This is a picture of the house where I grew up. I believe we moved to this house when I was 6th grade. While I'm sure this house has many more stories than the ones I can recall, my memories have been gnawing at my brain these last couple of weeks after a recent post on social media about the house. It was hit by a tornado in 2016 and has since been repaired for the current owners. Through social media, my mother has arranged to stop and visit them later this summer. I cannot wait to hear the tales from the house since it left our family.
The house is in rural western Kansas. It sits about 1/4 mile off of a gravel road. The house belonged to my family for approximately 12-13 years in the 70's and 80's. We didn't build the house. My parents found it about 10 miles away and had it moved to a foundation on a section (640 acres) of farmland that they purchased. The house was big enough for 4 kids and required a complete gutting. It had a big wrap-around porch which we loved. Looking back, I don't know how my parents were brave enough to undertake the pre-HGTV version of a fixer upper. However, my sisters and I thought the whole remodel was a great adventure! Maybe this experience shaped our combined love for HGTV.
My memories start before the house was moved. We spent what seemed like forever (probably only a few weeks) getting the house ready to move. My father always tried to make it seem like an adventure when he was using us as his construction cleanup crew. Picnic lunches were a necessity and so the crew would get a little time off for playing.
The main part of the house was all that was moved. There was a small utility room to one side and that was where our stairway to the basement was to be. The utility room didn't survive the turn into the 1/4 mile long driveway during the move and was lost in the ditch. No worries said dad, we could add a room on later.
I'm not sure how long the initial renovation took but it seems like we spent every weekend out there for about a year. When we moved in, the main floor was pretty much done so we had a kitchen, living/dining area, master bed and bath. The second floor was the realm of my 2 younger sisters and I with 3 bedrooms and a bath. Our floor was not anywhere near done. We only had studs for walls which allowed us to talk late in the night till finally mom or dad would yell at us to go to sleep.
Looking back now, I'm not sure why they didn't put in central air when gutting the walls. Maybe it was a money saver but more likely it was my father's belief we were all tough enough that we didn't need A/C. By the end of the first summer however, with a new baby brother, there was a window unit installed in the master bedroom. We girls would try to soak up cold air before bedtime. My sisters spent a couple of summers sleeping on a mattress on the front porch (with the stink beetles-they weren't as prissy as I) and we had an attic fan to cool the upstairs. Being the oldest, I scored the room on the south side so I usually had a decent breeze if the fan was running. This south breeze had a downside as well. When fertilizer was being spread over the south field it could be a little aromatic for a few days.
The utility room that fell off meant that there was no covered entrance to the basement for the first year. Mom had to hike the laundry outside, hoist open the lid-with-a-weighted-pulley contraption and prop it with a board in order to access the washer/dryer. The basement windows didn't get set until later that first summer. That allowed the cat to have free range and also the mice. When one ran up the side of my bed, across me and down the other side, I slept with a light on the rest of the night.
My father utilized lots of friends for help with the remodel. I believe that he paid the plumbing and maybe the electrical guys in beer (before the job was done) so that may have been why we had sump pump issues in the basement for years. That could have also been the reason you would shock yourself if you touched the upright freezer door and a light switch next to it at the same time. I figured that one out the hard way then proceeded to coax my sisters into being shocked. Nice sister that I am.
The 70's were the heyday of wallpaper and we had plenty of it. We each got to pick out our room colors and wallpaper. Mom and dad proceeded to hang it and NOT get divorced. My husband and I have tried to hang wallpaper--this will NEVER happen again in our marriage. The wallpaper in my room ended up upside down and was only noticed after a friend of theirs was visiting. I hadn't even noticed the upside down hearts/flowers. We girls loved our crazy wallpapered rooms.
The family/dining room was finally added so we no longer had to go outside to get to the basement for our weekly television fix of Mary Tyler Moore, Bob Newhart, and Carol Burnett. However, there was still no central air so it had a wood burning stove and another window unit A/C.
Mom's kitchen was actually pretty ahead of the times. She had open shelving for the uppers and painted cabinets. The chopping block that my father cut meat on in a grocery store when he was in high school completed the look. As with most families, this room was the gathering spot. It also had the landline telephone that we girls monopolized till my father added a separate line upstairs. After that, we monopolized both phones.
This crazy farm house was a great place to grow up. One of my fondest memories is laying on the bed in my room upstairs in the summer with the warm (ok sometimes HOT) breeze (mostly WIND) blowing across me while I escaped into library books with a fresh packet of sunflower seeds. There was the space to day dream. Unless you slept in too late and dad needed a clean up crew...
Thanks for bearing with me on my trip down memory lane.
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