Week 4: Home

Week #4 – Home. Describe the house in which you grew up. Was it big or small? What made it unique? Is it still there today?

In the early summer of 1979 we moved into the house that we grew up in. At the time Jeanne was 5, Susan 3(almost 4), David 1 (almost 2), and Heather was still hanging out in utero(due in July).
It was a good sized house, and to us it seemed HUGE, with 4 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, and a full basement. It was a cream colored colonial style home with dark brown shutters and doors. From the outside, it was a very tame looking.
However, being a new build, our parents got to pick everything out, from the carpet colors to the bathroom and kitchen fixtures. My parents, for some reason, let "the girls" pick out their own bedroom carpet color and we apparently chose GOLD! Don't worry, the other bedrooms were light green, blue, and yellow! The upstairs hall bath had a blue sink, a blue and white marbled countertop, and blue toilet. Is anyone cringing yet?
Other than the fabulous decor, it had one fun feature that none of our other friends had (unless they had a two story home in the same neighborhood by the same builder) - a laundry chute! What a fabulous invention! Besides being a great way to get your laundry from the upstairs bedrooms to the basement laundry, it had about a dozen other great uses discovered over the years --Forgot to take something vital to the basement with you? No problem, just yell up the chute to someone willing to listen and have them drop the needed item down the chute to you! We threw many things up and down that chute over the years. We used the doors on each floor as mailboxes and sent "mail" up and down it on strings. Many conversations with our mom were had through the chute as she was often found at the bottom (in the basement doing the mounds of laundry we created daily).
Writing this makes me miss that house. Luckily I still live a few minutes away and when I feel nostalgic I'll drive by to check on it. I was shocked this past fall to see that the newest owners had the whole exterior redone and now it's BLUE! Maybe they wanted it to match the upstairs bath?