Maybe Common Sense is Too Much to Ask?

When I was encouraged to start this blog, I hesitated & thought long & hard about it, not really sure I could be funny enough to be entertaining, not really sure if I was knowledgeable enough to have anything meaningful to share.... I knew I didn't want to use it as a soapbox for my political beliefs or as a platform to denounce my in-laws, with whom I have a challenging & adversarial relationship. I knew my husband would be uncomfortable if I was too personal about our family life in any form. A tidbit here or there he's accepting graciously thus far, but I have been cautious of the line...

So here's something that came up yesterday. In case you're unaware, I'm not fond of this house in which we live. I made some inquiries & have been able to learn that my husband & I have a very good combined credit score & qualify for enough loan to buy a house of similar scale if only we can come up with a down payment. So dreamy me decides to look at houses in our town with a keen eye.There are some nice ones in our range. But I have to rule some out because they are too close to our in-laws. Like this one.

Then I looked at the newspaper & out fell a flyer for a new home development that is actually outside our city limits, but is within our school system. Could be perfect & the developer claims the houses start 50 grand below what we expected we'd need to stay here in this school district. So I decide to look it up online.

Here's weird for you- can't do it. I went right to the builder's website & there it is barely mentioned, no link to it, no information on it, no map of it, no house plans to view... But I know the area as described in the flyer so I do a generic house plan search & I put in a few criteria. Just for fun, mind you.

I enter 4 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath, 2 car attached garage, basement, fireplace & 2nd floor laundry.... Barely a blink of an eye above standard stuff around here. The 2nd floor laundry is a luxury I crave. So I start perusing these house plans from various builders & I was thinking, some were truly cool & some were just...not.

My dream house could be a ranch. I don't really like stairs, but I really hate carrying laundry from the basement to the 2nd floor to put the clothing away. And as awful as that is, even more I loathe going down the steps with no risers to a dank, damp, dark, musty, gray cinder block & cement basement to do the laundry...the one household chore that I have never minded 'til we moved into this house with this basement which I have just described.

master suite, ground floor

So I ask you, how big a brain do you need to have to figure out that a master suite on the 1st floor isn't such a great feature when the laundry room is on the 2nd floor? Assuming that most single family homes (hence the name) are designed for families, how much common sense does it take to figure out that the bedrooms, aside from the master, should be almost identical in size so the children don't argue or feel cheated about who's room is bigger or who has more closet space or the window seat?

laundry facilities, 2nd floor

I said to my dear husband, most architects must be men because they are clueless about some pretty common family workings. Why would anyone build a house in the Midwest with a big entry way that doesn't include a coat closet? There needs to be a convenient location for shoes, boots, hats, coats, scarves, gloves & mittens when there's 5-6 months of winter with 4 months minimum that involve snow? It's a no-brainer or so I thought.

Speaking of closets....who's brilliant idea is it to put a master walk-in closet off the master bath? That might work in an arid climate like Arizona or Nevada, but it's not so great here in the muggy Midwest, in my opinion. I've yet to see a bathroom exhaust fan that actually extricates all the steam from a shower in 5 minutes or less. No matter where we've lived, we have never run said exhaust fan during our shower, only afterward, because 1 of 2 things usually happens: It might run well enough to make the bathroom seem cold when wet & naked or it causes a draft which has been known to lead to the intolerable situation of the shower curtain blowing into the shower & sticking to me which, regardless of how clean or new it is, gives me the creeps.

And still more on closets....if the aesthetics of the home require you to put a window in a closet, maybe the design isn't so great. I absolutely don't want a window in my closet. Windows cost money. Why pay for something that can't be used? They are supposed to let in light & fresh air. Closet doors should be shut firmly. There is no purpose. It's also impractical in that sunlight might (however unlikely it is here in Ohio) shine around the edges of blinds or shades & cause fading of one's clothing, particularly the things that stay put most of the time, like the dress worn to the coworker's wedding 4 years ago & not since. Just because there hasn't been use for it doesn't mean there won't be use for it. And besides, a great LBD is always good to have around, unless of course sunlight streaming into your closet gives it a gray stripe down one side. That just won't do.

Hi, I'm your garage & PROUD of it!
I also have a window up there, that's your master closet.

There was one more feature of many of these homes with which I took exception. The garage. Thank goodness I didn't put in for a 3 car garage! Why do these architects or designers make the garage such a prominent feature? I personally don't like a house where the garage smacks you in the face & you can't find the front door. I know garages are large & that generally, they have to be, but some plans managed to downplay the garage with a side entry & others put a 2nd floor over it with a peaked roof so that it dwarfed the rest of the house, then slapped it with 1 enormous white door so that it was all you could see. The front door, on the other hand, was hidden in the shadows of a small porch where the rest of the house appeared to be equivalent in size but more crowded to the garage. I just don't understand. Why don't they just set it back a little bit? I'm sure that would help.

So maybe we aren't quite ready yet, but we're getting there. And maybe the perfect design doesn't exist. While I can compromise on some things, one thing I won't compromise on is this- if I have to have a basement laundry, I will never again go without a chute. Even this house with all its wasted space has that feature. 

I'm your garage but am trying to hide it,
along with your front door.