This is My Home: Our Journey of Places

I must admit, my absolute favorite part of living in New Orleans is our house.  Yes, it's small, yes it was subjected to awful renovations in the 90s and some shoddy repair work, but my goodness it is perfect for our little family right now.  When we moved here (Mr. Bama in May 09, me in Oct '09) we lived in such an awful place.  It was listed as "lower Garden District luxury living."  However, after living there a few months we knew we had to get the heck out of there - at least from a construction/design standpoint.  I surely will never forget the kitchen that was thissmall, the lack of any garbage deposit anywhere within a 1/2 mile of our unit (I would have been laughed out of grad school if I had presented a project that had this place's layout... awful), our teeeennny tiny balcony, unique wiring (our cable was hooked up - to an outlet in our closet) and our, um, "interesting" neighbors.  So when our awesome 3 month lease was almost up, I began the search for a truly New Orleans home.  We knew that being given the opportunity to live in this amazing city was a gift, so living in a place that gave us a unique experience was essential.  Also, my Historic Preservation and old home loving soul was just screaming out to live in a pre-WWII house while living in this city (interesting side note: this is the first time in my life I've lived in a building that wasn't new construction or a product of the 1960s.  To say I've been quality, old home deprived is an understatement).  Before I knew it,  November had crept up and I was banging my head against the wall for a few weeks, only finding affordable places on Craigslist that were:

1. located in highly questionable areas (VERY important note in New Orleans.)
2. last renovated / cleaned in 1960.  Retro yes, but not in a good way, and they weren't much better than the apt where we were living.

It wasn't until we were driving home from yet another less-than-thrilling apartment showing when we passed a late 1900's, early 1910's converted double shotgun house with a "for rent" sign out front.  I made Mr. Bama pull over and I jumped out of the car and started calling the number on the sign.  The landlady picked up, walked right over from her house and gave us a viewing right then and there.  I was in love and Mr. Bama was really happy with the Uptown location.  Few days later, we had put down a deposit and were starting the move.

Now, a year and 2 months later, I am still in love with our home.  We were allowed, by our amazing landlady, to paint the house to fit our preferences, and the place went from pretty old house, to the pretty old Bama house.

Now, It definitely has its fair share of quirkiness, especially when it comes to the bathrooms:

walk-through-sized guilliontine windows.  I worked at prying this bad
boy open for 2 months after we moved in.  Lesson - never
EVER paint windows shut.

our creativity-demanding guest bathroom door, with windows, of course.

our master bathroom partition is on a mission to bring square
glass blocks back into fashion, circa early 90s style

But it also has its fair share of awesomeness

the hardware on the pocket doors.  It's craftmansship and detail like
this that you never find in the "throw them up in a month"
houses of today.  Cool note: The little latch in the middle
 is actually a key that can be used to lock the pocket doors and
 then taken out and stored.  really unique.

exposed rafters in the kitchen - perfect for defying the laws of gravity
and taking one's life into their hands every time they enter the kitchen

But it also has its fair share of awesomeness:

Transom windows (that are workable).  We has a serious airflow
problem when we moved in - after prying all of these open,
no more problem!  Such a simple concept,
yet one thats so incredibly overlooked

And probably one of the things I love the most is what I see when I wake up every morning.  The bottom portion of our big bay windows is covered with plantation shutters -- we dont have to have shades, but we still have privacy.  This is the view from our bedroom window:

doesnt seem like much, but I love being greeted by the pretty blue sky every morning without having to exert any effort.  Its truly the simple things!