If These Walls Could Speak
When we were first looking at this house we wondered the same thing all potential homebuyers wonder…Why did they move? It turns out, that was an easy question to get answered: After 10 years the previous family had grown out of the house.
This house? Who can grown OUT of THIS house? It’s almost three times the size of the house I grew up in!
Turns out…they had eight kids. EIGHT. And oddly? Something about that made me love the house more. I think of all of the joyful chaos three kids brings into my life and I think that these walls held almost three times that. I look at the chunks out of the kitchen cabinets and I wonder how many trucks rolling across the kitchen floor made those? I look at dents in drywall and imagine some sort of wrestling match or tickle torture session. I fall back on that fact a lot when we’re talking wear and tear on this home: Well, there were eight kids living here. It explains stains on the carpet and loose handrails on the stairs. It probably explains why we got the house for $60/sq ft – because how can you afford the time or the cost of making a house perfect that has contained EIGHT WILD ANIMALS. You can’t. And I see the signs and I smile.
Like all of the goodies the landscapers dug up in our flowerbeds this week. All of the things left behind to become a type of Playschool Compost.
This? Is a Pokemon ball. It brought me total flashbacks from E’s youth.
I mean – this is all stuff they gave up on. With 8 kids – how can you keep track of missing shoes or toys? Seeing these things makes me wonder if any of our missing items from the old house could be found under the dirt somewhere in our yard.
When we met the couple at closing, the wife was pregnant. (NUMBER NINE.) She was about the size of my pinky finger and gorgeous. Kinda made me hate her a little. But I looked at her and the most surprising feeling crossed my mind: Jealousy. Not because she was so tiny even pregnant with her ninth kid. Not because she dressed nice and knew how to put on makeup. No, I was jealous because of her eight nine kids. Not that I’ve ever wanted that many kids, it’s a thought that has never crossed my mind, but I imagine the joy and fun and vitality one child brought into my life for 10 years, and now I have that times three. So, looking at that Mom-to-be-again, I kinda wish I had it times eight nine.
I know the reality is with 8 times the joyful chaos, comes 8 times the PAINFUL chaos. If someone offered me a family of 8 kids today? I’d punch them in the face and run in the opposite direction as fast as my feet could carry me. But it’s still fun to think about. Never a dull or lonely moment. I feel the energy in this house sometimes, when it’s quiet. Like the wall are bursting with the laughs and screams of the family before. It’s a neat feeling and I hope that as the years go on, the walls continue to hold the joys of our family.
But maybe the house will let us keep our shoes.
Oh! I never thought to look UNDERGROUND for the kids’ missing shoes!! I’m going to try that next time!
Wow… that’s a lot of shoes to be left in a flower bed but with eight kids who would keep up. I loose my kids shoes all the time and i only have two
on another note thats what i love but older houses… when you cook makes you wander what they ate at dinner, or where they put the christmas tree, and i love when you find old growth charts on the walls or door frames…
They were BURIED in the dirt? I’m trying to wrap my head around exactly how that happened…
Wow, I never even imagined that you could lose shoes and toys underground like that. But I never even imagined having nine kids either. Yikes!
I don’t envy the woman for having nine kids but I do envy the patience she must have to be able to raise nine kids. I’d like to have one more sometimes but I don’t think I could take eight more!
That’s beautiful to hear~the walls hold laughter ^^
I saw a family at our neighborhood pool on Sunday with 8 or 9 kids (I could not really count for sure while watching my 2), I had the same feelings you did. I expecting my third in 3 weeks. This will be our last. I’m 42, my husband is 48. We joke that we are lucky we didn’t meet ten years earlier because we would have a dozen kids. Sometimes, I think that wouldn’t be so bad.
my boyfriend is the 8th of 9 kids…with a big gap in between the first 5 and the last 4.
Yeah I agree, it seems weird that shoes and toys could be buried in dirt… how did they get there? One thought is a dog who loves to bury things. Not all dogs are that way, but it’s one idea. For that matter knowing how little kids like to dig in dirt and how bigger ones sometimes hide siblings belongings for spite, that might be another way.
Does the family still live nearby? I’d be tempted to call them to let them know that a bunch of their stuff had been found. Single shoes probably aren’t of much use, but with that many kids, some of those items might be hand-me-down-able!
I love the photos you took of the old forgotten items.
It just seems nice when a house has a happy history.
that was a lovely entry…i am pregnant with twins which will bring our total to 3 and that makes me so happy
to think of 8…WOW!
That is a really interesting way to think of all the wear and tear in the house.
oh my gosh i love these pictures. we have those pokemon balls on just about every flat surface of this house, and i found one out by the flower bed the other day
Here’s to many happy years for you at your new place!!!
I laughed out loud in this post. But my favorite part was the whole, ” … I’d punch them in the face and run in the other direction.” Priceless!!!
I originally wanted to have 6 children. I always wanted that full house of laughter feeling. I grew up in the 70′s & 80′s and back then everyone, it seemed, had big families. I was an only child and let me tell you it had a lot of benefits, lol But I also remember the downsides.
After time, maturity and some good life experience… I am SO grateful that I stopped at 4 kids, lol! They are enough to fill our home with laughter, as well as, insanity and a wide assortment of challenges, lol.
Love this post! The idea of houses taking on the characteristics of their families makes me so nostalgic. I get teary when I see an old house fallen down or being demolished. That was somebody’s life! So many people’s stories were written inside that house.
I crave the walls full of laughter, too. We have an only daughter (so far) and though she brings joy and laughter, I want that times two. or three.
Love it.
ps. i hope they house lets you keep your shoes, too. maybe it just needs a good de-gnoming.