88. Stories from Apple Hill

December 2, 2013September 13, 2017 / Apple Hill Cottage / 16 Comments

It is the season of giving thanks and remembering our blessings.

And while I have much to be thankful for at the cottage (new windows, new insulation, and lower gas bills) today I’m going to be thankful for those who built and took care of this little cottage before us.

Joe and Clara named the road and made the signs. Now it is officially called Apple Hill Rd. and it’s even on Google Maps…

My grandfather, Pa, built the cottage sometime in the thirties after he bought the orchard. It was just a little two-room house at the time; it was what is now the kitchen and the living room. My mother told stories about her brother’s friends spending the nights out there on an occasional weekend and scaring themselves with ghost stories. My dad told the story of Pa shooting his shotgun in the air to scare off teenagers who were stealing apples in the dark. (I’m not sure how he knew that one…)

Mom and Dad at Apple Hill, ca.1949

This is the first photograph I have of the cottage. It was taken either right before or right after my mom and dad were married. There are several things I love about this picture:

My mom is skinny. (She would love that!)
Their smiles.
My dad’s tie.
My mom’s hair style.
My dad holding a cigarette. (Oh the forties, when everyone smoked…)
The delphiniums (or foxgloves) blooming behind them.
They are so young…

Mom also told the story of The Accident. (Some details are sketchy because I heard this story when I was young and never thought to ask for specifics; now there’s no one to ask. There is a lesson here…)

She was a teenager, dressed up to go out on a date. Pa was working late out at the orchard — it was his second job, being a farmer. I don’t know why Mom was out on the farm in her “going out on a date” clothes, but that was the way she told it. Pa asked her to drive the tractor into the big barn while he rode on the back in the wagon. I imagine she wasn’t happy about driving the tractor in her good black and white plaid skirt. As she was driving, Pa reached down to do something with the connection between the two vehicles and his hand got caught. He screamed, but she couldn’t hear him in the noise of the tractor. Bleeding, they raced the four miles to the hospital in the truck–Mom driving– but Pa lost the top knuckle of his ring finger. Whenever we asked him about it, he would just shrug and say it was an accident. Mom was the one who told us how it happened.

Pa was a teacher, a principal, and he retired as the county superintendent of schools, but I remember him always dressed in his farming clothes. Dark green or gray matching shirt and pants — he wore the suit of manual labor as proudly as he wore his business suits. He let us kids ride in the back of the truck as he bounced around the orchard. And he built bleachers for the bushel baskets of apples around the large oak tree in the front yard. As kids, we used to run around the bleachers, jumping from level to level, listening to the zing of the boards as we landed.

This is the way the cottage looked as I remember it as a kid.

Aunt Mary and Uncle Leslie lived in the cottage from sometime in the fifties until around 1973. Aunt Mary sold the apples from the bleachers in the front yard. Water problems always haunted the cottage — there was a well in the side yard with a hand pump where Aunt Mary got water for cooking and drinking, and there was a cistern in the other side yard for non-potable water. Aunt Mary was an Italian farm girl married to a Welsh miner. When my dad died I found her naturalization papers in his desk drawer.

Later, probably after their son Bob was born, they made a small kid’s room in the living room and added a split level basement with a large back bedroom over the foundation. It has hardwood floors and early sixties type trim around the doors. Neighbor Betty has told us the story of a young Bob who was playing with matches in his bedroom (or maybe smoking?) and set part of his room on fire. He was so afraid of getting in trouble, he ran away — all the way to the big apple barn down the road. He was found later that day in the hay loft, where we were never allowed to go as kids. As we took off walls and plaster in the cottage living room, we thought we could see scorch marks on some of the ceiling joists. (Bob, if you’re out there reading this, please let us know your version.)

The little barn has a refrigerated basement and that’s where the cider was stored.
Joe and Clara built the little garden shed. This spring it will get a facelift with a window box and new paint.

Mr. H.C.’s mom and dad, Joe and Clara bought the orchard in 1973 from my grandfather who wanted to retire–at the age of 81. Clara told the story of Joe coming home and announcing that he was thinking of buying the orchard, and how would she like to move? When they went to see the cottage, Aunt Mary was there and not particularly welcoming to the people who would be buying her house. She had lived there for thirty plus years and was now going to have to move to an apartment in town. Clara was moving from the house where she had lived for almost twenty years –the house they had built, the house where she had raised her family — to a humble cottage in the country that needed repairing. Two women, two stories; if these walls could talk….

Joe and Clara took out the little bedroom and made a larger living/dining room. They also made the garage into the garage bedroom and enclosed the apple stand to make what they called The Gazebo. They took up the bleachers and made shelves along the walls for Clara’s treasures. It was called the Treehouse Yard Sale. treehouseyardsale2
We found this sign inside the Gazebo hanging on the old door. office hours
It is totally Joe’s corny humor and we smile every time we read it.

And we found this on the back side of the step that goes down into the garage bedroom:We added our names next to theirs — with the date of Aug. 12, 2011.

