The Blue House

The blue house. To many it's a house, to me it's a home a story to tell.

I'll never forget the day we bought this house. Dave and I were newlyweds, 23 years old living in Washington, D.C. I was desperately homesick and Dave was loving the city. In typical Dave fashion he told me if moving back to Ohio was what I wanted he would go. Dave stayed back in DC to finish work and I started my search.

We had been paying $1,200.00 a month for a one bedroom apartment in DC about a mile from the Lincoln Memorial. We really thought we had moved up in the world because we now had a stacked washer and dryer. We were living the life. Upon returning I soon realized we could really be living large. For what we paid in DC we could live in a house. A real house!

This little blue house was the first and only house I looked at. I called Dave on the phone and said "I bought  house!" He asked me to repeat myself and I did. He said "Did you pay full price?" I proudly responded "I sure did!" That was the beginning.

I've always liked to learn my lessons the hard way. Not only did I pay full price, the plaster walls were covered with wallpaper and updates were non-existent. I never asked about the furnace, HVAC...what is that? All I saw was a beautiful house just dying to be given a little TLC. I could see the potential so clearly.

16 years later it's the house I saw and the home I wanted. Every nook and cranny has been filled and dreams have become reality.

This home has seen the birth of two beautiful girls, the coming and going of jobs and the completion of higher education, friends and family from near and far, holiday spectaculars, sadness, love and loss. Truly, if these walls could talk the stories they would tell.

My dad, Tom Lolan, is a fine art photographer. Quite frankly one of the most brilliant photographers I've ever seen. I asked him to photograph our home so that we could have a keepsake as we depart. We had a make-shift dark room in our basement when we were growing up. I'm probably one of the few people who enjoy and become nostalgic at the scent of film processing chemicals. Dad used to have contact sheets laying around everywhere. I would analyze each sheet and examine the small and large nuances of each image. The picture below reminds me of contact sheet where every image comes together and shows unity. The pictures represented are his work and I view them as art.

Our home has been a work of art and creative expression. I hope you will continue to follow our journey as we form a new beginning in Lake Mills, Wisconsin. A new home comes with hope and promise and I believe it will exceed our dreams once again.

I hope you enjoy viewing the home we created and the beautiful photography elements. Until I can get music to my site I highly recommend clicking on a new tab and listening to New Slang, by the Shins while watching this slideshow because the song rocks and the auditory stimulation is pretty excellent to go along! Here's to looking forward...