Rocco's Three Year Session | The Broken House, Social Circle, Ga.

Y’all, isn’t he so perfect! I know I phrased that as if it were a question but really, that’s a southern statement!! ;)

This Sunday, after 125 days of not attending church due to the virus, we made our way back. It was so wonderful to walk through those doors and be greeted by my friends! Honestly, it doesn’t seem like I’ve missed out on much - other than human contact of course. Our church has done such a great job of keeping everyone connected through our online service and our pastor reaching out to check on us. It felt like we picked up where we left off.

After service, we headed over to the “Broken House”. We changed Rocco’s clothes and handed him all his tools he got for his birthday. He didn’t skip a beat, or ask any questions, he got straight to work!

And, he knew exactly what to do!

He talks about the Broken House all he time! He actually calls it the “BOken House”. That “R” is no where to found yet. He talks about how he wants to fix it. Today, we are having insulation done, so we knew we had to get him over to the house to get some work done. It was the cutest, most adorable thing to watch our sweet baby boy work on the broken house. Trey and I followed him around and just let him do his thing all while snapping tons of photographs. I’m over sharing it all because, well, I just need to document how adorable he is!

His sweet little dirty face. Those cute little knuckle dimples. That crazy blonde hair. All that baby squish! I can’t get enough of it! And, I know it won’t last forever. In my last blog post (click here), I shared how I love to pray over our babies. Since then, it hit me. . .I need to pray that God will show Trey and I how to raise our babies so that we are supporting His needs for them in this world. I don’t want to interfere with God’s Will for our babies. I want to raise them in a way that supports God’s Will for their lives.

The past 18 years of my life have flown by. . .Trey and I celebrated our 18th wedding anniversary this past July 4th. 18 years. It’s crazy how fast that came! Before we know it, we will have an 18 year old. Lord, please let us hold on to these babies as long as we can and raise them in a way that pleases you!

Okay, I’m done being a gushy mommy! Well, maybe! Check out that adorable tool belt!

Two Chimneys on Cherokee - Week One

Today marks owning our new home for eight days! We’ve had so much great progress and learned so much about our 110 year old home. We had to make the decision to gut it. That was so hard for me. We didn’t have any intention of doing that and that most certainly wasn’t in our completion time line or budget either. Once we got to peeling back layers, I was very happy with this decision. The hardest part about this was the trim! Every single window had different trim around it. I loved that! It was similar but not the same. We are trying to decide if we will recreate that aspect of the house.

As you will notice, as you look through the photographs, all of the exposed wood. The house appears to have been built out of old barn wood. The braces that hold up the corners are very unique too. It’s so interesting seeing how they built this place. There are NO headers over any door or window. It’s as if the structure above is so solid there was no need for them because we haven’t found any sagging anywhere. We do plan on having this checked out to confirm before we keep on trucking! After uncovering the walls, you will see they are covered in old boards of every kind. They weren’t picky at all. It’s as if they just used what they could find.

Other fun things we’ve found:
- knob and tube wiring that was still being used
- electrical problems galore! The house should have burned to the ground!
- no insulation in the exterior walls
- rotten windows
- rotten front porch
- news paper articles
- so much wallpaper

The MOST exciting thing about gutting the house, we will now have ELEVEN foot ceilings! Whoa! We were told that back in the day, houses had really high ceilings and they dropped them to 8’ or 9’ foot to cut back on the expense of their heating and air bills. We plan on restoring that feature in every room!

We’ve also found two door ways that were covered up. A fifth fireplace that was covered up and unfortunately partially removed. Also, the front door windows were covered up for some reason. We plan on restoring the front door sidelights! It’s going to bring in so much extra natural light.

We’ve had lots of progress in the yard too! My nephew and father-in-law stopped by to help us pull up the nandinas that had gotten out of control and all the overgrown shrubs are gone too. We can finally see all of the house! We also had an arborist take control of the trees! It was so sad, but one of the trees, a pecan, was growing right up against the house. It was so beautiful but was so unsafe and had to go.

I had to give our sweet new home a name. . .it’s so perfect too!

Two Chimneys on Cherokee

I created an Instagram account to document our progress. You can find it here if you would like to follow along.

Unexpected. . .

This year, Trey and I had plans to build our dream home on beautiful land that we found right here in our favorite town of Social Circle, Georgia. We were less than a week from signing the paperwork for our construction loan to build and then, our loan officer called to let us know that due to Covid-19 and the uncertainty of our economy, he was dropping our loan. Devastation doesn’t even give my feelings justice. Angry doesn’t even begin to describe how bad it hurt. It’s not easy selling a house filled with 14 years worth of memories, three babies, five goat girls, three dogs and two cats. It’s easier when you know you have a “dream come true” waiting at the end of all the hard work. When he dropped our loan, and our dream all seemed to disappear.

BUT, God had other plans for us!

That same week, I received a text from my mother-in-law, Taryn, and Trey, my husband, within a 30 minute time frame. They both texted me a photo of a house that had just come on the market and then Zillow notified me of this same house!! Before I could respond to their text messages, Trey messaged to let me know that we were going the next day, Saturday, to walk through the house with our agent.

The house had only been on the market for less than 48 hours when we looked it over for the first time. We walked outside and we both knew it was for us! The house had several other offers come through that weekend and when we placed our offer, I honestly didn’t think we would get it! But of course, we drew up the plans and got estimates just in case! That Monday, March 16th, they accepted our offer and we were UNDER CONTRACT!

I’ve been praying, pretty specifically, that God would place our family where HE needs us! In a place where we would be suited best for HIS needs. 434 S. Cherokee Road is the place! It caught us both by surprise and was totally unexpected. But, we welcome it and can’t wait to dig in!

You know me! I had a photoshoot planned out the day of our closing! I immediately ordered the cute door mat from Amazon (click here for link), swung by the storage unit and picked up all my lanterns and rocking chairs so that we could decorate for photos! I’ve been going a bit nutty not being able to do photography sessions or weddings for my clients. I’m a “non-essential” over here that’s going bananas! This was so fun, even if I had to take my own photographs! I hope you enjoy the tour of our “before” the restoring begins!!

Here is our 1910 Workingman’s Foursquare Revival!!

What do you think?! Do you see what we see?! I might have an obsession over all the door hardware! It reminds me so much of my Papaw’s house in Avondale Estates. I can’t wait to share the restoration of this home as Trey and I bring it up to code and back to life!!

P.S. Don’t judge my Covid-19 roots, the Covid-19lbs I’ve gained or the fact that it looks like I’m on my cell phone the entire photo shoot!! lol I used my phone as a wireless trigger and well the rest is Covid’s fault!