New Year's Resolutions

We thought we'd do something a little different this year.  Instead of the same old new year's resolutions (lose 10 pounds, read more, exercise, be more green) that get lost in the shuffle sometime around January 15th, we have decided to have joint "house" new year's resolutions.  And we are going to track our progress to make sure we keep them.  So, with nine hours to go before 2008, here are our "House New Year's Resolutions":

1.  Spend less money on house.
1 (a).  Do more of the home maintenance and landscaping ourselves.

2.  Lindsey will cook one meal without using the microwave.

3.  Replace bathroom fixtures because Evan hates them.

3 (a).  Evan to convince Lindsey that we should replace bathroom fixtures.

4.  Replace mudroom floor.

5.  Install dishwasher (this is Evan's number one 2008 goal, after world peace and redemption for his beloved Mets).

6.  Lindsey will try and go one weekend without checking email (this resolution does not apply to Evan, as he is physically incapable of not checking email).

7.  Memorize our CT phone number (Evan had to call his mom the other day when he needed to give someone our phone number).

8.  Invite more friends up for the weekend (with preference to those who comment on our blog).

9.  Lindsey is going to learn how to plant the flower box.

10.  We are going to mine all of our professional and personal contacts to try and get on one of the HGTV design shows that we recently discovered and are now addicted to.

11.  Lindsey is 100% committed to finally buying rugs for the living room, dining room and master bedroom.

12.  Blog more often!

Thanks to all of our readers and happy new year!

Posted by Evan and Lindsey

Sad News

Oscar Peterson, the great jazz pianist, died yesterday.  He was 82 years old.  Here's the article from the New York Times announcing his death.  He was one of the few heroes I have.

I guess you're wondering what his death has to do with this blog.  His 1964 CD "We Get Requests," specifically the songs "Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars," "Days of Wine and Roses" and "My One and Only Love" are my Madeleine (apologies to Marcel Proust).  No matter where I am, hearing these songs instantly takes me into my parents' living room when I was a kid.  It was their go-to CD for cocktail parties, dinner parties and other grownup functions.  I used to love it when that CD came on, because it meant something fun and adult was about to happen.

And then I got older, and it became MY go-to CD for pretty much everything.  And then I learned more about Oscar Peterson, the music he made and the technical master he was.  And studying him brought me to others, like Herb Ellis, Dizzy Gillespie, Roy Eldridge and one of my other heroes, Bill Evans.

Which brings me back to the house.  I wonder what, 20 or 30 years from now, will remind me of this house and right now.  Will fire remind me of the way the house smells when Lindsey makes a fire?  Or will random typing remind me of the sound of Lindsey typing in her office, writing her next book?  Or perhaps it will be rain, which will always remind me that it rained almost every weekend during the first summer we owned this house.

Either way, I know I'll be listening to Mr. Peterson, and I will be grounded--perhaps even comforted--by the history his music represents.

Posted by Evan

Snow is Less Fun When You're 33 and Own a Weekend House

I just spent an hour and a half shoveling snow.  My back hurts, I have a blister the size of Connecticut on my thumb and my feet are freezing.

When I was a kid I used to love snow...there was sledding, snowball fights, no school and hot cocoa - much like one of those new animated Starbucks commercials, but without the hugging bear or penguins serving lattes...does anyone else think those commercials are a bit creepy or is it just me?

Now the only good thing about snow is that I can skip the gym on Monday because of the workout I just got.

But I did get to buy a really cool shovel at the Tractor Supply Co., so not a total loss. 

Posted by Evan

The Sharon Pile

We didn't go up to the house this weekend.  A combination of factors kept us in NYC: I came home late Friday night from a business trip to Boston, there is a big storm here in the northeast and Lindsey has a few deadlines so she has a lot of work to do this weekend.

Which brings us to the Sharon Pile.  During the week we collect all of the things we want to take to the country that weekend in a pile next to our printer.  Hence, the "Sharon Pile."  This week's pile includes replacement filters for our water filtration system, individual K-Cups for our new Keurig single-cup coffee maker, an extra warm sweater for Lindsey, running shoes, a nice Bordeaux and a new Pinot Noir I've been looking forward to trying, this week's Economist and a few books.

