Basement Blues

"Toss? Save? Who Decides?" Apparently, I do.

One of our top-of-the-list tasks is to clear out the basement, which we started to do last night. The previous owner of the Box House, a 94-year-old woman, had passed away last year, and we purchased it from her four children. Despite promises to have everything removed before we closed, they left us with an assortment of odds and ends to deal with—some of it pretty freakin' heavy, too. It will probably take a dumpster to get it all out. Here are some highlights:

Half a dozen boxes of Letters, Christmas Cards, Birthday Cards, Birth Announcements, Easter Cards, Graduation Programs, Wedding Invitations, etc., all of it spanning back 60 years, four generations of a family's milestones. I thought briefly of keeping it all, but it seemed too voyeuristic, too personal. Almost like reading someone's diary.

Instead, I flipped quickly through the boxes to see if there was anything specifically house-related, and then bundled up the rest for recycling. It made me kind of sad that the woman's family didn't want any of this stuff. It made me kind of cranky that I have to make angst-filled decisions regarding another person's ephemera collection.

A badly peeling cedar chest. The veneer on the top is all lifted. Is it worth restoring? I don't know. The interior smells good.

A dresser. After being told everyone in the family wanted to keep this piece for themselves, it turns out that nobody wanted it badly enough to actually remove it from the basement. Like the cedar chest, it's in very rough shape, with a fair amount of veneer loss. Still, maybe we'll keep it in the tool room or something for extra storage. I don't quite have the heart to throw it away. (However, the half bag of cat litter next to the dresser may come in handy when we go kitten-hunting in the next month or so.)

A trashcan filled with gosh-knows-what. It looks like bits and pieces of some kind of ceramic. Does it contain asbestos? Probably. Ted said it somehow reminded him of his mother's kiln from her pottery days.


A seventies-style jumpsuit? Cold War era protection gear? It was one of the only things left in the dresser, besides a ratty-looking stuffed dog and silver-plated salt-and-pepper shakers, souvenirs from someone's vacation to Arizona.

All in all, there is a fair amount of stuff to either haul away, sneak into someone else's dumpster, or set aside for future restoration—all of which must be decided upon before we get the rest of our stuff out of storage and into the Box House.

Winter Wonderland

Our first night at the Box House was quiet, the you-can-hear-a-pin-drop kind of quiet that stood in sharp contrast to our former Uptown Chicago neighborhood. There wasn't a single person drunkenly yelling outside the window, no cars honking as drivers made their way home from such places as the Aragon Ballroom and the Green Mill, and no gunshots.

We woke to a postcard-perfect winter landscape. It had been snowing all night, and while it was charming in a Norman Rockwell kind of way to walk home from the train station the night before, in the cold light of morning we remembered we would have to shovel all that lovely snow off the driveway and sidewalks. (Whose idea was it to get a house on a corner lot, anyway?)

I gave it a go, clearing the front steps and the sidewalk leading to the door. Unfortunately, my wrist gave out on me. It has been sore the last few weeks—too much computer work, I think, and aggravated by a post-Christmas bowling match with the kinfolk. So that left Ted to do the rest of the sidewalks by himself. What a trooper!

A Brief History of Evanston Illinois

This is adorable. I found it while surfing online for more information on the history of our town; it's playing on YouTube. Click on the arrow in the middle of the image to play or so straight to YouTube to see this and other videos by user JohnsonBrand2000.

Over the River and Through the Woods...

The problem with closing on a new house right before the holidays is that there hasn't been time to actually move in yet. While my mother flew off to Texas to visit my brother and his family, Ted and I took a road trip to Kansas City to visit his kinfolk. Ted's dad and one of his sisters live in the area, as do a couple of his good friends. We always look forward to the trip, but this year I was especially excited to discuss our new place with others who were going through similar rehab projects.

Ted's sister S. lives in a small frame house built in 1925, and she and her husband B. have done everything from renovating bathrooms to adding on completely new rooms. I've been to their place half a dozen times before, but this was the first time I really looked at how the bathroom was redone and how the tile on the floors was applied. And who knew that discussing electrical wiring could be so much fun?

Our friend D. owns a hundred-year-old farmhouse to the north of K.C., where she lives with her two pixie-bobs and a potbellied pig named...Hamlet! Rehabbing the old house has become her hobby, and she's even taken classes on basic plumbing, etc. She's my new hero, because one of the very first projects she's taken on was to tear out a little-used coat closet on the first floor to expand the bathroom, even moving over the plumbing and building a large, glass and tile shower. It's beautiful. Much to my annoyance, though, I realized I didn't have my camera with me, so unfortunately there are no pictures. I'll get them next time I visit, when she's sure to have another major project or two completed as well.

Ted and I are now back in the Chicago area to spend New Year's Eve with friends, and our first official night at the Box House. We don't have any of our furniture there, yet, and will be sleeping on an air mattress, but I can't wait.