House Tour Wrap Up

I want to thank everyone who took the time to stop by during my House Tour weeks.  Your comments were so kind and encouraging.  It wasn't my original intention, but the whole month of May seemed to have a house theme.  I started with my series on home stewardship.  And, that inspired me to do the house tour.

This has really ended up being such a growing experience for me.  I've mentioned here before that I struggle with contentment.  It seems that I am surrounded by everyone who has 'bigger, better, more'.   But, instead of focusing on what we don't have, this past month has reminded me of what we do have...a home full of history and love.

I shared with you that my neighbor Marla (daughter-in-law of Dan & Dora - the orginal builders & owners of our home) had taken a look at the blog & enjoyed seeing pictures of the house.  I believe she also passed the blog info on to some other relatives.  I received a comment here on the blog from one of Dan & Dora's grandchildren and I also received an e-mail from one.  This meant so much to me.  It has helped me feel connected to our home's history and has renewed contact with extended relatives (Dan & Dora's grandchildren would be my husband's second cousins).

To finish off my house tour, I thought I show you some outside shots.  I know I promised to show you our computer room (a downstairs room that Dan & Dora had used as their bedroom).  But, it has become my collect-all room.  My plan is to do a future post where I show you a before & after clean-up of that room.

Wow!  I don't think I realized how overgrown our yard looks from the front.  I do believe it's time to cut some things down.

 This is the side we usually approach our house from.  The house is actually covered in a faux brick shingle.  We plan to take that off and cover the house in siding, but first we need to put replacement windows in the downstairs.  (We did the upstairs windows a few years ago)

Can you see the metal contraption?  Can anyone guess what it is?

View from our back deck

Another view from part of the back yard.  The fields and the barn you see behind our property is part of the farm that John's grandparents originally owned (and where John's dad grew up).  Another family now owns it.

Looking to the right when standing in the backyard.  This was originally the business that Dan & Dora owned.  That's why it's right next to our house.  The building is actually a good bit bigger than you can see in this picture.  And, while it's not family owned anymore, the business is still running.

If you still didn't figure out what that metal contraption was, here's another hint.

It's a clothes line!  It's hard to tell in these pics, but the line stretches from one corner of our yard all the way to the top corner of the building next to us.  This is a typical type of clothes line used by Old Order Mennonite and Amish in our area.  I've often thought we should fix it and use it (the line it'self is metal and quite rusted...we'd have the replace the line) but we've never done that.  And, I can't quite bring myself to take it down either.