Thursday, August 15, 2013

Number one son called after...



He had emailed us a copy of the architect’s blueprints of his home design to us in a PDF file; he already owns the acre plus of land that it will be built on. It will be his third home. His county is quite strict about all building requirements and only 'professionals' can do any of it that is card carrying ones.

Hubby had eight years of drafting between high school and college and so when we built our home in New Jersey. He drew up the blueprints and they were accepted by the building department without any difficulty, accordingly for our 3200 square foot bi-level home that we had five bedrooms and three baths in, a very large eat in kitchen, a formal dining room and two fireplaces, with two car garage and was on nearly an acre of land and it took from fall 1978 to spring of 1979 to complete; mostly due to building during a fairly harsh winter, but we were also the building contractors too!

Florida has more extreme laws for building and you need a permit for just about anything here and so we had many projects that were done and with our three homes, since we moved down here and all those renovations. So that is why while being here we purchased all three of our homes had already existed we didn’t want or need the hassle of building from the ground up again and we just added on to or updated a bath or kitchen wise and added a couple of pools. Although, our second home, the one on the east coast we added on a third bathroom with a bonus room of a total of 672 square additional feet, 24’ X 28’, making it just under 3500 square feet in total. That home had four bedrooms and two baths originally with a formal dining room and den with a fireplace as well as ceiling to floor bookcases. We had closed in that screen porch and bumped it out a bit too due to here most of them become mold issues, so that’s why we never leave them as screen rooms. 
That house originally had two sky lights, one in the kitchen and one in the master-bath and we added four in the bonus room and another in the additional bath! That big room had a fifteen foot half round wet bar/sink with an ice machine and freezer, bar frig and extra microwave. Our sons had a commercial grade pool table in there and a table in another corner for cards or board games, not to mention the enormous speakers for our stereo. The boys would have twenty-five friends over on the weekend for dancing and we would put plywood over the pool table with two table cloths as well to be a server for snacks and we served only soft drinks. Hubby and I would watch movies in our bedroom and check every once and a while on the kids. The bathroom that was added had a shower and a door to go out to the pool or to come in from the beach, since this home was one house from Ocean Shore Blvd. or A1A, right across from the Atlantic Ocean. Many of our sons’ friends slept over to go surfing early the next day, how I miss those days. We also had a boat, a Bayliner, brand new in 1987 that they would also water ski from in the Halifax River that was on the other side of us; we lived on an island with a bridge to go over to us. They also enjoyed beach volley ball, tennis, hand ball etc…Those were the years we also received lotsa company from up north; relatives and friends staying with us and we loved it! We were only an hour and half from Disney and most all amusements, in Ormond Beach, next door to Daytona, in fact our sons went to high school a few miles from out home in Daytona, Seabreeze, across from the ocean too…and the airport expanded while we were living there, to an international, it and Daytona Raceway were only ten miles from out home.

That’s what number one’s home plan spurred in me, those memories, sorry I went off on a tangent, but I so often do.
His home for a single guy again will be a three bedroom split plan, his last one did too, meaning the master will have the one bath while the two smaller bedrooms will share the second one in between, a great room from the large open kitchen and front and back porches, a nice touch.
His girlfriend is not only is a psychologist, but a landlord and owns about a half dozen rental homes in central Florida that are all rented for quite a few years!
So they have separate homes, but travel often together. Since they are both in their forties and it’s none of my business, really! I only know what I am told.

Gosh, I have gone on and on once again from just one germ of a thought, I bet you’re happy we are not talking in person, since you wouldn’t get a word in edgewise.

Any-who, on that note of fond memories allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night and ask you to kindly count all your blessings, oops I first wrote memories, that too and share those overages with you know who and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!

PS thanks for being responsible for another blogging milestone for me:


That was earlier today; so by now I am sure it has even gone higher and thank you so much for that too! And please don’t hesitate to continue!

Speaking My Mind: Which way will the war go?

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