Outside my windows... is a huge deck.
From which I get to look at this ...
... and this.
I am listening to... the dryer -- I've never had first floor laundry before!
I am thinking... about the five houses we looked at today, specifically one of them. It's an older historic home, with large rooms and beautiful woodwork. It's close to the Cathedral parish, which seems like a good fit for our family. It is old, though, and the basement and attic would need to be finished. But there is enough space to live in without finishing these areas for the time being. Any opinions or good advice on buying an older home?
I am thankful for... all the wonderful people we've met already. Saturday night we attended a young adults gathering sponsored by the Cathedral parish (I guess we're technically still "young adults"). Sunday we hosted an informal gathering of some other new hires at the University and their families, which included many children. My own children were delighted with their new playmates. (And so was I!)
I am hoping and praying... that we find our new home sooner rather than later, and that we can come up with what we need for the down payment.
From the kitchen... we've been doing a lot of grilling since we got here (on that fabulous deck!).
From the schoolroom... Yes, I should probably start thinking about the new school year soon and ordering books and supplies.
I am creating... order in our temporary home.
I am reading... Praying Scripture for a Change: An Introduction to Lectio Divina. I also need to track down a copy of One of Ours -- I was in the middle of it when we moved and I had to return it to the library.
Noticing that ... I like a house with a lot of rooms and a lot of space.
Around the house... most everything that I am going to unpack here is unpacked. There is ample storage for the rest of the boxes and bins.
One of my favorite things... warm summer days and cool summer evenings.
Pondering these words ... from Willa Cather's Shadows on the Rock:
... and this.
I am listening to... the dryer -- I've never had first floor laundry before!
I am thinking... about the five houses we looked at today, specifically one of them. It's an older historic home, with large rooms and beautiful woodwork. It's close to the Cathedral parish, which seems like a good fit for our family. It is old, though, and the basement and attic would need to be finished. But there is enough space to live in without finishing these areas for the time being. Any opinions or good advice on buying an older home?
I am thankful for... all the wonderful people we've met already. Saturday night we attended a young adults gathering sponsored by the Cathedral parish (I guess we're technically still "young adults"). Sunday we hosted an informal gathering of some other new hires at the University and their families, which included many children. My own children were delighted with their new playmates. (And so was I!)
I am hoping and praying... that we find our new home sooner rather than later, and that we can come up with what we need for the down payment.
From the kitchen... we've been doing a lot of grilling since we got here (on that fabulous deck!).
From the schoolroom... Yes, I should probably start thinking about the new school year soon and ordering books and supplies.
I am creating... order in our temporary home.
I am reading... Praying Scripture for a Change: An Introduction to Lectio Divina. I also need to track down a copy of One of Ours -- I was in the middle of it when we moved and I had to return it to the library.
Noticing that ... I like a house with a lot of rooms and a lot of space.
Around the house... most everything that I am going to unpack here is unpacked. There is ample storage for the rest of the boxes and bins.
One of my favorite things... warm summer days and cool summer evenings.
Pondering these words ... from Willa Cather's Shadows on the Rock:
A few plans for the rest of the week: Tomorrow we are visiting Fort Lincoln. We are also going to check out one of the houses we saw today one more time with my in-laws and the kids. I'm still only taking it a day at a time.Fears for the sick and old so far away, sorrow for those who died last year -- five years ago -- many years ago, -- memories of families once together and now scattered; these things hung over the rock of Kebec on this day of the dead like the dark fogs from the river. The cheerful faces were those in the convents. The Ursulines and Hospitalieres, indeed, were scarcely exiles. When they came across the Atlantic, they brought their family with them, their kindred, their closest friends. In whatever little wooden vessel they had laboured across the sea, they carried all; they brought to Canada the Holy Family, the saints and martyrs, the glorious company of the Apostles, the heavenly host.
Courageous these Sisters were, accepting good and ill fortune with high spirit, -- with humour, even. They never vulgarly exaggerated hardships and dangers. They had no hours of nostalgia, for they were quite as near the realities of their lives in Quebec as in Dieppe or Tours. They were still in their accustomed place in the world of the mind (which for each of us is the only world), and they had the same well-ordered universe about them: this all-important earth, created by God for a great purpose, the sun which He made to light it by day, the moon which he made to light it by night, -- and the stars, made to beautify the vault of heaven like frescoes, and to be a clock and compass for man. And in this safe, lovingly arranged and ordered universe (not too vast, thought nobly spacious), in this congenial universe, the drama of man went on at Quebec just as at home, and the Sisters played their accustomed part in it. There was sin, of course, and there was punishment after death; but there was always hope, even for the most depraved; and for those who died repentant, the Sisters’ prayers could do much, -- no one might say how much....
Inferretque deos Latio. When an adventurer carries his gods with him into a remote and savage country, the colony he founds will, from the beginning, have graces, traditions, riches of the mind and spirit. Its history will shine with bright incidents, slight, perhaps, but precious, as in life itself, where the great matters are often worthless as astronomical distances, and the trifles dear as the heart’s blood.
Some picture-thoughts I am sharing: from the Lewis and Clark Riverboat pizza cruise we took last night.
For more daybooks, visit here.
Any opinions or good advice on buying an older home?
ReplyDeleteWell, since you asked...yes:
BUY ONE!
Of course, not having seen the house you're looking at, I can't comment specifically, but speaking generally, the old aphorism is true in spades when it comes to houses: They don't make 'em like they used to.
That's the opinion I've arrived at living for the past 9 years in two different bungalows built in the 1920s and having never had any significant problems with either.