Telling a story is like reaching into a granary full of wheat and drawing out a handful. There is always more to tell than can be told… —Wendell Berry in Jayber Crow.

87. The Accidental Demolition

November 13, 2013September 1, 2015 / Apple Hill Cottage / 13 Comments

The demolition of the mudroom was planned. We had important work to get finished before real winter starts. After all, mudrooms are the bridge between the real house and the outdoors. We bought and installed the new window, stripped the walls and ceiling, Mr. H.C. did the electrical work… and then somehow, we managed to skip the finishing part, and ended in the living room taking out the walls.

This happened because we accidentally bought a new living room window. We hadn’t planned it this soon — the living room was to be later — but we all know what happens to plans…

Window trim pulled off led to a smell, that led to tearing off old paneling, that led to plaster that wasn’t worth saving, that led to finding no insulation in the walls, that led to bare studs in the living room…

And these are the lovely windows that started the accidental demolition of the living room.

They look pretty from the inside as well, despite the fact that they grace a stud wall.

These were three individual windows that were connected at the factory, I think for the sole purpose of making them heavier. Although we only had to install one window, it took four people to shove that window in the empty space. Thank you Matt and Joanna!

And just so you remember what it used to look like:

and from a distance, the old and the new:

The gray cedar shakes will be replaced with white cove siding that matches what is on the house already. I’d really like to get rid of the brick as well, but the idea of actually taking it off, makes me shudder. I’d like to talk Mr. H.C. into ~~painting it~~ letting me paint it, but that’s a long shot…

The rest of the yews are going too. Those two in the middle that are gone? Mr. H.C.’s tractor couldn’t even pull them out! He hacked at them with a chain saw and the roots are still there. Now we’ve got a new saying — tough as an old yew…

These sliding glass doors are next:

And they are going to be as tough as an old yew to change…

86. Demolishing the strongholds

November 2, 2013September 1, 2015 / Apple Hill Cottage / 11 Comments

We strapped on our armor this past week. We were doing battle.

safety glasses and masks

Against the creatures who have lived and died in our walls.

What is living in the walls of your house? The better question might be phrased What is dead in the walls of your house?

It isn’t pretty, and it isn’t picture-worthy. What? You say, you don’t really want to see pictures of Dead mice, Old nests, Dead ladybugs, Old hickory nut shells, Scat, and Spiders? Throw in dirty insulation, rusty nails, and forty-year old newspapers that have been stapled to the walls? And dust, lots and lots of plaster dust…

Lesson learned: If your house is neglected, unwanted creatures will move in to dwell with you.

I actually wished that the newspapers were in better shape — I love looking at old newspaper ads and reading articles from the seventies would be fun. But the newspapers were of the sort that couldn’t be touched without gloves — heavy duty work gloves, that is.

This newspaper is dated March 14, 1974.

I have stopped dithering about what is to be done next and decided to just go with what is. Or what will be? Everything we do to this old cottage is an improvement; so does it matter if one project isn’t quite finished before we start the next? Or, more accurately, does it matter how many rooms are torn up in the effort to finish them all?

Lesson learned: Demolition of walls is only fun once it is done.

The view from the living room through the holes. The mudroom has already been gutted; the living room is on its way….

The holes in the mudroom lead into the living room. An air conditioner was once there; a log box for storage and easy access for fireplace logs was once there too. Now they are just gaping holes that have to be repaired. Wiring is another issue. The wiring in the living room is just hodge-podged up there and has to be fixed. The electric panel is in the mudroom, and right now with those holes between the two rooms, it is a perfect time to rewire the living room too.

When we bought the window for the mudroom a few weeks ago, we also ordered a new series of windows for the living room. (Can’t pass up a sale on Anderson windows!) In order to take out the large window in the living room to replace it, we had to take off the current trim and a bit of the old paneling. Once we had some of the paneling off, there was a terrible stench. We have had bad smells at this place pretty often; we have torn up carpet, peeled off wallpaper, and scrubbed walls to get rid of smells. This one was very bad, so we had to keep tearing out to find the root of the evil, er…the smell.
Living room wall demolition

We are now down to bare studs on the living room wall. (We were hoping this wasn’t the plan…) But three dead mice later, the smell is gone. So now insulation is a necessity too.

Lesson learned: Every part of a house is interconnected.

We thought we would be doing this cottage one room at a time. It’s easier to manage that way; it’s easier to think about one room at a time. But the inter-connectedness of the wiring, walls, roofline, ceilings — all makes that impossible to do. And I’m okay with that — finally.

My post on the finishing of the kitchen that is ready to be published? It will just have to wait. And that’s okay too. After all, the whole house has to be finished for us to get featured on This Old House anyway. 😀

Lovely expensive sheers (K-mart special) hanging next to bare stud walls and insulation. Is this like leather and lace?

There are many lessons in this post, but these three should be repeated:

If you neglect your house, unwanted creatures will move in to dwell with you.
Your house is interconnected; it can’t be dealt with one room at a time.
Demolish the strongholds of ugly stuff today; the longer you wait, the bigger the job.