the modern photos, we’re a bit more low key than in those earlier days. We do still have the flag that’s in the sidewalk and the awnings are in the garage.
Thanks for visiting my world. Tomorrow it will be back to the Ivy and Lace Tea’s recipes.