The Sharon Pile is more than just a pile.  It's a way for us to remember that no matter how bad the week gets, we are always a day closer to our refuge in the country.

Posted by Evan

Come Live Near Us

Our friends Jane and John recently moved to a new property and are selling their former weekend house. It is a cute, three-bedroom Cape Cod in the charming town of West Cornwall, CT, right next to our town of Sharon. (The towns are connected by a covered bridge...how cute is that?)

Here is the listing:
ROMANTIC 3 BD CAPE W/ FIREPLACE IN LIVING ROOM, Built-in bookcases in library & BR. A screened-in porch looks out on the garden-filled 4 acres. 1.5 bathrooms, full basement complete with pantry, 2 utility rooms for recreation, and a one-car garage. $399,000

Click here to learn more about the house!

Baby It's Cold...INSIDE

So we just got to the house.  It's Friday at 10:30pm.  It's 24 degrees outside and only 52 degrees inside the house.  We've turned on the heat, plugged in the portable radiator and started a fire.  But it's still freezing.

I am writing this post in my jacket, hat and gloves.  Linds is upstairs buried under three blankets (and still in her coat, hat and previously mentioned mittens). 

It is so cold right now I am thinking of getting back into the car until the house warms up.  Is this what other weekenders do?  Are we doing something wrong?  I have to end this post so I can put my hands back into my jacket pockets.  If you have any ideas for us, please let us know.

Posted by Evan

A Weekend of Firsts

It was quite a busy weekend for us--one of "firsts."  Here is a list of things that we experienced for the first time this weekend:

1.  First snow.  Only a dusting, but still exciting.

2.  First time it was colder than 13 degrees...it got down to 10.  Evan is already upset about our heating oil bill.

3.  First time we (Lindsey) set off the alarm.  It was so cold that she tried to punch in the numbers with her mittens still on, and she could not do it fast enough so the alarm went off.  The ADT guy contacted us through the ADT intercom system and asked for our security password.  I forgot it for a minute so it took a little while to convince him we were the owners.  Fun was had by all.

4.  First local dinner party.  Lindsey's friend Betty invited us to her beautiful home in West Cornwall (7 miles from our house) for a dinner party with her friends Jane and John (who have been coming to West Cornwall for 20 years).  We had a wonderful time, and it was great to meet other Country Weekenders.

5.  We made our first visit to the new Target in Torrington.  Lindsey was ecstatic, because she only used to go to Target when she visited her friends Danielle and Steve in LA (there is no Target in Manhattan). 

Land$caping

By now it should be apparent to our readers that we became homeowners with very little knowledge about what it means to be a homeowner. And I think we've done a pretty good job. We got the septic tank cleaned (lesson here: never look into the tank), we figured out how to put in storm windows, we learned what everything in the basement does...we take pride in the fact that two life-long renters figured out how to run the house pretty quickly.

But there is one thing that neither of us anticipated: the outside. We have a big lawn, trees, bushes, flowers (and flower boxes), more trees, a raspberry patch (well, not anymore), an herb garden and some large plants that just look like bigger bushes. And all this stuff needs to be taken care of or it will grow out of control and take over.

In the past two months we have spent a small fortune on landscaping. Maybe we were spoiled because the house was in perfect move-in condition when we bought it. We thought we could just show up and bang, enjoy life in the country. Well all that "country" around the house needs to be managed, and it is not cheap.

I guess the point of this post is that if you've never owned a house, and you're thinking of buying one, and there is some land, set aside some additional money...especially in the fall and spring.

Posted by Evan

PlayStation 2

Yes, I am playing "Transformers" on my new PlayStation 2. But that's because PlayStation 2 was $89.99 at Wal-Mart yesterday. And we don't have an HD TV here, so I needed something to do that was not in HD.

And it was 13 DEGREES here yesterday, and 24 degrees today. There is absolutely no good reason to be outside.

Posted by Evan

I made fire!

We have a beautiful woodburning stove, and today I made a fire. I'm very good at arranging the logs in a diagonal, stacked layout so that air is flowing and the flames are pretty and bright. It smells wonderful and makes cozy crackling sounds.

