04.01.07
Posted in Musings, This Old House at 12:59 pm by Administrator
The topic of this post is cracks. I hope that word does not scare off the timid. Let me explain.
I live on a once quiet, now busy street. I have seen the pictures of the days of horse and buggy, on this thoroughfare, and I long to have lived in that era. We’ve come a long way, and that is not always a good thing. Age-wise, our 1821 house is out of place in this neighborhood. Across the street, there are two apartment complexes, one in a former Mill building. Other houses in the immediate area seem to have been built in the 1950s era. There are a few older houses close by, but none quite as old as ours.
That information as a backdrop, I will tell you that every day large trucks whiz past our house on our two lane street. These are mega semi-trailer trucks, delivering gasoline, food items, and other consumable goods to businesses just north of here, where deer used to graze in the (former) fields, and when there was a store that was called “Thirty Pines.” At that time, there actually were thirty pine trees on the lot. (The trees have all been cut down, the store expanded, and yet, the name has been retained!)
Every time one of the nine-wheelers roll past my door, it creates a wind tunnel, and my whole house shakes, rattles, and “cracks.” The walls are composed of old horsehair plaster covered with wallpaper. The intensity of vibration causes the wallpaper to split, too. Some of the boards, like the wainscoting in the living room, have cracked. Some of the kitchen cupboard doors have splits.
We have wide floorboards on the upper levels of the house, and it is there that the faux-Ladybugs “over-winter.” I did find some antique sewing pins in some of those cracks but have to constantly use a magnetic picker-upper to retrieve pins and needles I drop between those same cracks in my sewing room.
Now, personally, I sometimes like cracks. For instance, I am charmed beyond belief when I see violets, or daisies, or johnny jump-ups growing out of a crack in the sidewalk.
A smile comes to my lips remembering a cute Get Well card sent to me years ago. It was based on the old saying, “Step on a crack (on a sidewalk), break your mother’s back.” The card depicted “mothers” who were in a hospital because their kids had stepped on cracks. Ok, I know. The description loses a lot in the translation!
Speaking of other cracks, if I had a nickel for every wise crack, (er, remark), that had ever been sent in my direction, I’d be a wealthy woman. I’ve often threatened to write them all down, for future use in a novel! Is it really true that a wise crack a day will keep the doctor away?
Some cracks are just fine. The cracks in my wall are not in that category. I wish that I could move this house to a farm with a lot of acreage, in Vermont, and keep chickens, and pigs, and horses, a cow, and some goats. There would have to be a babbling brook or river across the street, or a swamp teaming with bird life and wildlife, in close proximity, for purposes of sketching and photography. Ah, I know I’m dreaming! One has to hold on to dreams. Remember the saying, “You can take the girl out of the country, but you can’t take the country out of the girl?”
Of course, the verb “to crack” has a number of meanings. “To crack open a case” means to have a breakthrough in solving a crime. “To sit and to crack,” as in the Scottish song I sing, means to “sit and chat.” If I thought more, I could probably think of other examples.
“Smilin’ Thru,” at the “crack” of dawn.
Patricia
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03.28.07
Posted in This Old House at 7:05 pm by Administrator
Not having running water, or even a sink in the bathroom for several weeks, made me appreciate what life was like in this house when it was first built in 1821. At that time, the “facilities” consisted of an outhouse that overhung the “gully,” teetering on the edge of it. Right beside the structure were two hen houses. When I first lived here, there were chickens and yes, a rooster - a very loud rooster whose job it was to be an alarm clock, the minute the sun started rising in the east.
Our bathroom downstairs is the smallest room in the house. I always imagined it to have been used as a birthing room, although I have no knowledge of children having been born here to previous owners of the house. All I know is that we are the fourth couple to have lived here, in almost two centuries. The bathroom used to have a door that led outside. The area is now a window. The well is located on that side of the house, so it must have been handy to exit from that room.
