Wednesday Walk ~ Walk With Me ~ Going Home & Sharing Some Memories

I visited the house I grew up in and took a little walk around the outside. There really is a lot more I want to share about why I haven’t been back there but I’m just going to concentrate on my walk for now and share some stories. One may think a walk around a house isn’t much of a walk but for me it was. Please keep in mind also that it is still very much a work in progress. My husband and a sister were with me and as we drove up you could actually see the house.

(My sister was standing at the door so I had to blur her out)

I say that because not too long ago the house was almost completely hidden by overgrown trees and brush. Overgrown may even be an understatement! This is a photo I got off the internet of how it looked before. Lol! See, I wasn’t kidding and the back was even worse.

Source

It took a while to cut stuff back and down, pull what needed to be pulled, get rid of a ridiculous amount of junk and other general maintenance stuff. For reference, four family members still live in the house but one person there works her butt off on it and she is the one that had one hell of a battle with cancer. Knock on wood! She is doing okay now! Two others help somewhat but not like her.

Myself and another sister (who doesn’t live there)and our husbands were there not just for cleaning out most of the inside but the front yard and, easily, half of the backyard before I quit. My other sister continued but I just couldn’t. I’ll explain more another time if I’m up to it. Anyway, that sister gave them this nice bird bath that sits in the front yard under the tree.

We still have mom’s bird bath that she bought many years ago. It will be cleaned up and put back up in the backyard where mom originally had it.

Here is a larger view of the backyard. It is a pretty good size yard.

The one sister that lives there has been transplanting a lot of mom’s plants.

Mom had a few different varieties of hostas.

The hostas that I have in my front garden came from my mom. They were so little when I got them but they are huge now. This is one group of my hostas.

This is a photo of what is left of the old grape arbor in the backyard. When we were little it produced a lot of purple/blue grapes that had great flavor.

Here are a couple of photos of the old garage. My sister who goes over to help wanted to tear it down but after talking it over she decided on keeping it. It needs some work but the frame is in great condition and they just don’t make them like this anymore. She agreed afterwards so they are cleaning it out so it can be fixed. We use to have little club meetings in that old garage and I snuck my first cigarettes in there..lol! I only smoked because I thought it cool and that was the brand of cigarettes “Kool”..remember those?! A sibling snitched on me and another sister and my mom made us smoke a whole pack. That was about the last time I smoked.

You see that brown jug next to the garage? That came out of the basement and was an experiment that a brother and sister did many years ago. I may have to, actually, call the fire department to find out how to dispose of it. My brother and sister would put different concoctions in it and the last time it shook a little and they immediately stopped doing that but all this time it was still in the basement. It’s a wonder we are all still here! Did I tell you we didn’t have internet growing up? We also only had four or five channels on the television.

I thought you would get a kick out of this next photo! I’ve posted the one of me when I was little before but here is in about the same area where it was taken.

Some photos of the underneath of the back porch. When we were real little my mom would send us out there to “dig a hole to China”. She would come back at the end of the day and fill it in. One time we dug pretty deep but we didn’t know the dangers of it possibly collapsing but mom must have. After that mom told us no more digging and once it was said then you best not disobey ‘cause back then you got the switch or the belt.

This is the little ledge under the porch where we would crack stones. Sometimes when you cracked them open then they would be so pretty inside!

I still like pretty stones and rocks! Here are just a few I currently have …

I was delighted to see that the old Rhododendrum is, amazingly, still living. Looking rough but still hanging in there. It has been there ever since I can remember!

This is the driveway that goes from the front of the house to the back. My sister that lives there uncovered it. It was covered in dirt and grasses. I remember this same sister when we were maybe four and five years old playing in the yard. She was walking back and forth on that driveway when she stepped up on a glass milk jug and it broke. That was a trip to the hospital for her. Amazing how looking at photos bring back some memories. I still don’t know why or how it came to be in the driveway but it did.

Here are some more flowers that were throughout the yard.

Heading out… this is another shot of the house. Still lots of work to be done.

The view looking up my old street. This is where we would walk to a little neighborhood store called “List”. I guess they called it “List” because that was the name of the street it was one.

This is the view looking down my street and is where we walked to school and went for hikes in the woods!

That brings us to the end of my little walk except walking to the truck that is parked in the last photo! If I get back over there and I’m still around then I’ll give an update and share some more memories. Thanks for joining me and take care!!

Thank you @tattoodjay for #wednesdaywalk!
Thank you @lyndsaybowes for #walkwithme!