Luckily, we found our barbie dream house... or at least someone with the plans for it who would agree to build it for us. But before we found our builder and plan, we were a little unsure if we would ever find a home exactly like what we had imagined and talked about for our first three years together while living in a rental home. We had hoped to find a pre-existing home so that we wouldn't have to W A I T F O R E V E R for it to be built or deal with the headache of building, but despite TONS of home tours (thanks James Hutson! (our super patient realtor)), we never found anything that quite had that ju ne sais quoi.
This may be because we had a very lengthy list of criteria for the dream house and having waited this long, were more than willing to hold out until we found the right house. When you have three years to daydream about something, you kinda get into specifics in your head. Below is the wish-list we walked into our home search with:
Ross:
Appx. one acre or more
Naples Sunroom
Three garages
Convenient Location (since he grew up in the uber convenient Houston, he's used to being able to get to the grocery store - or Home Depot in his case - in a matter of minutes)
European Style
8 foot garage doors (so that his trailer and truck can fit in the garage if need be)
Backyard flat enough/big enough to accomodate a pool
Home located in North Raleigh (we immediately fell in love with the area)
Non-cramped shower (didn't have to be huge, but Ross got pretty tired of our super cramped 2 ft x 2 ft shower in Houston)
Oil rubbed bronze fixtures, hinges, knobs and pulls
Whitney:
Huge closet (since closet space (or lack thereof) has been a lifelong, eternally taxing battle for this barbie)
Ornate foyer
Formal living room
European or Georgian style
Backyard flat enough/big enough to accomodate a pool
Open floorplan for parties (i.e. Christmas parties)
Dynamic facade/roofline
Long dining room
A neighborhood good for walking (my only form of exercise)
Lots of trees (I missed them while we were in Houston)
Home located in North Raleigh (we immediately fell in love with the area)
Non-white trim work (I preferred ivory or almond)
Lots of good Christmas tree corners (for my Christmas tree problem)
Oil rubbed bronze ("ORB") fixtures, hinges, knobs and pulls
Two front doors (since I have two of every wreath I own) (*this isn't a guarantee at this point... still working on it :( )
Antique white cabinets with ORB pulls and knobs and a fab oven hood
To our great fortune, we were able to find almost all of these things in the Country Manor! The few things the plan didn't feature, the builder was able to add or modify for us, although we're still hammering out the details on the closet and the double front doors (they want $4,500 for this option so we're looking into cheaper alternatives). Now the builder just needs to get the show on the road!
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