One day, in recent memory, Jim took one look at the bathroom and decided to make some changes. He went to the lumber store and bought whatever boards he needed to build a new cabinet for the sink. He recycled a cabinet door that was in the cellar and cleaned up a closing mechanism that says “1871,” on the underside. Then, we went to a pottery place and purchased a sink with Chickadees on pine boughs painted inside it.
In the meantime, there were many trips to buy plumbing parts, the kind of special stain he wanted for the wood, plumber’s “goop,” etc. Home Depot is to him as Keepsake Quilting is to me. Fun to browse, think, and plan!
Hand painted pottery - bathroom sink by Sharon Oliver of Granite Lake Stoneware, 544 Granite Lake Rd., Munsonville, NH 03457 (603) 847-9908.
Of course, the potter also had a Chickadee liquid soap dispenser, and a Chickadee bar soap holder. Both were irresistible. I remembered that I had stitched Chickadees on a bird feeder, and Pansies, in Crewel Embroidery, on a hand-painted background, so I retrieved that framed piece from a closet where it had been staying ever since we “made over the bedroom,” about a year ago. That piece is enough to convince anyone that we really, really like birds!
There is more work to be done! Jim wants to add new hardware to the cast iron bathtub, including a spray nozzle. He also plans to replace some of the hardwood floor boards. In the meantime, there is yard raking to do, and more work, as spring and summer chores kick into place. He is so hopeful that we shall have no more snow, he moved the snowblower from the summer porch to the cellar.
Running water in a sink…such a little thing. A more aesthetic rest room…so much work to create, yet pleasing when done. This old house is one that gives us so much to do, but at the same time, provides so much enjoyment.
For now, I’m smiling, ear to ear, admiring the results of Jim’s “Yankee Ingenuity” and know-how. If we had to pay someone to take care of all of the details that this ark requires, we could never afford to live here. We have both made up our minds to work hard. We are happy!
Best wishes,
Patricia
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03.01.07
Posted in This Old House at 3:46 pm by Administrator
In the dead of winter, my husband looked at the downstairs bathroom and said, “I should do something about this!” Funny, how things creep up on a person. First, he was annoyed that he’d used plywood to replace the rotted wood under the commode, instead of trying to find some Southern Pine wood pieces to match the existing floor.
Then, he realized that the pre-made, wood-surround for the sink, that he’d replaced not that long ago, had deteriorated because it was pressed sawdust or something. Don’t ask me. I’m not the builder!
We had been inspired when a friend told us how she had gone to an antique store and purchased a small wooden piece into which her husband had been able to insert a sink. It looks antique-y and she likes it…she even showed us a picture.
We trekked off to antique stores. Some tables were too high, some too low, some too wide, and some too ugly, or just not suitable. So, we did the next best thing, and went to Lowe’s and Home Depot. The wooden units that would serve a similar purpose were far too wide for the space available.
It is then that Jim went to the cellar to think, ponder, and see what he could “find.” Like a true Yankee, he saves everything! To his own amazement, I think, he found an old door that could serve as a cabinet door, and it still had the old hardware attached, dated 1871. So, he set to stripping off the old layers of paint with that pretty nifty citrus oil paint stripper that is less toxic than other methods of paint removal.
That “find” made him decide to build his own cabinet. Today, he is “off” to purchase lumber. He is nothing, if not innovative and adaptable.
Yesterday, we took a trip, across the state, to Granite State Pottery in Munsonville, New Hampshire, a lovely shop! There, we found just the perfect sink to suit our artistic tastes. It is painted pottery that features painted chickadees, sitting on pine boughs. I could almost hear them singing! We purchased a matching clock, soap holder, and liquid soap dispenser in the same design, and felt that we’d scored, as they were on sale. Of course, we still need to buy faucets, etc.
We’ve also decided to retro-fit the old, clawfoot bathtub with a new faucet that has a spray unit (to simulate a shower). With a little bit of hard work, and more expense than we’d initially anticipated, by spring we will feel like we are living in a different house!
Call us dull. It’s the most simple things in life that please us. However, I know that I will smile, every time I view the chickadees, and that, my friend, is worth a lot!
Patricia
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