We must've lost our minds... Part 1

This is my first blog/rambling so please bear with me. I've wanted to start a blog for a while but really didn't think I had anything to say. After looking through a ton of old pictures, I realized I have a lot to say... about the nightmare of home remodeling.

We'd been looking for a house for a couple of years. Looking at listing after listing trying to find something even remotely interesting to actually go see. Now, for those of you who have ever been to West Virginia and especially those who have ever looked for a home in West Virginia, you'll know that there is a language indigenous only to West Virginians when it comes to real estate listings. For instance, you see a listing that says, "Updated A-frame, 2 baths, 12 acres, close to town.. a must see!" You just KNOW this is THE one! For three days, you anxiously await the open house. When you get there, what you find is actually a chicken coup with his and her outhouses on 1/2 acre of flat land and 11 1/2 acres of cliff side, 15 miles from the nearest "hard top."

Needless to say, when we saw "Brick ranch, 5 bedrooms, 2 baths, lr, dr, rec room, den, detached garage on 7 acres just outside town.. A must see...," we weren't particularly hopeful but knew we had to look all the same.

Imagine our surprise when we pulled up and saw this:

Not perfect but definitely better than what we'd seen up to this point. We're both relatively silent until we park the car and look at the backyard.

Ok, we aren't yet foaming at the mouth but our hearts are definitely beating a little faster. We took a walk around the property before we even set foot inside the house. Lovely. Just lovely.

We walk around behind the barn and look back to the driveway and one of us says THE word that's been on both our tongues and yet, has not been said.... "POtential... It has POtential."

Potential... dangerous word for DIYers. The official definition is capable of being or becoming. For DIYers, the definition is more like "Oh shit.. We're in over our heads and don't even know it yet."

Our minds are racing... "we could cut down that stuff there in the middle, take down that silly white fence. Pffft... Move that corny little windmill.. Bury that power line running to the barn.." On and on and ON it went and we hadn't EVEN been inside yet. That's another blog altogether.

So after we did a walk-thru of the house, we found ourselves sitting on the back porch, looking at this. Sitting on a porch swing and the father is very old and the kids who are in their 50's, are sharing fond memories of growing up. I imagine my summers spent sitting on the porch swing with my beloved grandmother while she imparts words of wisdom and her wicked sense of humor. I'm sold! Where do we sign? I want to move in now! I have to say, for me, it was the porch swing that sold the house. They even told us if we bought the house, they'd leave the porch swings. They didn't.

We would soon learn this was the first of many little fibs they told. Of course, I'm TERRIFIED of snakes. When I say terrified - I can't explain to you how terrified I am at the mere THOUGHT of a snake so of course, I asked if there were a lot of snakes on the property. I was assured that in the 60 years they'd been there, only one snake had ever been seen. I felt much better.

I won't bore you with the details of what a pain in the ass it was getting everything in place to buy this house. There was a foundation problem that had to be fixed and by the time all was said and done, there had been threats from this "sweet, ideallic" family about scaring us "city girls" and casual mention on our part that we "had a gun" and "weren't afraid to use it." We had no gun. I could've pointed my finger and shouted, "Pow!" but that's about it.

We closed at noon and walked in at 3pm with sledgehammers, a chainsaw, a lot of hope and a few friends. I have cut more than 5 dozen trees and only one nearly killed me. The one you see at the very left side of this photo.

It was a plum tree and had all these vines growing up through it. The vines kept it from falling the way it should've fallen. I cut one limb and all but the main trunk fell on me.

Luckily, I had the presense of mind to hit the kill switch on the chainsaw as I thew my arms up over my head and sank to my knees. It nearly broke my arm. What I wound up with was a nasty burn-like skinned place on my arm and a bruise that went all the way around my forearm and HURT LIKE HELL.

There were 7 apple trees on the property, 2 peach trees, 2 plum trees and grapevines in the yard and on the barn. We're 5 minutes from everything including, thankfully, Home Depot and Lowe's. Where once we shopped at Macy's and Talbot's, we were now spending our time and money at the hardware store.

My dad raised 3 daughters so imagine his delight when he asked what I wanted for Christmas and I thought only for a moment and said, "I'd like a rotary hammer drill." He was on cloud nine!

If you've noticed, the house is brick. The garage and storage building, which are clearly seen from the house and coming up the driveway are yellow. YELLOW!!!

Nothing matched. The trees hadn't been pruned in at least 20 years. There was this overgrown mess in the backyard that closed off what could be a beautiful backyard from the house. You couldn't even see the front of the house for the overgrown bushes and there was this white brick lamp post that matched absolutely nothing! They could've at least painted it yellow to match the buildings that didn't match the house but no! This was a different color altogether. A sidewalk to nowhere and many other things that left us scratching our heads and various other body parts from all the overgrown poison ivy.

So... stay tuned. There's plenty of nonsense to come as I chronicle the adventures of two women trying to remodel an old house and the surrounding property.