Bye Bye Home Sweet Home

A special era came to end for Kara and me today.   We sold our old house, the home where we spent the first years of our life together. 

It was the summer of 2000 when I moved into the historic brownstone in downtown Hartford.   The first meal in the new pad was pizza…..Kara and I sat  on the floor of an empty place with nary a stick of furniture in sight:  no curtains, nothing.    It was the beginning of a period in our life we will never forget.

That home was the scene of  Thanksgiving celebrations, family Christmas gatherings, a baby shower, engagement party, a magazine shoot, lots of painting, renovations, barbecues, going away bashes, pool matches and our traditional St. Patrick’s Day Parade parties.    The parade went right by our front steps.  

 We watched the First Night fireworks from our living room and often just kicked back and gazed at the skyline.    The views were amazing.

In early 2007 we took Helena home from the hospital to the brownstone to a nursery Kara designed and I painted.   It was featured in the Hartford Courant along with our colleagues Rebecca Stewart and Jamie Muro who also did the nursery thing for their son Charlie.    We had planned on Helena growing up in the brownstone until reality started setting in. 

The home had plenty of room and we loved the convenience of being able to walk to restaurants, concerts, events and for many years, work.   It had character everywhere including  multi-level rooms with 12 foot ceilings which unfortunately meant  lots of stairs.   I counted them once:  67 steps from the sidewalk to the top floor.    It didn’t phase us for years until we had to carry a baby up those stairs and a stroller, and a car seat, and the all the baby stuff.  Plus, we wanted to have a another baby so double the load!  

We also started to think we needed a yard with a swingset and other family types of things.   Life changes and your needs change.  It was time to say goodbye to downtown living.  

After we moved, we rented the place to two young professional women, and now we have sold the brownstone to an awesome couple who fell in love with the place just like we did.    They are the latest in a long string of people who called the brownstone home.  The first owner in 1871 was William Hamersley,  who later became a Connecticut Supreme Court Justice.    Like us, they all made memories in the brownstone.   The owner before us had their son’s briss in the dining room!

We wish the new owners  years of happiness in a home that made us so happy.     Who knows….when our kids are grown and off to college, maybe we’ll move back downtown.

About these ads