Dream Come True: Part 1

If one could engineer a really practical social network by forming personal relationships based on skills and experience rather than say, affection and mutual interest, I would make sure to have a doctor, lawyer, accountant, financial advisor, computer geek, photographer, and mechanic at all of my holiday parties. I married for love, but as it happens, I also struck gold.

My husband will tell you he is a carpenter, but in fact, he's a miracle worker. (He'd probably object to that term, which is funny because he isn't at all modest.) He prefers working with wood, but can in fact do just about anything related to houses, and then some. He can tile, finish drywall, replace a roof, fix a plumbing problem, add new electrical circuits, install floors, cabinets and light fixtures, patch brick, pour concrete, build decks - in short, he's the ultimate jack of all trades when it comes to building and remodeling. He's even an inspired space designer, and has good, if traditional taste.

You can just imagine how useful he is to have around. He is the reason we were able to afford our first house, because we could look at the fixer-upper we found in our price range as a creative project, rather than a leaky, outdated dump. Together we worked long hours and went on a lot of dates to Home Depot. But while I'm pretty good with my hands (if I don't say so myself) my husband was the one who really made it happen, with his know-how, experience, skill, and blinding speed. Sometimes it was best for me to just step back and let him work his magic.

That house is a labor of love for us and contains a lot of our personal history. We were married in the back yard under the big maple tree. We invested countless hours of our lives together in its transformation. We planned and got dirty and were creative. We nested.

Last year, we welcomed a baby girl into our little world. And our cozy little home was ready for her, thanks to her father.

While we were preparing to be parents, my own parents decided (under heavy pressure from yours truly) to move to the area in order to be close to their granddaughter. We went house shopping for them, realizing as we did so just how lucky we were to live where we do, in the house that we had re-shaped to be exactly what we wanted. The market was full of unaffordable houses, and the few that met our criteria of price and function needed work. It was a familiar story to us, though we weren't as eager this time around to acquire a house that needed that much effort.

One day, when I was quite pregnant, my husband came home and announced that he had found a very intriguing house, and I should come look at it with him. We hopped in the car, drove a few minutes away, and that is when I first beheld our dream home.

Remember that my husband Roger is a miracle worker, and you might be able to see the rainbows shooting out of those broken windows and the unicorns cavorting on the lawn. You see them don't  you?