Ever since my husband and I started dreaming of our life together, we always imagined ourselves in an old brick house. We would drive around the pockets of historic neighborhoods in our city and imagine ourselves relaxing on the grand front porches admiring the historical houses across from us while we sipped on cocktails.
We were non-discerning. We drooled over Craftsman style, Bungalow, Tudor, Foursquares, French Eclectic, and Colonial Revivals. All typically built between the 1910’s and 1920’s. For fun, on lazy Saturdays (that seem to only exist pre-child), we would hop into these various open houses on a whim. Reveling in the interior design, woodwork, layout and character one only gets from a historical house. Each house was different, no cookie cutter designs whatsoever in these neighborhoods. Even the bricks were set in a unique design or pattern with various colors.
Original woodwork trim, built ins and hardwood floors added to each houses character and story. Phone niches, coal chutes, push-button light switches, dumbwaiters, servant staircases, milk doors, and metal mail slots only added to the charm of these old houses. You can only imagine how ecstatic we were when we found our brick bungalow, put in an offer, and
after a brief bidding war, we were selected! We were now the owners of a 1900 sq ft. 4 bedrooms, 2 baths 1928 bungalow with an upgraded kitchen and a finished basement. I was 7 months pregnant when we moved in and started establishing our home. The inevitable projects began alongside the learning curves of becoming new parents and laughable decision to get a puppy a mere 4 months after our daughter was born.
We always envisioned popping the top on the house by adding a second floor. Because the larger of the two small bathrooms was placed downstairs, we decided to become basement dwellers, leaving the two bedrooms on the main floor as an office and quest room and the two very small bedrooms downstairs as our bedroom and our daughter’s room. However, my husband is 6’3” and the creative drywall covering the ductwork made for a lot of ducking and dodging for him. Not to mention the multitude of accidental run ins by his head. So, while he managed to make it work, it was always the plan and dream to expand our little bungalow.
Yes, we love our historic bungalow and the neighborhood filled with unique brick houses. What we don’t love is the lack of closet space, side-stepping around our queen-sized bed, sharing one bathroom between the three of us, and the noticeable temperature drop between the two floors. Over time, the main floor began to feel claustrophobic with the ‘two-butt’ kitchen and closed off bedrooms. When we first moved into the house my father made the statement, ‘You’ll be moved out of there within 5 years.’ With his life experience he knew what we did not, that the space and layout would only become more constricted as time and life expanded.
Yet, our love for this house, community, and neighborhood has brought us to begin the arduous process of opening pandoras box to a massive renovation of the main floor, addition of the new floor, and likely, the basement as well. Come join us on this wild, scary, exciting, and anxiety induced adventure!
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