While I am making fire, Evan is playing "Transformers" on his new PlayStation 2.

.

Posted by Lindsey

Our Other Weekend Visitors

It's been a VERY busy week for both of us, so we're just now getting to this post. Evan's parents visited us last weekend (before the deer). We picked them up at the train station and had a fun day showing them around Sharon and the surrounding towns.

They gave us a quilt that used to hang in their old country house. We hung it up that day. So it's now a weekend house hand-me-down.

Weekend Visitor

You should be reading a post about the lovely visit we had from Evan's parents this weekend. But yesterday we had an unexpected visitor, so the parental visit post will have to wait until later this week.

We were upstairs winterizing the house (more on this later as well) and a deer walked into our yard and started grazing. We were shocked. It's the closest we've been to wildlife since our last trip to the zoo (Evan, 6th grade, Lindsey about 10 years ago). We were able to get some great pictures, and even a video (thanks Sony digital camera w/video!):

We also took some still shots:

My Kingdom for a Cappuccino

As far as we know, this is the only cappuccino machine within 20 miles of our house. Except it's never working. It's in a small diner-esque restaurant called the "Wandering Moose" about five miles from our house. Every Saturday we would wake up and drive to the "Moose" (that's what the locals call it) in hopes of a cappuccino or latte, and each time the owner told us it was out of order. He always seems angry when we ask, so now we just get regular coffee. It's not very good, but given the lack of options, it's the best we have. Lindsey is working up the courage to ask him for Splenda.

Lindsey's Cow

We went to the Sharon Summer Craft Fair this past August. We got a couple of small things for the house, but this is by far the best. Lindsey found this at a stand that specializes in wood carvings. It's the closest we're ever going to come to owning cattle.

City vs. Country

So, a lot of people saw the New York Times article on Friday, and were shocked to hear Linds and I got a place up in the country. More to the point, they wanted to know how we were adjusting to life up there (even if only on weekends).

It gave me an idea for a post: I thought I'd compare (through pictures) our life in the city vs. our life in the country. First up, the kitchen junk drawer:

In the country, we are prepared for anything. In the city, we order in a lot.

Next up, the entertainment center:

New York: 52" DLP HDTV, surround sound (B&W speaker system), powered subwoofer, Xbox, Apple TV, DVR...and of course, always tuned to the Simpsons.

Sharon: 27" TV for $113 and a $39 DVD player, purchased at Wal-Mart. Never on.

And finally, laundry:

We bought this HUGE washer/dryer set from the previous owner. As for laundry in the city, it's the opposite of dinner: we send it out.

So that's a brief snapshot of our city life vs. our country life. Watching TV on a 27-inch screen and doing laundry took some getting used to, but I think we're adjusting pretty well.

We're in Today's New York Times!

Exciting news! We're featured in the article "Home Sweet...Yikes!" in today's New York Times, on the front page of the "Escapes" section.

Thanks to reporter Dan Levin for interviewing us (and calling us "urban sophisticates!").

Check out the article: "Home Sweet...Yikes!"

Ten Things We Love About Country Caretaker

A few days after we closed on the house, we realized we needed some help. Thankfully, there is a service in our area called the Country Caretaker, which specializes in helping city people manage life in the country (or, as they call it, "property management and personal service coordination").

Adam Manes is the owner of Country Caretaker. From the minute we met Adam, we felt safer. Thanks to his services, we know that someone is watching our house when we're not around and we always have someone to call if a project is too big for us to handle (or if we just don't feel like doing something...like cleaning the gutters).



Here are our ten favorite things about Country Caretaker:

1. Adam has a very big truck. It's an F350 from Ford and it's almost as big as our house.



2. Kevin built us the best fence in New England.

3. Mary Ann writes lots of comments on our blog. (Thanks, Mary Ann!)

4. We're pretty sure Adam's entire wardrobe is from Orvis.

5. If our alarm goes off accidentally, we don't have to drive up from the city to turn it off. That's part of Country Caretaker's services.

