House in Progress Diary

A peaceful place

Instead of showing you pictures of our dusty, yucky place today (can you tell we worked all day?), we will show you our vision of hope...a little piece of paradise that we call...

A's parent's house.

A's parents lived on the same street that they live on now when A was born. They moved a few times and eventually settled back in Chicago, a few blocks away from their original house. They rented THIS house from the previous owners and then eventually bought it. It is adorable.



It is a Tudor-revival bungalow with a clever, lovely addition in the back. It is also clean. And everything WORKS. And they are working on a new garden. Sigh.




The flags (click picture to resize) are a loving nod to the Scandanavian roots of A's family. I pass for Scandanavian sometimes, especially when I wear my clogs :) But my Irish and (Polish? Russian? Ukranian?) roots betray me sometimes.

For example, I had no idea until I met A that this picture was painted by a famous Swedish artist, Carl Larsson (book). But it looks very Arts & Crafts, doesn't it? No wonder Scandanavian folks who settled in this neighborhood were at home in these bungalows!



It's hard to pick a specific part of the house that I love...there are so many! And the amount of pictures to capture the whole house would take its own site. I am a big "nook" lover...anything tucked away will do. So, I'll just have to post a few favorite "perches" and "nooks":







The house actually has its original front staircase and a "tucked away" back spiral staircase in the addition. This gives the house two extra bedrooms and a family room with a fireplace. The original exterior wall creates the interior wall of the addition and a fun loft is above one of the "newer" bedrooms. (It is from this loft that I typed my first webpage entry for this blog! Yes, this was our beloved "transitional house.") The house is very "Sarah Susanka"...Not So Big house. Esthetically pleasing and making great use of space.

Plus, it isn't often that a you get a neat indoor "treehouse" in your mid-thirties!

p.s. Yes, the lanterns in the porch nook ARE from IKEA...how did you know? :)

Posted by jeanne on August 2, 2003 at 9:12 PM