And So It Began On Mechanic Street...

Well I finally managed to get my act together and created this Blog - so welcome!

I thought this would be a great way to keep family and friends near and far up-to-date on what Larry and I have been up to in Illinois – so ‘hello’ to all back in Connecticut, Montana, Nova Scotia, Malta and parts in-between. I/we hope that you will enjoy our Blog – in fact, we hope you visit often and post comments!

What prompted me to start this Blog? Well, those that know me well know that I LOVE pretty much anything that has to do with interior design and houses (I should have stock in HGTV!). So when we moved from our loft in Evanston to Crystal Lake, we had our work cut out for us. We were so lucky with the loft because when we moved in, we literally just put up pictures where there were holes; it was that turnkey.

That was however, not the case with our place in Crystal Lake. Larry and I love older homes because of the character, but our 1920s farmhouse located in our city’s downtown, somehow had a lot of the character snuffed out of it over the years. Actually, I’m embarrassed to admit that when we bought the house I think both of us thought the other really wanted it and said “let’s do it!” I think we were both shocked that the price was less than our loft and the taxes were so much lower that well, we went for it.

When we moved in I suddenly felt like “gee, it’s cute on the inside, relatively speaking, but the outside, sure does look like it was wrapped in aluminum” – which in fact, it was. As such, we had/have our work cut out for us. But truly, we’re so happy here, you’d pretty much have to drag us out of here to move us.

So, we’d like to fill you in on what we’ve done so far to the house and our life in general – hopefully we have enough adventures going on to have updates. So here goes…

One final note – the posting title references Mechanic Street, which was the original name of our street when the land was a pickle factory years ago. I like it because it harkens back to yesteryear and well, that was our goal with the house…bringing it back with some character. I’m hoping were doing that.

Enjoy!