6. Adam says "Don't worry, we'll take care of it!" a lot.

7. Adam is totally unfazed by bugs.

8. They just started online billing.

9. Adam had Lindsey's dad as his high school English teacher (seriously!).

10. Who do you think removed the hot tub?

Posted by Lindsey

Obligatory Fall Foliage Montage

These shots were all taken within a five mile radius of our house. The water you see is Lake Sharon. Let the foliage fest begin:

New Restaurant!!!

We found the most amazing restaurant. Well, we didn't find it. We just finally decided to eat there.

Serevan is in Amenia, NY, on Route 44 on the way to our house. We've talked about stopping in for a while now, but we never had time. Luckily we tried it this weekend. Serevan is an absolute jewel, serving the freshest, highest quality food we've had outside of NYC. The restaurant is run by Serge Madikians, an Armenian who grew up in Tehran and was the Executive Chef at Chez es Saada here in NYC.

We had an extraordinary meal. Serge peppers his food with Mediterranean and Middle Eastern flavors that are surprising and delicious. And the wine list is quite manageable, with selections perfectly matched to the food.

We had a wonderful evening. We ended up staying pretty late, so Serge gave us a tour of his kitchen and introduced us to his staff. They also serve brunch on Sundays, so I think this is going to be our new spot.

I highly recommend a visit to Serevan if you are ever in the area. You will not be disappointed.

Posted by Evan

Bye Bye Hot Tub

As promised, here is our yard minus one hot tub. I'm thrilled with how it looks, although I expected the grass that it was built on to be green immediately. It was explained to me that the grass actually has to GROW back. We'll also be getting rid of that random bush.



Posted by Evan

The Hot Tub

Our house came with a hot tub. The previous owner told us how she liked to relax in it naked.

This freaked Evan out, so last week he had the whole thing removed.

Next week we'll post a photo of how the yard looks post-tub.

Posted by Lindsey

The Basement

The basement is by far the scariest part of our house. Growing up and living in apartments my whole life, the basement was a place with three functions: laundry was done there, garbage went there and the basement provided the perfect place to win hide-and-seek.

But in a house, the basement is home to crucial systems: heating, electrical and water. When our broker first took us down into the basement, the first thought that went through my mind was, "Well, this was a nice day in the country, I hope we don't hit traffic on the way back." If you've never seen a boiler or a water-heater or a fuse-box before, your first time can be...intimidating.

The basement is like Mission Control. Everything important happens down there. And as much as I wanted to never, ever go back down there, you really have to. I know it's cliche, but information is power. The more I learned about each system, the better I felt about going down there. They key was our home inspection. The inspector explained each system and what it did and why. That was VERY helpful.

The basement is still my least favorite place in the house. But with each passing week I'm getting better about going down there. Some things to keep in mind:

1. Get a dehumidifier. I recommend the Whirlpool 75 Pint Energy Star Dehumidifier. Moisture is the enemy of basements and this baby has an Auto setting that's perfect for weekenders--turn it on once and you're good-to-go.
2. Make sure you have ample lighting. Too much important stuff is going on down there and you need to be able to see everything.
3. Get the service contract for the boiler. You don't want to mess with that thing, and the service contract will save you money in the long run.
4. If you have a water-softening machine, be warned that the salt pellets only come in 40 lb bags, and they are a pain-in-the-ass. Remember, lift with your knees and watch your eyes as your pour in the pellets--the salt dust stings.

Posted by Evan

A Tale of Two Fridges

This is our fridge in Manhattan. We order in a lot.

This is our fridge in the country. Because there is no takeout in Sharon and only three restaurants that all close by 8pm, we go shopping and we--okay, okay Evan--cooks. This is the most full refrigerator either of us has had (well, since moving out of our parents' houses).

Posted by Lindsey

Home Depot vs. Dill's

I've been thinking about this post for a long time. Before we bought the house, I'd never been to a Home Depot or any kind of home superstore. But I always thought that Home Depot was the kind of place where a guy could go and automatically feel at home. I had this idea that Home Depot was like a universal Cheers, and when you walked in, not only would they know your name, but you would just fit. And I so wanted to fit in there. I assumed I'd walk in and immediately be able to put up dry wall, handle a clogged drain and know things about lumber. The reality was quite different.

When Lindsey and I walked into our first Home Depot, we made it about 20 feet into the store, looked at each other with equal parts horror and fear, and left.

