The House That Built Me (Part 1)

Prepare yourself for the longest, sappiest blog entry I've ever written (and that's saying something!) 

In case you're new around here, my parents are selling my childhood home. They've owned it for 35 years, so I was brought home from the hospital to that house. I lived there until I got married at 19, then moved back in with my husband and family for 6 years from 2013-2018. My parents are finally empty nesters, so the house is too big and the upkeep too much. It was on the market for 6 days when it sold for above asking. And they're closing this week. In 30ish days someone else will move in, and we'll move on. As Miranda Lambert says, I won't take nothin' but a memory of the house that built me.

So join me, won't you, on a trip down memory lane at the Fruit Ridge house . . .

These 2 lovebirds bought the house in 1984 for $28,000. 🤯

Standing in the kitchen - pre wallpaper (and post plenty of other renovations)

This is the reason they got such a bargain:

1984. This is the kitchen looking to the North. Some rooms in the house had dirt floors, and there were electrical wires hanging everywhere. 

2019

In the living room. 1984.

Same room (different angle). 2019.

My mom likes to tell the story of one of the first times they saw the house. They pulled into the gravel driveway that was full of puddles. A dirty, half-naked little boy came running up from the chicken coop with a dead chicken in his hands, fell in a puddle, got up soaked in mud and kept running. My mom turned to my dad and said, "Is this our future?" Lol.

Some more pictures of how the house changed over 35 years:

We had so much fun in that barn - there was a basketball hoop, and haylofts full of hay. It was also falling down and we knew to watch where we stepped. Eventually, a windstorm blew it down sometime in the 2000s. 

The memories this old house holds . . .

Me when I was blonde (1986ish)

Niki and me

Libby was born in this house! (My mom had a home-birth before home-births were cool!)

My mom's parents meeting Libby for the first time. (1991)

We have a whole series of pictures from this day, documenting my mullet and hours spent making mud with Luke. (At least no dead chickens were involved . . .)

Luke and I shared this room and Niki had the one behind that newly constructed wall. When Libby was a little older, she also shared this room with us. #bighappyfamily

21 years later, my girls shared this same room. Lucy even slept in that same bed!

Luke and Libby playing with fire.

Libby and me . . . riding a roller coaster on our back deck?

A few years later, here we are again crowded around the couch looking at a new baby (Tristan 1997).

Soon Niki's boys became as much of a fixture in that house as my own siblings. Here we are sitting on a tube playing with the sprinkler in the front yard with Tyler.

This picture has faded so you can't see the rainbow sprouting out of our heads - but you can see that we all possessed an epic sense of style. (I remember regularly telling Luke that his pants were supposed to rest beneath his belly button!)

A few years later, my girls experienced the same phenomenon in the same spot!

Did I mention I had a peculiar childhood? This house lent itself to the best imaginative play - and my Jr. High BFF Sharon was the best ringleader. 

We used to pretend we were Jewish during the holocaust, hiding from Nazis in the barn. Not even kidding. 

And then there was this - perhaps my most iconic "childhood" memory (I was too old to be truly considered a child - probably 12 or 13?). Sharon and I went through an Amish phase. We spent a summer preparing, then spent one day and night living as if we were Amish (in the chicken coop, no electricity, no running water, etc.). Here we are "milking" our cows (logs on stumps with water-filled rubber gloves tied to them.) This picture lived on my parents' fridge for many years, and now it lives on mine. 

Oh, and those are dryer sheets in our hair. 

This is also the house where Justin and I spent much of our dating relationship, and he fell in love with my sparkling personality! 9 months after this picture was taken, Justin proposed to me in front of the fireplace in the living room!

This house witnessed so many birthday parties . . .

My first birthday (being held by Niki)

My 5th

Libby's 1st

My "golden" birthday (10th) with school friends and siblings.

My most epic birthday aka costume ball when I turned 13. (I was such a cool teenager.)

Libby

Niki

Luke (the year he asked for homemade bread instead of a cake - lol)

It's been home to so many Christmases

Me in the late 80s/early 90s

Can we just take a moment to recognize how skinny I am here?!

The rule has always been that you have to take a "kids' Christmas pic" in front of the tree until you're married or have your own kids. This was probably one of my last years.

2005

2006

The appearance of Lucy! (2010)

I don't think both of my siblings were married this year . . . cheaters. (2011)

The appearance of Lucy's attitude (and refusal to be in the picture with all those scary boys.) (2012)

This was actually Thanksgiving (2012), but it goes with the holiday theme. Do you see Lena in this one?

Lena's first Christmas. (2013) 

I can't even begin to imagine how many cookies we decorated in this house over the years . . .

We had so much fun and made so many memories as a family.

