My Childhood Home - Now

Before my blog break I shared my memories and photos of my childhood home. You can click here to see that post. I promised to show you what it looks like today and I gave you a sneak peek at the front of the house that showed the wonderful restoration that has been done.  This home is a vacation rental now and their website describes it like this:

Accommodating up to 8 people Lava Flo is a large three bedroom, two bath, Craftsman Bungalow located on Lava Road. The neighbors are McMenamins Old St. Francis school, a rectory, and a church! Flo also has a large, tiered yard full of lava rock and a hot tub. The front bedroom has a king-sized bed, the master at the back of the house has a queen sized bed, and the middle bedroom is furnished with two twin beds and a Smart TV. The house can easily accommodate six people but comes equipped with aerobeds upon request for an additional two houseguests. There is an attached laundry room at the back of the house with a washer/dryer, and off-street parking for up to three cars.

Now, let me take you inside.  So you don't get confused, I've used photos from two versions of their website. Some photos are older than others but they provide a good view of the house.  As you enter the house you step right into the living room.  The original front door was an old craftsman style door that was replaced with a different style but I love what they chose.  All of the windows in the house are the original windows.  They were in pretty bad shape when restoration began so the windows were sent out for reconditioning.  To think that these are the very windows my childish eyes looked through back in the day brings such pleasure to my heart.  The floors are all original and have been refinished.

Our floor-to-ceiling ‘natural’ from-the-forest Christmas tree stood between the corner windows every year.  It was decorated with strings of those old lights that got hot and burned your hand if you touched them.  And tinsel!  It was amazing how much tinsel those big trees took, and my mother insisted that each piece be put on the branches with precision.  Oh, how I would love to rent this house for the Christmas holidays and have a giant tree right there again. 

Looking toward the back of the house from here you can see more of the living room and the wonderful dining room where many special meals were shared with friends old and new.  There was a French door between the windows out onto a side porch and yard.  That door was replaced with this one that matches the front door.  The ceiling was flat when I lived there but I really love the way they opened it up.  My mother had a chair and a small table that held our phone where the little table sits beside the side door.  I spent so many, many hours in the corner when I was old enough to call my girlfriends and chat.  I love the French doors into the kitchen.  Remember them from the photo I shared from my childhood Christmas?  Yep, same doors!  To the right of those doors sat my dear, little mother’s desk and that ‘naughty-corner’ chair I showed you.

Let’s go through those French doors into the kitchen.  It’s exactly as it was when I lived there with a few updates!  I was thrilled that they didn’t change it.  I shed a few tears when I peeked through the back windows and saw that the kitchen was just as it was.  This is where my mother and I spent so much time – time together learning how to do household tasks, cooking, baking, cleaning and doing dishes.  There was no dishwasher back in those days, so we stood at the old sink below these very windows each evening to do the supper dishes together – she washed, I dried.  And as we worked together we played a Bible character game.  She was teaching more than ‘mundane’ household tasks.  She was teaching me about the lives and character of people in the Bible.  The window you see looks out onto the old, enclosed back porch that is now a new, modern laundry room.  Someday I’ll have to share more of my memories about that laundry room.  The little shelves between the window and door were there when I was a little girl.  My sweet mother had such pretty things on display there.  The door appears to be the same door that was there in those days.  I ran through that door, in and out to the back yard more times than I could possibly count.  The refrigerator was in a recessed area behind where the open door is in this photo when we first moved in.  A few years later the church board purchased a new, bigger refrigerator that stood exactly where this one is today.  The recessed area in the wall was sealed up, allowing a larger closet in the guestroom that you enter on the other side of the refrigerator.

Here’s a view of the kitchen from the back door.  When we first moved into the house a big, old wood cook stove stood in this corner.  I remember the curved, black stovepipe that went to the chimney appears to still be in that corner.  My little mother had more escapades with that wood stove but the heat it produced was wonderful on snowy, cold winter mornings when I ate breakfast at the kitchen table before I left for school.  An electric range replaced the wood stove and we thought we had really come up in the world!

If we step through the back door of the kitchen you can see the laundry porch.  My dear mother started out with a wringer washer and big, double cement laundry tubs out here.  No insulation in those outside walls and it got c-o-l-d in the winter.  No dryer – she hung the sheets outside as I shared in my childhood memory photos. Here’s what it’s like today.  Do you see shiplap?  She would have loved this. The original door was like the door from the kitchen into the porch but the new door provides more security.  The rock walls outside the windows were there and I spent a lot of time playing on and around those walls.  In my imagination, they became all kinds of things.  At the top of the terrace you can see an iron fence.  No fence in those days.  You’ll see more of this in a bit.

The website for this home indicates that our guestroom off the kitchen is now the master bedroom.  I peeked through the windows when I was there and it brought back such memories.  Memories of lying on the ‘big’ bed in the afternoon sun - daydreaming of adventures and making plans.  Memories of guests who came and were part of our family for a time.  And special memories of a very dear friend who became like a big sister to me when she lived with us for two years.

The guestroom had a small closet behind the kitchen wall.  From the vacation rental's description of this room and after looking at photos of the side of the house I think I've figured out where they added the master bathroom.  The guestroom shared a wall with the big walk-in closet in my bedroom.  Seeing a small window that's been added to the side of the house and from the photos from the website,my guess it that the big walk-in closet in my bedroom became the master bath.  That's a pretty wise choice, I'd say. Here's the glimpse of the master bathroom.

Let’s go back through the kitchen and into the living room-dining room area so I can show you the bedrooms. 

