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We have lived in Morgantown for over 25 years--much longer than we expected. When we first arrived, classes already had started and so I gave my first lecture two days after I arrived. We needed housing fast, and so we rented for several months the house pictured below. After looking at numerous homes, we decided to make an offer on our rental and it was accepted! The house was in an historic part of town, and it showed it's age (~ 80 years). So we put a lot of labor into fixing up both the house and the yard. I may be the plant pathologist in the family, but Sunnie has the "green thumb". click on photos to see larger image
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Sunnie made the case that our back yard was getting smaller with time and that living on a corner with only a sidwalk separating the house from the street (see above) was not fun anymore. She wanted a home with more land on which she could have a larger flower garden and we could let the dogs roam a bit more. When a young couple wanted to buy our house (it wasn't even on the market at the time), we had two weeks to find another home. On the day before the deadline, we found a house on five beautiful acres just outside of Morgantown that was only a 10 minute drive for each of us to our respective workplaces. The place was large enough to accommodate Sunnie's mom as well. Amazingly, her house sold within 24 hours of putting it on the market, and this provided ideal circumstances for us to move together.
| We took possession of our new home in June, 2002. It is located just off of Route 119 North (two miles from Point Marion, Pennsylvania) shortly after passing old Stewartstown Road (which passes in front of the local "Cheat on the lake" winery). It is of good size (3,200 square feet) with three floors and a full basement, nine rooms, and four and one-half bathrooms. It was built by Warren and April Clousten, from whom we purchased the house. They had lived there for eleven years (after a lot of work to clean up the property and do some great landscaping). |  |
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| Even though the house is nestled amongst trees partway down the hill from Rt. 119, the hill extends for another mile down to the Monongalia River. The only flat area is in the immediate vicinity of the house. Sunnie and I created the flower beds in front of the house within several weeks after we moved in, partly because I was too enthusiastic picking up perennials from our university greenhouse and they needed to be transplanted quickly. I also fenced in the back yard almost immediately, partly to establish boundaries for the dogs and partly so we could establish plantings that wouldn't be eaten by the numerous deer that roam across the property. | |||
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| We currently feel like we are living in a park (Sunnie calls me her "park ranger"). We are surrounded by a nice mix of trees (cherry, oak, maple), and we even have a rather large stand of bamboo that takes continuous maintenance to prevent it from spreading (last photo). One of my first priorities was to build several Adirondack chairs so that we could relax and enjoy these spaces on sunny afternoons. | |||
At right are photos of our living room(s) and sitting room. The latter has windows facing the porch, and so the dogs often sit here watching for wildlife to walk onto the porch. |
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| The kitchen is where most of the action takes place and where people congregate who visit. Both Sunnie and I cook, so with the large center island we finally have the space to each do our own thing. Sunnie also has a desk to organize and pay bills and overhead shelving to store our numerous cookbooks. |  |
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| Our dining room has a more formal ambience, and so it is used only for special occasions. The room spans the width of the house and also has a small alcove which I took advantage of and built bookshelves (back wall) and shelves for the numerous CDs created from tons of downloaded music (side wall). The CDs aren't used much anymore, now that I've converted most of the music to mp3 and m4p files for my computer and iPod. |  |
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Upstairs are three bedrooms. We painted the master bedroom with bright colors. It is the largest room in the house, so I'm amazed we were able to fill it so easily. We added a shower in the bathroom to supplement the huge jacuzzi bathtub (which takes far too long to fill, so it doesn't get used for the intended purpose much). The guest bedroom (far right) originally was remodelled for Sunnie's mom, and she lived there for the last year she was alive. |
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The other bedroom was converted to an office where I could work and also relax and listen to celtic music (Sunnie only tolerates the music in small doses). I chose a dark maroon color scheme to accent the plaid wall coverings Sunnie gave to me several years ago. From this room, I have a great view of the back yard. All of the wood furniture were pieces I hand-refinished. |
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| We have made few changes to the spacious third floor. Sunnie and her mom made one side into a sewing room, and there is a small extra living room area containing mom's teak furniture (left photo). Elise likes to sleep in the twin bed when she visits. The other side is for exercise equipment (like the Nordic Trac orbital trainer) and weights. It also is a space where Sunnie and I can do some of our yoga positions. |  |
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| We finish up here with a few photos of the property in the fall, when changes to leaf color are truly spectacular! The evergreen bamboo (middle photo) really stands out this time of year. |  |
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