An Update (finally)

It's been over a month since my last post and life has continued to move on.

In my last post in mid-August I was talking about Tax Free Weekend. Something that we didn't consider back then was that tax free weekend generated so much business that the items ordered then have taken weeks to be delivered.

• Our washer and freezer were in stock and ready for delivery but the dryer took about 3 weeks to come in. In the meantime, we'd ordered a new refrigerator that was supposed to come in about a week after the washer/dryer/freezer delivery date. Apparently, the refrigerator came in just as the delivery truck was getting ready to leave so they put it on the truck and delivered it unannounced.
• Our window coverings would have normally been here in 2 weeks. They finally shipped this last Saturday and were hoping for delivery this Thursday, 9/24.
• Our pellet stove fireplace insert will get installed this Wednesday, 9/23. Delivery of the 3 tons of pellets that we ordered a couple of weeks later wasn't supposed to happen until some time in October. We got a call the other day that they will also be delivered on Wednesday.

One of the things about packing up for a cross-country move prior to finding a new house is that you end up taking some things that just aren't going to fit. We ended up with a large sectional sleeper couch that we just didn't have a home for. We put it on Craigs List and it now has a new home in Connecticut.

Everything else was just small stuff. Oakham had a Town wide Yard Sale in late August. We paid our $15 and were put on the map. We had a very successful sale and met many of our neighbors. What we didn't sell, went to the Salvation Army the next day.

The Senior Center up the street was selling food. I wandered up there in the morning and came back with some donuts. Later, we sent Briar and Gus up to get lunch for us all. While I was up there, I got to talking with one of the town librarians and she mentioned that there was a history of our house at the library.

We've walked up to the library a couple of times but, until yesterday, were very successful at finding the times when it was closed. The volunteers who were staffing the library yesterday had to look long and hard but they finally came up with The History of Our House (page 3 doesn't quite track from page 2 so there must be a missing page - sounds like the newspaper woman was the wife of the blacksmith).

We had been told that the house had been built in the 1850's but had come across 1 or 2 references that suggested that it might be the 1830's. We now have a date! The house wasn't there when the land changed hands in 1837. An 1838 document mentioned that there was a new house on the land.

We were also interested in the original acreage. We currently are on 2.61 acres. The house was originally on a 1 acre "houselot" with an additional 193 acres of farmland.

It was also interesting to us that one of the long ago owners was the town's blacksmith when he wasn't farming. That might explain the large number of old rusty horse shoes, etc. that we've been finding in nooks and crannies around the house (understand that the prior owner found a lot of these during the renovation).

Our Blacksmith artifacts. I think that the item on the top was probably a spokeshave.

The document mentions that the blacksmith shop was behind the Methodist Church. It's not there any more but, when we visited the Oakham Historical Society a while back, we chatted with an 89 year resident of Oakham who grew up in the building. The Methodist Church was originally in the village of Coldbrook Springs but was moved to Oakham Center when Coldbrook Springs was razed in the name of progress (Boston needed water). It's location was just across the street from our neighbor 2 doors up. It continued to be a church for a while and then became a cheese factory (they called their product "Methodist Cheese"). It's last incarnation was as this 89 year old man's childhood home.

Way back on Fathers Day, Briar, Gus and the kids gave me a pair of tickets to the September 8 Redsox vs. Expos game at Fenway Park. When the time came, we decided to spend a couple of days visiting Boston while we were at it. The Green Line that connects downtown to Fenway continues on to Newton so we stayed in Newton and rode the train into Boston both days. Unfortunately, Boston was setting heat records (high 90's and extremely humid) both days so the visit could have been a little bit more pleasant. We did enjoy the ball game.

The Green Monster

The red seat is where the longest home run ever hit at Fenway landed. Ted Williams hit the 502 foot homer on June 9, 1946. It bounced off the top of a man's straw hat and ended up another 12 rows up.

As we've been settling into this house, we've come to realize that we'll need some sort of mud room area where we can don and doff our winter clothing.

We found this bench and pair of crates (under bench) at an antique fair. The small table was at an antique mall. The 4 iron dragonfly hooks were on Ebay.

For the wetter and muddier stuff, we'll want to change in the garage. I built this 6' bench and put some hooks on the wall above it.

-JC-