In the Middle-of-Somewhere

House Hunting - Alabama Style!

Day Two - How fun it is to wake up hearing the sounds of a baby happily jabbering away in the morning! Elijah is an early riser and completely content to spend time in his crib before the rest of the household rises. We could listen in on him through the baby monitor in the living room. The temptation to get him out of the crib was great, but we didn't want to be in trouble on our first morning.

Paul has Wednesdays off so he agreed to accompany us on our house hunt, along with Elijah. The tour today focused on area East of Birmingham:

• Leeds
• Irondale
• Cedar Point (East side)

While we looked at many houses, the one we liked the best from today's search was 6596 SW Lynn Ave, Leeds.  It's a foreclosure home, so poses some special issues as far as timing (no control over what a bank will or will not agree to for closing dates.)  

We like that this home has three nice sized bedrooms, two baths, and a family room, (in addition to a living room, dining roomkitchen, and a full basement.) It sits on a beautiful lot with a strong slope in the back so spring rain water has a definite place to go. There is a deck just off the kitchen wrapping around to the back and lots of old growth trees ... shouldn't be hard to find a place for the tire swing!  Just down the street is a beautiful park and the church is only 15 miles away.

I think it's fun that the street just south of the house is Katherine St.,  the street just north of the house is Carolyn St. and to the east is Elisabeth St. ... all familiar names (my mother and her two sisters!)

Drawbacks include a water/mold problem in the basement just under the front doorsteps (probably requiring some landscaping modifications and mold abatement). The living room and dining room need wallpaper removal and fresh paint, the kitchen needs to be gutted and redesigned (luckily we have great access with a fabulous cabinet maker!), the big bathroom needs to be gutted and have some redesign work done, the family room needs the dark paneling to be painted and we think the basement steps would need to be moved in order to make the kitchen work. THAT is a pretty long list!

In addition, Bruce would want to extend the parking slab to include room for the trailer and other misc odd vehicles we seem to have off and on. Then he would be converting the basement (which is exposed in the back) into his workshop, including the addition of a basement bathroom.

It's all do-able, but ... gives us reason to pause.