Sunday, May 24, 2009

Fun weekend: History Lesson from older previous owner of our house & Purchases for the House

Our weekend started off early on Saturday morning as we had to take my car in for an oil change. Since it takes approx. an hour and I was 5th in line when the car dealership opened up, we decided to walk to JJ Kapps for breakfast. We finished up and headed to the grocery store where we bumped into an old school friend of Bob's and chatted for a bit and headed for home. We were having company. :o)

We had managed to track down the owner of our house (prior to the owner we purchased from) who's grandfather had built the house and then her parents had lived in the house and then she and her husband had lived in the house. We were hoping she could give us details about our house and the house ruins we had dug up on the property. SEE HERE FOR OLD FOUNDATION PHOTOS.

The "previous" owners arrived shortly after 11:30am and we took them on a tour of the house. They were amazed with the changes the owner they sold to had made. (whom we purchased the house from).

Some of those changes were:

KITCHEN: The stairs going up to the attic room use to be enclosed and there was a doorway to get up to it, now it is all opened up.

OUR MASTER BEDROOM: Use to be a smaller room with another room attached at the back, the guy they sold the house to covered up a small window in the back room and tore down a wall in-between.

OUR SPARE ROOM: It use to have a door leading to our now Master Bedroom, it is all closed in now

OUR BATHROOM: It use to be quite smaller, as there was a closet on the otherside of the tub with the door leading to it from OUR DININGROOM. Where the toilet is, it use to be a sink with the toilet right next to it and a small tub near the end, and also a window (which is non-existant now).

UPSTAIRS: There was a bar with a working sink and a wood stove. We also had it confirmed that it was once used as a sort of dance hall or where they held parties for people to dance and there was even a wedding reception held there!! Tell me how cool that is!

Where our ART ROOM was once a master bedroom and then turned into a music room of sorts as the family were very musical.

As for the ruins next door, this is the house that use to stand there:



What a beautiful looking home, so sad to hear that it burnt down! She doesn't know anything about the fire as she was a baby when it happened. So that was over 50-65 years ago.
She and her husband also told us that the backyard use to contain a chicken coop and a smoke house. The poles in the back on the CN property are actually telegraph poles. Also, her father and grandfather both worked for the Railway.
It was so thrilling to meet them and have them give us information. They told us if they think of anything else or find more photo's they will be in touch! :o)
After they left we had lunch and headed out to some local antique shops. We were on a mission to locate some old door knobs for a craft I wanted to make -- a coat rack :o) The first store we stopped at did not have any unique looking knobs, but I found these awesome hooks for $15.00 each.

We continued down the road to another shop and there were lots of interesting pieces but nothing we needed.

We decided to head back to Jordan to another unique shop we had never been into and Bob found me these iron pieces which sort of resemble knobs which will work perfect for my project. Can you believe it, they were only $5.00 each!



We were on our way back home when I had a quick thought we should continue on to St. Catharines to Home Depot to get some plans drawn up for a deck for the back yard.


After we had that down and were given a quote price of $2700.00 for material (YIKES, not even labour included in that) for a 12x24 deck -- (we still have to get a building permit) we might have to throw that idea on hold :o( we picked up a door that I had wanted since the beginning of moving into the house. I'm putting Bob in charge of this baby. The plan is, to replace the door that leads to the basement. This will be perfect. First off, the ceiling above your head when you go down the stairs contains a light -- we can't use it, you see, poor Bob's head smacked into the light bulb every time he used it, so we removed the bulb and cannot use that light which we will need when we are in the back yard at night and want to access the stairs. We have to keep that door closed so that cats can't get downstairs or outside. I had an idea to buy this type of door, but that means we'll se an ugly outside door, so the plan is to let Bob do some Stained Glass Window painting on it and voila we'll have a huge work of art. In case you don't remember the type of items Bob has made in the past, check this out: DR. WHO PAINTING CLICK HERE, LUKE SKYWALKER & PRINCESS LEIA PAINTING CLICK HERE, YODA PAINTING CLICK HERE, and CHEWIE PAINTING CLICK HERE.

Maybe I can convince him to do a Yellow Submarine painting for me!!!!!!!!!! That would be sweeeeeeet!!!

Bob headed off to his last concert for the season with the Niagara Peninsula Orchestra and said it was a complete success, packed full house, standing ovation at the end! What more could you ask for? I missed it of course............ I wasn't feeling so hot in the afternoon and laid low. He rushed home afterwards to make sure I was okay and we decided we would relax by a fire outside and my brother, fiancee and my nephew came over as well. It was good evening!

Last but not least, today we headed back to town to take in a tarp to my mom's pool which had ripped over the winter and needed replacement along with a sample of water to collect the chemicals needed to add to the pool. When we were driving back we spotted this interesting vehicle. Guess they are a huge FINGER ELEVEN fan. :o) They had a lot of FINGER ELEVEN bumper stickers on the back along with a FINGER ELEVEN license plate. Way cool.



When we got back home we spent the afternoon in the yard cleaning up. I planted two more Fire Bushes (LOVE THOSE IN THE FALL), some sunflower seeds (LOVE THOSE TOO), put some patch master on the old fire pit to fill it in with grass, Bob cut up some more wood for the fire and put some cement on crack around the foundation of the house.

Now we are relaxing as I update my blog and play the addictive game RESTAURANT CITY On Facebook. Man oh man, what a life. LMAO!

Until next time! Ta ta for now!

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