Windows on the World

Holiday celebrations, sisterly visits, busy work schedules and illness (on John’s part) means that our updating to this blog is not taking place at nearly the pace that improvements are being made to our house. It is truly a completely different space than it was when we bought it. Then, if you had said, “Turn on the hallway light,” I would have spun around in confusion wondering what on earth you were talking about. Literally, there was no hallway. That has all changed. Credit where credit is due, I think it was Cousin Bill’s idea initially way back in the day to create a hallway. I have to admit, I nodded and asked probing questions to make it seem like I knew what he was talking about, but really I was baffled. You’re going to do what? But, at the time, I was enamored with the idea of a hallway, even if I didn’t know where it would start and end, or how it would be accomplished. Talk of this hallway has continued through all the projects that preceded it, and still I had no idea what this would entail or even what it would ultimately look like. Well, now I know…it looks like a hallway! But think about it…consider a space that has no hallway and think about just how you would go about creating one. It’s a bit of a mind bender, right? Basically, it takes a lot of sheetrock and a lot of vision, from as far as I can tell.

So, stay with me here…one space that included an oversized, enclosed room; a regular-size room that you needed to walk through to access the added-on family room; and a linen closet is now…a master bedroom with large closet; a guest bedroom; and an office (with a closet) off of a hallway that leads from the master bedroom down past the two other rooms, the linen closet and the bathroom into the family room. Really, trying to describe this is an exercise in futility, but I wanted to try to get it down because every day I feel like I’m forgetting a little bit more of what the original house looked like. Good thing John has endless video documenting the journey.

Yesterday also saw another long-awaited improvement. Our new windows were installed. John gave me the lesson yesterday in how to open them for cleaning. I’m not sure that I’ve ever cleaned a window in my life, and I’ve had some OLD windows…so, I’m pretty sure that these brand spankin’ new ones won’t need to be cleaned for a good long while, right!!??