This week’s post is the first guest blog on my site.
I’ve been at this blogging / writing thing for a year now, and I’m proud to say that I’ve finally convinced Brooke to jump into the deep end with me.
She’s been the steady, consistent force for me this last year. Encouraging me to be brave, find my voice and keep writing. She’s been my unpaid in-house editor and my biggest fan.
But lately we’ve been working hard behind the scenes to get her site ready to launch and it’s finally live. She has a story that the world needs to hear.
If you know her, I think you’d agree, that Brooke is wildly talented. Her site is going to cover lots of topics with a special emphasis on home design, marriage and parenting.
Check it out at www.ReclaimtheHome.com and give her first ever post a read here below.
Here’s Brooke:
So, this house has been a project; fun but also frustrating and all consuming at times.
And we didn’t even do the hard stuff like raise the front half of the house that had sunk eight inches lower than the rest of the home. Or peel 100+ year old plaster from the walls.
We glided into the part where the home was primed and ready for design. A blank canvas, an empty sheet of paper just ready for a story.
But there was a story.
One that had started 150 years earlier. The man who had built this home, brick by brick for himself and his family.
I wanted to know all about that man, his family, his children. What was his business, what did he care about?
I felt the need to respect him in the revitalization of this place that had started out as his. A home that had remained in the same family for 150 years.
Yes, it went through changes throughout it’s growing up.
There were horse stables on the property in its infancy.
It was turned into apartments in the 1920’s. It saw several amazing wallpaper patterns which I’d guess were from the 50’s.
But as the house aged, it got further and further away from its original purpose: A home. For a family.
This house stood vacant for 10 years. We were told chickens and pigeons lived on the second floor where my children now lay their heads at night.
The wood floors were uneven and unstable and there was no heating and cooling.
But despite the shape this home was in, we knew there was a story under the brokenness, dust and debris that was masking this house.
Although we didn’t see it in its worst state, what we did see was a dead carcass of what had once been a home.
We loved it the first time we saw it. We walked through the house and saw life being breathed back into the walls.
We envisioned Friday night movie nights in the family room, late night dance parties in the kitchen, sword fights in the one acre yard just begging to be played in, tea parties under the Bradford pear.
We saw a story being written as we walked the gouged wood plank floors, and ran our hands along the dented trim that cased the windows and doors.
We saw our story meeting the old story. The one that was 150 years old.
This home was meant for a family.
View Brooke’s site at www.ReclaimtheHome.com.
