the house that daddy built... (part 1)

Many, many years ago (I believe it was it was in 1935 the year they got married...) my daddy started building a house for his new bride and future family... My paternal grandfather was a builder and a contractor... that was what his life's work was... so he naturally helped many of his children to build homes... We grew up hearing about how grandpa helped daddy to build that house all those many years ago... I remember that momma said that only the front living area and their bedroom were completed by the time they had my oldest brother... at that time they had been married about 4.5 years... the next two children came close behind that eldest child's entry into the family, fortunately another bedroom, the kitchen, and bath, were completed about the time the 2nd child came along... eventually the home would be a small but well built 3 bedroom, one bath, home... and 4 children were born within the walls of the home at a time when women didn't go to hospitals to have children, and doctor's were sometimes late to the party, anyway... My grandmothers delivered or helped deliver all those older siblings...

That was during a time that few homes were larger than 2 bedrooms to start out... Homes were usually added on to as family needs changed, so they were sometimes a hodgepodge of styles and shapes... but grandfather was a man of vision and had embraced the idea that floor plans should be built at least with expansion in mind, and that family homes needed to be bigger to start with... not just for the wealthy, or large farming families that could generally afford it...

I remember momma saying that they made the decision to get a loan to keep building on the house, because they ran out of money... (kind of a new idea back then... remember the Frank Capra movie "It's a Wonderful Life"?) Well they went to a savings and loan to borrow a modest amount in order to complete their dream... right after they were married, and while they were first building, they lived with daddy's parents, in the basement of their house... and of course they wanted their own space to grow in... The loan officer that approved their building fund application asked them why they needed so many bedrooms...? The short answer was that momma and daddy were from pretty large families (there were 12 surviving children in dad's family, 6 in mom's) and both wanted a large family, though they never really had a number in mind, momma once explained to me... The longer answer was that they intended to fill the bedrooms with memories and memories sometimes come with building something... They would eventually have 8 children but the second four were all born after they sold that first home that daddy built in Southeastern Arizona and moved far north to another state, Idaho...

I am the 7th child in my family... My little sister was born while our oldest brother was on his mission and after our oldest sister was married. She is only 15 months older than momma and daddy's oldest grandchild, who was born to that sister... I was only about 5 when my first nephew was born, but I remember thinking it was great to be an aunt... though I wasn't really sure what that would mean for my future... now I don't really remember not being an aunt...

(...to be continued.)