It was 1995 when Irene and I moved into our house at 3824 Pershing Drive in Lafayette, Indiana. It was a single story (with a 1/2 basement) 2350 sq. ft. ranch home designed by .... well, ME and built by Durbin Construction of which I was president. Ed Durbin, Josh and Joel (our twin sons), Junzo, and 2 others did all of the framing on the house from bottom plates to roof ridge boards. Once it was "in the dry," Ed and I did all of the finish carpentry on the inside.
The corporation had built the home "on spec" (speculation). When it didn't sell Irene and I decided to put our house at 310 Chippewa Drive in Lafayette, IN up for sale and whichever sold first, the other would be our home. Our West Lafayette house had a buyer within the week. So, we moved into 3824 Pershing Drive. It was to be our "Final Move."
Since it was a "spec house" we had finished it relatively nicely, but once it became our "FINAL HOUSE" some things needed to be changed. The first thing I did was finish out the basement. I put in a large 12 x 18 room which was my Media Room. 2 smaller rooms (one 8x9 and one 9x12) would be used as classrooms for the house church we had meeting in our home - the Ouabache Church of Christ. There was a 3/4 bath put in and a 10x10 office to complete the build out. It was fully painted, carpeted and had drywall ceilings that were 7 feet high.
Time moved on and the next thing we decided to do was add a 475 sq. ft. sun room in which we placed our Hot Springs Portable Spa. The next decision was to take out a home equity loan and use it to redo the exterior. When we had built it on spec, we decided to put some brick on the front of the home but then we finished the other 3 sides of the home in vinyl siding. I'm not much of a vinyl siding fan and when 2 or 3 pieces on the west side (the wind usually comes from the west or northwest in Lafayette) had some siding blow off - well, that was the last straw. I began to look for alternatives to put brick around the rest of the house. I found that in the years since we'd built the house a new product had been "discovered" - cultured stone. Here's a picture of what it looks like on a portion of the front of the house:
At the same time we decided to lay tile in our Sun Room and put a large shower in our master bathroom (we had put a very nice "corner unit" in the home when we built it on spec.
The final "improvement" we made to the home was to purchase the lot directly behind it to assure no one could move in behind our home. That expanded our "footprint" to a full acre. We did that in 2005. We then proceeded to plant about 125 trees in that 1/2 acre lot - about 10 varieties of oak; 5 varieties of maple; some hickory; pecan; blue spruce; norwegian spruce; elms; chestnut; beech; birch; buckeye; sycamore; sassafras; white pine; weeping willows and weeping cedars; bald cedar; tulip poplar (Indiana's state tree); concolor fir - in other words - LOTS OF TREES. We named the lot "MARDON WOODS" - "MAR" from Irene's maiden name "MARlow" and DON from "GorDON."
Our "final home" was finally complete. BUT, age takes a toll on houses too. The carpet, which was nice when installed had taken a 18 year beating and needed replaced; A few tiles in the kitchen had cracked; Some squeaks had developed in the sub-floor.
Age took a toll on ... er, ah, well - US too! Irene has Reynauds phenomena so she's never tolerated the cold well, but she has now developed neuropathy in her feet that make them seem extremely cold once they get cold and now I have become less and less able to bear the cold winters. We decided that - since we'd become part of Sojourners and only ONE of our SEVEN children still lived in Lafayette we'd full-time in our RV and "Chase the warm weather" - winters visiting the kids in the southern states (Arizona and Mississippi) and summers visiting the kids up north (Lafayette; Toronto, Canada and North Carolina). So we decided to put our "final home" up for sale.
Next Blog Posting will be "There's a reason why it's called 'Pulling UP Roots"
I preached at the Athlone Church this morning and this evening (Sunday 5/11). It went well. It was so great to see so many good acquaintances.
Since it was a "spec house" we had finished it relatively nicely, but once it became our "FINAL HOUSE" some things needed to be changed. The first thing I did was finish out the basement. I put in a large 12 x 18 room which was my Media Room. 2 smaller rooms (one 8x9 and one 9x12) would be used as classrooms for the house church we had meeting in our home - the Ouabache Church of Christ. There was a 3/4 bath put in and a 10x10 office to complete the build out. It was fully painted, carpeted and had drywall ceilings that were 7 feet high.
Time moved on and the next thing we decided to do was add a 475 sq. ft. sun room in which we placed our Hot Springs Portable Spa. The next decision was to take out a home equity loan and use it to redo the exterior. When we had built it on spec, we decided to put some brick on the front of the home but then we finished the other 3 sides of the home in vinyl siding. I'm not much of a vinyl siding fan and when 2 or 3 pieces on the west side (the wind usually comes from the west or northwest in Lafayette) had some siding blow off - well, that was the last straw. I began to look for alternatives to put brick around the rest of the house. I found that in the years since we'd built the house a new product had been "discovered" - cultured stone. Here's a picture of what it looks like on a portion of the front of the house:
(The Picture above shows both the original brick on one the 3 outcroppings along the front of the house as well as the cultured stone in one of the alcoves along the front of the house. The other 3 sides of the house are completely covered with the cultured stone)
At the same time we decided to lay tile in our Sun Room and put a large shower in our master bathroom (we had put a very nice "corner unit" in the home when we built it on spec.
The final "improvement" we made to the home was to purchase the lot directly behind it to assure no one could move in behind our home. That expanded our "footprint" to a full acre. We did that in 2005. We then proceeded to plant about 125 trees in that 1/2 acre lot - about 10 varieties of oak; 5 varieties of maple; some hickory; pecan; blue spruce; norwegian spruce; elms; chestnut; beech; birch; buckeye; sycamore; sassafras; white pine; weeping willows and weeping cedars; bald cedar; tulip poplar (Indiana's state tree); concolor fir - in other words - LOTS OF TREES. We named the lot "MARDON WOODS" - "MAR" from Irene's maiden name "MARlow" and DON from "GorDON."
Our "final home" was finally complete. BUT, age takes a toll on houses too. The carpet, which was nice when installed had taken a 18 year beating and needed replaced; A few tiles in the kitchen had cracked; Some squeaks had developed in the sub-floor.
Age took a toll on ... er, ah, well - US too! Irene has Reynauds phenomena so she's never tolerated the cold well, but she has now developed neuropathy in her feet that make them seem extremely cold once they get cold and now I have become less and less able to bear the cold winters. We decided that - since we'd become part of Sojourners and only ONE of our SEVEN children still lived in Lafayette we'd full-time in our RV and "Chase the warm weather" - winters visiting the kids in the southern states (Arizona and Mississippi) and summers visiting the kids up north (Lafayette; Toronto, Canada and North Carolina). So we decided to put our "final home" up for sale.
Next Blog Posting will be "There's a reason why it's called 'Pulling UP Roots"
I preached at the Athlone Church this morning and this evening (Sunday 5/11). It went well. It was so great to see so many good acquaintances.
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