Residence #5: Our first experience with home ownership.

Years: 2003-2010
Ages: 27-34
Occupation: Professional Asshole/neurotic mommy.
Status: Still married, parent of one, then parent of another.  


Really?  It was lovely.  I started looking in the spring of 2003.  Again, I was ready to ditch the rental that we were in, for the reasons cited in the previous post.  Lord.  Was I ready!  But... I knew what I wanted: 


1. It had to be built before 1940.  I wanted character, and style.  I wanted a house that would not easily break.  I wanted a place that had stood the test of time.


2. It needed to have a decent, fenced yard.  It did.  And how!


3. It needed to be in a neighbourhood that wasn't riddled with crime.  (I thoroughly checked this on a crime map, and found that the worst crime commited there in the last 5 years, was petty larceny.  Not bad.)


4. It needed to be at least within a few minutes of places I liked to hang out.  And with this place, while I couldn't walk to much, there was an Asian market across the street, and only a 5 minute drive to Hollywood.  Boom.

5. The neighbourhood itself needed to be something I could take walks in.  Yes.  This was one of those places.  We still trick-or treat over here on Halloween.  It's really great for that.


I still own this house, so I have access to quite a few more, and recent pictures of it.  Bear with me.  I recently took some while we were in the process of getting it ready to rent out to our second set of tenants.  I'm glad that our first set took such great care of this place!  We have been so lucky!

View from front.

Driveway, and flower garden.

I really miss the flowers.

Backyard, from patio.

Now, knowing me, you would think that I would have been freaked out by all of the bird houses on this property, because birds freak me out.  Well, these little birds were OK, mostly.  So, there.

Yes.  I miss the flowers.  Especially this Crocosmia Lucifer bush.  They were so bright and pretty.

I got a bug up my butt to paint my kitchen bright red when I lived here.  Don't judge.

Dining room.  We stole the light fixture for our current dining room when these guys moved out. LOL

One of the things I love about the Tudor style, is the floor, to ceiling, leaded glass windows.  I was equally grateful that this one was double-paned.

Entry alcove.  Notice the glass doorknobs... I miss those, too.

I also miss this little peep door. 

And the sweet little mail slot.

Yeah, we like bright colours.  Shut up.  We redid this bathroom in 2009.  I was pretty happy with how it turned out.  It had art deco, pink and black tile before.  I wish we could have preserved it, but it was in sad shape, and someone had placed a carpeting over the top of it.  So sad.

This was my bedroom when I lived here.  I liked having an en suite bathroom.  I did NOT like how cold it got up there, because there is no duct work to the upstairs.  We may fix this sometime soon.

Upstairs Bath.

I couldn't resist posting this.  It's Mel Brooks!

Also?  Osama Bin Laden, playing fiddle.

Stairwell.

So, there you have it.  We moved on from this place, because it got too small for us.  We may have gone for overkill, as our current house is 3,500 square feet, but well?  It... is... bigger.  LOL

-H