So the decision is made

Originally, we took the house on as a project. Sam's dad bought the property. We were going to rehab the house, possibly divide the property. Maybe build a home up in one corner and hopefully make a little money in the meantime.

Only one problem.....I fell in love with the house. From the first time I saw it, I just felt like it was meant to be ours. We drove up the driveway (no small feat in itself - that's the driveway in the picture) - I saw the exterior of the house and garage, looked at all the trees and saw nothing but potential. When I shared my thoughts with Sam, he laughed! He thought I was kidding. When he shared them with his dad, he thought I was nuts! But I managed to convince Sam, and his dad, that I really wanted to see if we could get everything to work out and make this our home.

Knowing that we have lived in nothing but brand new, built for us, by us, new homes for the past 35 years should give you an idea of what we have come to expect in a house. We like our space. We like roomy rooms, an oversized office, big showers, kitchens with cabinets and countertops to spare, a triple car garage, extra guest rooms and storage, storage, storage. Well, let's see, we have, let me think - none of those. But what we do have is - cozy rooms that felt like home from the minute we moved in, 2+ acres of fruit trees, grapes, kiwis, blackberries, ivy, dogwoods, redwoods and more to explore with the grandkids, and an ongoing project that has no end in sight.

So we dug in - no literally, we dug our way in, and started working on the place to see if it was even salvageable.

Another view of the driveway

                                           The garage

The Adventure Begins

I've been saying for almost a year now that I would blog about this adventure/project we have undertaken, so here goes. I am somewhat intimidated at the thought of writing something for others to read but I decided it is not as intimidating as deciding to take on this house when we first saw it. Now, you have to agree it is adorable from the front .. outside .. lots of potential, don't you think??

So, a little background to get started.....We have been in the construction business for 35+ years building new homes. Along the way we have built 8 brand new homes for ourselves. Almost every time the house was a little bigger and a little nicer. We loved having a big house where everyone could gather for birthdays, holidays or just the occasional long weekend. We have two married daughters and 7 amazing, wonderful, beautiful, happy grandchildren. (too many adjectives? I don't think so!!)

A couple years ago we started talking about downsizing - the house was a lot to take care of, the yard was a lot to take care of and did we really need almost 5,000 sq. ft. for just the two of us?? So we started talking about options and decided to keep our eyes open for an opportunity.

Well, opportunity showed up in early 2010 when Sam's dad came to us with a project to rehab an older house on 2.2 acres right in the middle of Tigard that we could get 'for a song'. Sounded like an amazing opportunity, so Sam went to take a look. A week or so later he got up enough courage to have me see it. We are still trying to decide if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

I decided on the blog title because this is the little house that could....
1. be brought back from the brink of being demolished
2. be cleared of all the critters who had found shelter here
3. be restored to some of its former beauty

But most of all.... this is the little house that could become a home again!!!