My family's house

The home I lived in for 10 years and my parents still lived in for another 10 years is for sale. I cried the other day when I passed it. It needs to be a home used and loved and filled with family. Why does it bother me so much I ask myself? Then I realize I have so many, many memories, and it was a home hand built and put together by my parents. I remember while we lived in the rental house for a year the architect coming all the time changing this or that adding a greenhouse, putting the laundry room upstairs, raising the ceilings.

I remember the summer before we moved in going over with my parents and doing our part to help in the building, even if it was sweeping up the sawdust or helping to hammer in a nail. Going over to check on the house every week and seeing the new changes and development and my mom being so concerned because the railing wasn’t up yet in the living room or on the stairs. Of course that is also the time my little sister was running through the open walls and a nail completely cut her knee and she had to have stitches and has a battle scar from the experience.

I remember moving in soon as the upstairs was done, and it did have everything; a family room, living room, laundry three bedrooms, kitchen and two bathrooms. I shared a queen size bed with my three sisters. It was o.k., but it wore on me I went to my parents in tears, I wasn’t sleeping and I hated being kicked during the night and I felt too mature for my silly little sisters. I proposed that I sleep in the basement. Anything had to be better then sharing a bed. There were spiders, open unfinished walls, cement floors and big black windows. My mom helped me put a blanket over the window and I had a twin size bed, a little dresser and put a blanket on the floor and I lived like that for six months.

I would go out in the yard with my dad and take a turn swirling the seeds around for a clover yard, apparently that would help the lawn be thick and prepare the ground for the lawn. I think we had a clover yard for a year or two before he put down grass seed. My dad loved plants and boy did he plant; There was the large tree in the front, the bushes, ground cover, the orchids, the peach tree, walnut trees, the grapevines that completely cover the chain link fence in front, the aspen grove and the pussywillow tree, the rubarb plants, the blackberry and raspberry bushes, the two hills with a variety of plants and flowers. The 150 apple trees behind the house and the vegetable garden he planted on the side of the house and the plants he put between the apple trees when they were still young.

I remember hearing my parents discuss the playset and surprising us with it. A strong sturdy metal set we would play on for hours. We would be pirates avoiding the sharks in the grassy waters, we’d talk, swing, slide. Even as a teenager and coming home for a break from collage I would swing while the sun was setting on one side, the mountains and trees on the other. We would play volleyball with other teenagers as we grew up in the yard in front. In the back there was a little hill and a slight dip that I hated mowing, but was so fun to run down that hill or have a little hill to sled on. When it rained a lot or when the snow melted we’d have almost a little pond to splash or float things on.

My mom put up curtains and blinds, pictures, carpet for each room. We had a large bulletin board and white board where our art work would be displayed, family councils recorded, job assignments put. Then of course there was the deck that was added on to the back and a shed built underneath it. I was paid $50.00 one year for girls camp to stain the whole deck. We had so many Sunday dinners there. I would curl up in my warm flannel blanket and sit on the lawn chair during the thunderstorms, smelling the musk and watching the storm clouds and admire my wonderful mountains.

There was the green house, I remember helping my dad to lay bricks on the earth for flooring, there were hand built shelves for the weird and exotic plants, ferns and flowers my dad had, even a full lemon tree was planted, avacado plants too. There was a fan and it was always warm even in the winter. I often would go mist all the plants as one of my favorite chores. It also shared as a weight room when my brother got into highschool basketball.

Our cherry small grand piano sat in the livingroom next to the bay window that viewed Timpanogas mountain. There I cheated my mom of her kitchen help by luring myself away with songs on the piano, how could my mother deny the music I wished to practice? How many concerts for grandparents and guests did my siblings and I perform there in that room? I helped put up the wall paper for one of my rooms, I’d change from sharing a room to having my own room off and on. There was the large storage room with shelves installed just for food storage.

Of course there was the garage, hardly ever used for a garage no matter how many times our mom had family cleaning there, if it wasn’t crowded with stuff, it was crowded with apples to store, sale, or give away. So many wonderful memories and so many associations. Yet, where my parents are is where their family home is. It was a split level home and a whole flight of stairs to get to the kitchen, even to get to the front door there were several porch steps (that I hated cleaning off in the winter). It got harder and harder on my grandparents and then on my mother to go up those stairs. It made perfect sense when they sold it and moved into my grandmothers house, also a home my mother help build and made with love and purpose. I hope a family will buy it and love and appreciate it enjoying similar memories to mine. I have my memories, and maybe I’ll go by and put a few pictures to go with these words.