I'm home from my whirlwind house hunting trip to Illinois, and I saw a whole lot of houses.
I saw houses I *should* have fallen in love with... white trim, thick moldings, glorious wood floors:
But something stopped me from seeing our family living there... perhaps the weird redo of the kitchen floor, which created a full six inch lip between the two:
Or maybe it was the ghost in the basement? I don't know.
I saw homes that looked very familiar...with floor plans that started to all look the same:
Some with things that made them stand out. Others that blended.
I saw houses with incredible yards:
Where I could picture myself having my morning cup of coffee...
But the hunt was a bit more difficult than I expected it to be. And it still is, because we're still trying to make grown-up decisions (we're faced with THREE HUGE decisions right now for our family... and I have Taylor Swift's "Never Grow Up" on repeat to try and cope.)
So far I'm just stuck at the part where she says "OH, wish I'd never grown up...wish I'd never grown up..."
sigh.
Sometimes being an adult is for the birds.
Anyway, there was one house we saw that was just too amazing not to share. And by amazing, I mean, we walked in and were instantly transported to the 60's. I felt like I'd just stepped back decades and woke up in the middle of a Mad Men episode. Not that I've ever seen that show, but it takes place in the 60's, right?
(Sorry for the rotten iPhone pictures...it was the last house of the night, so it was getting dark.)
I've never seen anything like this, in all my house hunting adventures.
Here's the living room:
The furniture was in perfect condition. All of it. And it had to be original to the house. Total 60's.
To the right, the dining room:
This house is over 3,000 square feet and it felt enormous. I'm sure we would've gotten lost in it. There were just SO many rooms.
Here's another living room:
The curtains were the same print as the couch. The end tables were pure sixties glam. About this point, I realized my jaw was dragging along behind us. I couldn't get over the home and how it seemed frozen in time. My mind started spinning with stories, trying to figure out who lived there. And how.
Despite my lack of knowledge that the Hatfields and McCoys were real people, I actually do love history...I was enamored with this home.
Check out the kitchen:
Pink! The chairs were covered in vinyl.
Through one of the bedrooms we found this:
A dressing room outside of a bathroom.
And there were lots of bedrooms, both upstair and on the main level. Here's one:
Can't you see a little boy hopping up on that bad with slicked down hair and button down pajamas?
This was on the opposite wall:
And the bathrooms! There were SIX total. This one, I actually fell in love with. That RED wallpaper is to die for:
And this one had a booty-cleaner (bidet). It's the thing over there on the right. (Can you imagine?)
So, then you go downstairs and you are right in the middle of a sixties party. The poker table, the pool table, the ample seating...
And this guy:
On a bulletin board across from the rec area, lots of pictures from the sixties. Pictures of beautiful people in fur coats or a group of men with rolled up pants on the golf course:
I was completely gobsmacked.
This was what was left of a life, or lives. Frozen remnants of time.
Original Crayola boxes still full of half-used crayons, paper peeled off of them and begging the question "Who did these belong to?" A closet near the front door still full of fur coats.
And this:
An indoor swimming pool.
In its day, this house had to have been THE house. The place to bring your friends, to have adult parties with cocktails and cigarettes.
In my mind, it sort of sprung to life...
And yes, it was remarkable.
Overall, an exhausting few days...that gave us what we thought were answers but have ended up to be more questions. If ever there was a time we needed to pray for wisdom, this is it.
And our family would love your prayers as well.
