Posts made by author 'Paige O. Roberts'
19
Heating And Cooling In The Northeast
The weather has been hot lately, with no end (or rain) in sight. On one hand, it's a nice break from the early summer rainfall we were seeing through June and most of July, with thunderstorms rolling through every single weekend, but it feels a little unbearable to exist in temperatures hitting over 90 degrees every day. I am not much of an outdoorsy person in the summertime anyway, but even the most simple tasks like preparing to take recycling and garbage to the dump can feel like something better suited for the early morning or late afternoon, just to avoid even fifteen minutes of walking to and from the car and house in the heat.
I recently met some folks from Arizona, and they were commenting that even though th...
5
Cleaning House
I am in my declutter era—that goes for my house, mind, email inbox, and Facebook friend list. It is so easy to just become surrounded by stuff, even when you're trying to be intentional about doing the exact opposite. Recently, I cleaned out a kitchen drawer that had become a graveyard for plastic grocery bags. Some had receipts in them from almost 10 years ago! The truth is, I hadn't added to that plastic bag stockpile for some time—since the local food co-op stopped offering them and reusable bags have become the norm—but I also never got rid of them either, for fear of being wasteful. It took all of 10 minutes to take them out of the drawer and Google a place nearby to recycle them. I couldn't believe how much lighter I felt after that, and that is what kicked off this decluttering journey.
28
A Dog's First Home
Recently, I met someone who relocated to the area from Boston. She was younger than me; maybe in her mid-twenties. When I asked what brought her north, she smiled and excitedly told me that she just couldn't wait to get out of the city and give her dog a backyard to play in. She has no ties to the area, but started looking for houses and found exactly what she wanted, and went for it. I was touched by that answer, and also totally impressed by it.
It's no secret that on average, people are waiting to buy homes longer than they did in years past. There are many reasons for that, but the trending delay in big life milestones like mar...
20
Well Water Testing
I recently met some folks who moved to the area a few years ago, and were telling me about how they took part in a townwide survey-type project regarding well water testing. I don't know all of the details, but it sounded like they were invited to participate in a free testing as part of a research project regarding well water in their area. It sounded fairly simple; they had to collect some samples, send them off, and wait for the results to come back in a few weeks.
One of my favorite parts of my house is that it has its own well and the water straight out of the tap tastes so good. I've never given much thought beyond how good it tastes, and never wondered why. But after talking to these people about their well water testing project, it got me thinking: I have never had my well water tested in the twelve years I've lived in my house. I know for sure when I bought it, there was some sort of disclosure regarding the well water testing and that the results didn't show anything abnormal, but I can't recall when that testing actually took place prior to me purchasing my house.
12
Thoughts on Downsizing
When I was in college, and for some time afterward, I did a lot of house and pet sitting. I loved it; I can remember describing it as being paid to go on vacation. For weeks at a time, I would stay in these homes that had so many more comforts and amenities than my own: cable or satellite television, washers and dryers that weren't in creepy basements, dishwashers, and huge showers with stone floors and built-in steam settings. Some houses only had a few of these luxuries, but a couple houses I watched had them all.
One house in particular was especially fancy, in my opinion. It had a beautifully manicured lawn, with a century-old apple orchard on site. When the owner first gave me a tour prior to me staying there, we spent about two hours going from room to room as I learned the history of the property and the house. The home had been in her fa...