Luke and I showing off our acrobatic skills. 

Many musical moments . . .

"Waves of mercy, waves of grace . . ."

Mom playing guitar hero.

Libby on piano, Luke and Tyler on guitar, Tristan on tambourine, Tayton on French Horn, and Sadie on vocals. We're practically the VonTrapps.

Family Twister (We should try to recreate this. I bet Niki and I are the only ones who could still do these moves. Lol.)

Dad and Libby discover FaceSwap

When we were kids, Luke, Libby, and I always wished on Oreos for two things: a trampoline and a pool. Eventually we got both. I think we got the pool around 2001 or 2002. The summers thereafter spent at that pool were some of the best of my life.

Niki, Libby, Lucy

Luke, Tayton (?), and Tyler (?)

Lena

Libby and Tayton in the kayak

Lucy

We spent many Independence Days with friends and family playing Bocce:

And fishing wayward Bocce balls out of the pool . . .

We spent summer nights roasting marshmallows

And snuggling (Lucy)

We took so many sisters pictures:

2008

2010

2011

2012 (pregnant with Lena)

And of course, our favorite past time is playing cards:

Lena

Nash

My dad spent years cultivating gardens all over our 2 acres. He had an elaborate "garden book" that he worked in all winter to make plans for the following spring. He planted fruit trees (apple, pear, cherry, plum, peach), grape vines, strawberries, raspberries, chestnuts, walnuts, corn, potatoes, veggies, I even remember a couple years of blueberry bushes. I think the orchard and vineyard will be the hardest for my dad to leave behind. We sure enjoyed the fruits of his labor for many years.

Lena with the Asian pears (a big favorite)

Lena with grapes

Lena and Lucy with pumpkins

Cherries

Apples

Cider making with friends

 

I loved growing up in the country. Our house was nestled in the middle of a field - sometimes it was wheat, sometimes corn, or soybeans. One time Luke and I took a few ears of corn while we were pretending to play Indians. My dad made us go down to the farmer and apologize for stealing! I remember being mortified and so angry - like the farmer was going to miss a few ears! Haha.

The aerial view.

Tristan and Libby climbing on the farmer's haybales. 

Our neighbors up the street had cows that sometimes ended up in our yard!

My senior picture in the wheat field.

Although, the country wasn't always fun and games. For most of my childhood, my mom hung our laundry to dry. Suffice it so say, we always knew when the manure truck went by while the laundry was out - we smelled like it for days! And winters in the middle of that big field were brutal.

As a kid, winter was magical. My dad built a ramp off the side of our deck and we could zoom halfway through the yard on our sleds! We built elaborate snow forts, climbed through the drifts, and even got to miss school a couple times because our road was impassable or our car was stuck in our drifted-shut driveway!

 

Drafty old farmhouse = snow inside the house!

Growing up, this was our sole source of heat. Actually, we had a furnace, but we were only allowed to use it for an hour in the morning or right when we got home from school until the woodstove was going. I remember writing a paper once about "the heart of the home." For most people, it's the kitchen. For me, it was gathered around this woodstove. I can't imagine how many books I read here. I remember a few times when the power went out and we spent all day next to the woodstove. Mom made eggs in a skillet on top and we thought it was the coolest thing ever.  Despite its romantic facade, however, I hated that woodstove most of the time. If you weren't within 4 feet of it, the house was freezing. I was so thrilled when we finally got the outdoor wood burner.

This, however, is what it took to keep us warm. My dad worked tirelessly year round to find, cut, chop, and stack the wood. And this was the nail in the coffin for the Fruit Ridge house. After getting a defibrillator and being forbidden from using a chain saw, my dad knew it was time to move on. 

I think the thing we can all agree that we'll miss the most is the amazing views that living in a field afforded us. Growing up I took for granted that we could see the sun both rise and set at the horizon line. It was beautiful throughout the year as different crops popped up, as the fall colors blazed, even as the sun sparkled over the dreaded snow. My dad added that huge wrap-around deck onto the back of the house in 1998, and we all spent countless hours on it enjoying this view:

Fog at sunset after a rainstorm.

Sunrise

Wheat field 

We like to joke with my parents that this house became something beautiful "all because two people fell in love" (they hate cheesy stuff like that). But they didn't only fall in love, they stayed in love. They worked hard to turn a house into a home, to raise kids that wanted to come back, to be a part of their grandkids' lives, to cultivate kindness and joy. I couldn't have asked for a better childhood, or a better home to grow up in.

1994ish

1996?

2006ish

2014

2019

Stay tuned for part two about my kids' growing up years in this house. It will be up as soon as I can stop crying over this entry . . . (Kidding! I'm too medicated to cry.)