Tuesday, July 7, 2009

New House

Somehow Daddy and Mom scrimped and saved enough money to start building a new house. They worked on it in the evenings after Daddy came home from work. It was a long slow process but finally they had the roof on and the outside walls closed in.

They got the partitions up on the inside and by then their house fund was depleted, but we wanted to move in anyway. Grandpa Mast brought several five gallon pails of white paint and aunt Emma brought some coloring to tint it and they spent all day painting the plywood on the floors for us. The kitchen floor was painted a rust brown and three of the bedrooms a country blue. It was fun to watch as they would pour paint into the paint pan and then dip their paint roller in it and turn the plain plywood floor into something much prettier. When they were ready to paint my bedroom floor aunt Emma told me to come watch as she tinted the paint with some coloring she had brought along especially for my room.

I watched as she carefully put several drops of red in the paint and was delighted to see the paint turn a lovely shade of pink. I thought that surely no other little girl was as fortunate as I was to have a pink floor in her bedroom. It didn't bother me that there was nothing but stud walls all through the house. To me there were only so many more options of where to enter and exit my room and all the other rooms in the house.

Once the floors were painted Grandpa went to town with our spring wagon and came back with a load of huge boxes from an appliance store. They cut the boxes open and then took them inside and nailed the cardboard to the walls of Daddy and Mom's bedroom and the bathroom. Once they had it enclosed Mom found several old blankets and nailed them over the doors.

When Daddy came home from work he and Mom started moving in our furniture from the trailer. It was so exciting to be able to finally sleep in our new house.

14 comments:

  1. Thanks for sharing!
    I enjoy your post on your blog!
    Thoughts &Prayers~
    Carrie

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  2. It goes to show it's the simple things in life like a splash of pink paint that can bring joy. Beautifully written childhood moment.

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  3. I enjoyed this one. Very nice. Glad they used the cardboard for the bathroom. :O

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  4. Isn't it fun to think about our childhood memories??? That is neat---to watch your new home being built, little by little... I lived in the same house all of my childhood (until I went to college). When Daddy died in 1969, Mom stayed in the house for a few years and then sold it. I was SO upset when she sold "MY" house. It was so special to me.

    Have a great week.
    Hugs,
    Betsy

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  5. I just love your blog, I'm so glad you commented on mine earlier so I could find you :)

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  6. What beautiful memories of childhood. I especially like the entering and exiting of a room where ever you felt. You will never forget that happy pink floor. These memories make us the people we are today.
    I am grateful for my memories of childhood. They are the best. I didn't ever feel like we didn't much money, although others around us might have thought so. Rich memories made up for the lack of funds!

    Thanks for sharing:)

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  7. Thanks for stopping by my blog Playing Dishes and a sincere thank you for your condolensces.
    Visit often.

    You have a nice blog and I look forward to returning and reading your great posts.

    I entered you in my July 25 CIJ tablecloth giveaway.

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  8. Such sweet childhood memories you have. My husband and I also built our house about 12 yrs ago. We moved into it before it was finished. We did have our drywall up but we had no interior doors for a couple of years. We did buy 1 door for the bathroom though! My husband also painted the floors like your family did but I wasn't lucky enough to get pink floors like you! He painted ours brown. It was 6 months before I had kitchen cabinets but I somehow manged to cook. I'm wishing I had pictures of that sparce kitchen but I don't think I took any. I took so many pictures of them building it that I have 2 photo albums full of pictures of just the house! lol

    I forgot to tell you the other day that I put up a few pictures of the farms from the Oakland Maryland Amish area that you might like to see.

    I noticed the Amish men were back working on the log house down the road from mine today as I went to a doc apt this morning. I've often wondered if their driver drives them all the way from Ohio every day or if they are staying in a hotel somewhere. That would have to be hard to be away from their families and also hard on them to drive that far every day.

    God Bless!
    Angela

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  9. What a wonderful story! I love to hear shared memories! I would have loved to have had a pink floor! :)
    Thanks for popping in to see me and YES, I've entered your name in my giveaway!
    Hope you'll come back for another visit sometimes!
    Be a sweetie,
    Shelia ;)

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  10. Thank you so much for stopping by my blog!

    I've really enjoyed going back through some of your posts and getting to know you better! You have the sweetest family! I know you are going to be a favorite spot for me to visit!

    I loved reading the story of moving into your home! It's all in the way you look at it, isn't it? You had a lovely room with pink floors! :) I love that!

    Have a great evening!

    Blessings,
    Tammy

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  11. Great story! Thanks for stopping by my blog!

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  12. There is nothing like a new house. It even smells new! Oh, and there is something waiting for you at my blog! :-)

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  13. sounds like our unfinished basement, where the framing is done, and we could only sheet rock a few of the walls. Old sheets have become walls, and doors. My children love it.

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  14. Hearing about you're house growing up brings me warm fuzzy memories of my childhood. We, too, built our house as we could afford to. I remember being so excited when we finally had "rooms" instead of one big room. We had framed walls with dark sheets tacked up between the rooms for a couple years because all our extra money was going into finishing the plumbing
    (outhouses are terrible in the Alaskan winter) and putting a permanent roof on the 2nd story.

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Thank you so much for taking time to comment. I love hearing your thoughts.