Not a great start. But we needed stuff for the house, and Home Depot is the only game in town (or so I thought at the time). So I went back. I convinced myself that a store with the motto "You can do it, we can help" can't be THAT hard to navigate. It took me about 20 minutes to walk up and down every aisle, and ask a few questions along the way. I have an idea for a new Home Depot motto: "You can do it and we really don't care how things turn out. In fact, just get what you need and leave as quickly as possible."

Home Depot is just not a place for a novice homeowner. It's a place for contractors, professional builders and homeowners who really know what they are doing.

The experience at Home Depot forced me to drive around and look for a different option. And boy did I find one. It's called Dill's Best Hardware, a locally-owned hardware and lumber shop. Yes, the prices are about 10% more than Home Depot's, but the guys there are so helpful.

It's funny, the staff at Home Depot are clean cut, all wear bright orange aprons and look very friendly, but they're just not that helpful. The guys at Dill's are dirty (in that I-just-built-a-shed kinda dirty) and seem to wear pretty much whatever they want.

I have to admit, the first time I went in there I was sure they'd immediately peg me as a weekender and ignore me. I could not have been more wrong. For each item I needed, they explained how to use it correctly and they showed me multiple options based on price, steering me towards the right purchase, not the most expensive (turns out the $40 electric screwdriver is just as effective as the $125 version). And they actually talked me though each project.

I never thought I'd be this guy, but now I make excuses to go to Dill's. It's where everybody knows my name.

Posted by Evan

How Evan Relaxes

Evan told me he was going to sit outside for a while and relax. When I went outside to check on him, this is what I found:

• E-book
• BlackBerry
• Bug spray
• Water
• Diet Coke
• Phone

Posted by Lindsey

Country Time vs. City Time

Having lived in Manhattan for all of my 32 years, I am used to being able to get what I want FAST. I can pretty much order anything from sushi to an Xbox to duct-tape, and have it within an hour or two. The country is...different. Things just take time. The line at the grocery store moves slower, people don't drive very fast, clerks move at a slow (but determined) pace. It's like everyone got together and agreed to function at 60% capacity 24/7.

It's not a bad thing per se, but it takes some getting used to. We've been having some work done on the house and what I thought would take a week has taken seven. It's been a good lesson in patience for me. Perhaps now I will be kinder to the tourists in NYC who wander around aimlessly staring up at the tall buildings (are there no tall buildings in other countries???) and walking four across on the sidewalk, making it virtually impossible for me to get where I'm going (kinda like cattle in Sharon).

Maybe I'll bring Sharon's lack of urgency to my life here in the city. Although next time it takes the sushi guy more than 30 minutes, I'm sure I'll be on the phone demanding to know where my sashimi deluxe is, and how much longer will I have to wait.

Posted by Evan

A word about mortgages

ING DIRECT. I guess that's two words. I already had two accounts with ING, and on the same day I found the listing for the house, I decided to apply for a mortgage. I remembered that ING had a special mortgage product with only $895 in closing fees. The application and approval took six minutes. And the $895 is the real deal; there were NO additional costs at our closing. The lawyer hired to represent ING (who had never represented them before) actually said, "Wow, most banks I represent tack on $4k to $5k just because they know they can." We were shocked.

ING rules. They make the closing process, which can be stressful, a breeze. Thanks to ING our close lasted 20 minutes and we saved over $5,000. Which went right into my brand new, 42,000 BTU, 60 burger capacity Weber grill.

Picnic

Our first dinner at the house...before we had furniture.

Trash

In the city we throw our trash down a chute in our apartment building. In the country we have a big blue bin.

Our favorite local restaurant: Pappardelle

There are only three restaurants in Sharon and this is our favorite. We love the owner, Tina Paradise, mostly because Linds loves her last name. They always remember us and they serve Monty Python beer.

Tina says friendly, non-city things like, "If you want coffee in the morning, just give us a call and come by and we'll put on a pot for you!"

The Virgin Homeowner

This is the book Evan bought Lindsey when she was freaking out about owning a home. We both loved it and learned more about septic tanks than any person should really know.

We officially became homeowners on June 20, 2007. Yippee!