See that door on the inside wall between the living room and dining room?  When we go through that door we are in the hallway.  Before we do, I'd like to tell you about a door you can see in the hallway.  That door was there when I lived in this house but I don't know what's behind it now. I'm pretty sure it doesn't go where it led when I was a little girl.  The door opened to stairs that took us down to the huge, sometimes creepy, big basement. A monstrous wood furnace that heated our home stood in the middle of the basement.  My dear father got up more than once a night through the cold winter months to go down those stairs and add wood to the furnace to keep us snug and warm upstairs. I'm not sure if that door leads to the basement anymore - it could be that a coat closet was added during the renovations. It's obvious that a new source of heat was added because I see a thermostat on the living room wall.

Once we're in the hallway we'll turn to our right, toward the front of the house and enter what was my parents’ room.  It was not furnished like this at all.  It was cozy with a big brass headboard and foot-board that my dear mother found in the corner of the basement!  A bit of polish and elbow grease and it was a beauty.  If you look back into the hall you can see a bit of the doorway we came through from the living and dining area.

The front corner of my mother and father’s room had corner windows like those in the living room.

Back into the hall and just to our right we come to the bathroom.  This was the only bathroom when I lived here. They have kept much of the character of the room but have updated to accommodate modern conveniences.  The floor was like this and this HAS to be the original doorknob!  We locked the door with a skeleton key – very convenient if someone locked themselves in and couldn’t get out.  Someone like a small child.  My father had several skeleton keys because, for a long time, that’s how all the exterior door were locked!

Just inside the door, to the left, is the sink.  We had a free-standing sink with no counter but I like the way they've continued the vintage-style tile.

And above the sink is a cabinet like the original medicine cabinet.  I don’t know if they were able to refurbish what was there or if this is new.  The lights are similar to what I remember.

I must say that I was very disappointed that the old claw foot tub where I took my ‘Saturday night’ baths is not gone.  I believe the bathroom was remodeled and updated in the nineteen-seventies and this wall and tub were added.  At least the original window is there!

Let's go back out into the hall, to the right.  At the opposite end of the hall from my parents’ bedroom – was my room.  Oh, the stories those walls could tell!  So much play and imagination and dreaming and some tears along the way in this room.  Giggles and secrets shared when my girlfriends spent the night. This is my room! Don’t you think it’s appropriate that they chose to paint it yellow?

Now, I have to tell you a piece of history, trivia perhaps.  We did not have a second bathroom back in the day but there was a bathroom on the other side of my bedroom wall - the  wall you can't see in this photo.  Back then, that bathroom couldn’t be accessed from the house.  It was the ‘church’ bathroom and was only accessible from the driveway between our house and the church.  There was no plumbing in the church building in those days and since winters were harsh in that mountain town, a bathroom had been added to the house.  We moved into the house on a Saturday.  The next morning - Sunday - my mother heard voices 'in the wall' and she about freaked out.  After asking a few questions of someone in the church we found out about the 'church' bathroom.

Now, let’s go outside and see the yard and surrounding area.

Out through the front door and onto the front porch you could have seen the wonderful homes that were across the street.  ‘Grandma and Grandpa’ Duckworth lived in the house on the right.  They were such a dear couple and they became like grandparents since mine were all in California and I didn’t see them often.  On the left is the home of the owner of the ‘Piggly Wiggly’ grocery store around the corner.  These homes are no longer here.  They were moved across town and restored for vacation rentals.  A three-story hotel complex is across from ‘my’ house.  McMenamins bought the entire block where there are some historical buildings they have restored.  Their hotel is rustic and very much in keeping with the area.  

If we walk to the sidewalk and turn left to the driveway you can see the side of the parsonage and the church.  See the little house up straight ahead and up the stairs?  That’s where ‘Grandma and Grandpa’ Morgan lived.  They were an older couple in our church.  They didn’t have a car – they walked everywhere and they used our driveway to go back and forth even though their address was technically on the street above ours.  I spent many, long hours in their home.  They had the most wonderful toy box and she baked the best cookies!  They had raised two sons and were thrilled when a little girl moved into the parsonage!  Their little house is also a vacation rental now.

OK, let’s go around to the other side of the house.  We’ll go through the gate that wasn’t there when I was a child. 

And into the side yard where we spent so much time living outside.  It didn’t look like this but I do love what they’ve done.  The side yard was all grass except for the concrete steps you see that lead from the dining room door to the yard.

This photo gives you a look at the side of the house and the door to the side yard.  Of course, there was no deck, no rock patio, no hot tub!  But lots of birthday parties and gatherings and a lot of play and games and fun!

An updated photo from the website gives another view of the side yard.

Here are a few more photos that show you the size of the yard.  I loved being out here, no matter the weather.  I rolled over and over down the hill in the summer and made snow angels and tried to sled down the hill in the winter.  

If you saw the photos from my post about my childhood home back then, my dear mother’s clothesline was where the table and chairs are in the photo below.  Again, there was no iron fence around the yard and no wood fence at the top of the terrace.  The wood fence on the side of the terrace was built while we lived here.  The Catholic Church and Rectory were next door to us. The side fence was added to give privacy to the priests, to give them a quiet place to walk and meditate and pray.  When the fence was first built somehow I got my little self up high enough to hang on the top of the fence with my face peering over - and I hung there and watched the priests as they walked and prayed.  Well, I did that until my mother found out!  It never happened again.

The upper terrace is completely different than it was.  I was pleased to see what they’ve done with it.  It had never been landscaped and wasn’t used for anything except for playing in the dirt!

Another view from the terrace.

This is my childhood home! Five-thirty Lava Road in Bend, Oregon.

I loved it back then – and I love it now.  I would love to design a sweet, little bungalow home with the same footprint – and perhaps an update and change or two.  Someday I hope to return and take a tour of the house. Or, better yet, rent it and snoop through every single corner and nook and cranny.  This was the parsonage and I must show you the church.  It’s been restored, too.  I’ll save that for another time. Soon.

photos from  Lavabelles Vacation Rentals