Happy Birthday 2007

We spent about a month clearing the land so we asked Larry's kids if they'd like to come and visit while we were ensconced at the Little Main Street Inn in Banner Elk. Valerie and husband, Chuck, and our grandson, Evan, came from Owensboro, KY; unfortunately, grandkids Nathaniel and Hillary couldn't make it. Michael and Cherell and grandkids Kyle and Lexi came from Charlotte, NC. Larry and I both have March birthdays so we celebrated all on St. Patrick's Day. All week long I had been looking for a restaurant that would be serving corned beef and cabbage but wasn't having any luck. I mentioned it to our innkeeper, Lori, and she asked her friend, a chef at a restaurant in town, if he'd make it. He agreed and it was excellent. And Michael treated us all! Except our innkeepers decided to come to the restaurant and they sent dessert over to our table.

Later in the month we checked out a local pizza place. Just for conversation, we asked if he delivered. When we told him where we'd be living he told us he goes as far as the Baptist church at the foot of the mountain so we'd have to meet him there. Now whenever we pass that church we say, "Wanna get a pizza?! (Seinfeld reference.)

The end of March we were invited to Ruth and Boyd McCloud's for dinner (Sherry's parents). Sherry advised me not to bring a bottle of wine because her parents, being strict Baptists, would pour it down the drain. So I brought flowers and chocolate -- my preference anyway. What a spread! Larry was in hog heaven because we had fried chicken and milk gravy (I don't make fried chicken -- or milk gravy.) I especially liked the good, down-home biscuits and I asked Ruth if she'd part with the recipe. She sheepishly said, "They're from Market Day."

As we were winding down our stay I got a call from my sister, Maureen, out in Colorado. She had moved there in August 2006 and was planning her first trip home for Easter which was the 8th of April. It was a little sooner than we planned on returning but I wanted to see her so I turned to Larry and said, "Do you think we could leave a couple of days early because Maureen's fixin' to drive in from Colorado..." Maureen shouted, "Fixin'?" I said, "What?" She said, "You said fixin'!" I said, "I did not!" She said, "Yes, you did!" I reckon I did.

March 2007 - Time to Clear the Land

Our first day "up the mountain" we had a visit from our neighbor, Sherry McCloud. She introduced herself and asked us for our names. Larry said, "Larry and Lolly." Sherry repeated our names and said, "Larry and Lolly -- why that's so cute I could just puke." Then she laughed and let go a stream of tobacco. We were a bit chagrined, but it was all very friendly. Sherry was interested in what we were going to do with the cleared trees. The deal we made with Sam was that he essentially owned the trees with the exception of a small quantity of hardwoods that he would haul to the mill, sell, and give us credit for. The rest he would sell to the pulp mill and the cost of trucking and fuel would cancel that out. But Sam was happy to leave them piled on the land so that Sherry could spread the word that anyone interested in cutting and splitting the logs for firewood was welcome to them. It seems a lot of our neighbors have wood-burning stoves to heat their homes and water. It eventually all disappeared and we felt right neighborly about it.

The thing I find so funny about Sherry dropping in that day is that I envision her down at her place saying to herself, "I believe I'll go meet the new neighbors -- oh, wait a minute," then she loads up on chew and says, "now I'm ready." After having this conversation with Sam he teased me that once I lived down here I'd feel the pressure to fit in and that I'd eventually take up the habit myself. I told him it would be a cold day in hell, but now when I see him he asks if he can "bum a dip." (Sam doesn't imbibe.)

Here we go!

Happy Lolly.

The view starts to reveal itself.

Selling Our House

On the 12th of January 2007 we closed on Old Beech Mountain. Now it was time to list our house. Rather than wait for spring when there would be a lot of inventory on the market, we thought we'd get a leg up and list it in January. We were told there's always a market for tranferees and that was our most likely target. We've always been pretty meticulous about upkeep and, as all sellers probably think, we thought our house was pretty special and it would fly off the market. Larry took these pictures with the Christmas decorations still up thinking it would be for the last time.

We also told our hangar neighbor at Kenosha airport that we were going to be selling the hangar. He leapt at it and asked us not to tell anyone he was the buyer or the amount we agreed upon. We had a handshake deal. Silly us.

Meet Sam Proffit

November 2006 is also when we met the inimitable Sam Proffit. (I swore I wouldn't publish any unflattering pictures of myself but I just had to include a picture of Sam. Besides, Larry says this is a good picture of me, a fact I find quite depressing.)

The first thing you notice about Sam is that he is the slowest talkin' man in North Carolina. The second is his quiet, unassuming way. The third is his wry sense of humor. Because I asked everyone I met about snakes in these mountains, he told me about professors at Appalachian State University (in Boone, our nearest "big" city) trying to reintroduce the rattlesnake. To this he said, "My question to them is, why don't we start in your yard?" Oh, and the answer to that question from most everyone was that I didn't have to worry about snakes at 4,200 feet. Whew!

Sam is a logger, but with that business drying up in NC he's getting more into excavating. He was recommended to us as the man who could find the best path into the property as well as where to site the house. We were armed with a compass and topographical maps, Sam was armed with his cup of McDonald's coffee.

Because the land is so wooded, we entered near the back of the property near those Christmas trees I mentioned earlier. It seemed to be the levelest spot and we wanted to be far from the road anyway. Sam said, "I think we should start walking out here." We tied a ribbon on a branch and waded in. A machete would have been helpful. He took us up, down, around, over, under and even through some thick rhododendron bushes, tying ribbons all the way. We came out very near the middle of our road frontage. Sam never spilled a drop. (See that sagging pocket on the front of Sam's T-shirt? We later learned that that's where he parks his coffee cup all day when he's operating heavy equipment.)

We told Sam we'd be back in March to clear the land and be ready to start building in April or as soon as our house sold. Ha!

Surveying the Land, November 2006

After our offer was accepted we came back in November to perform our due diligence which included surveying the land. We found that the tenant Christmas tree farmer had planted trees on land he assumed belonged to his landlord, our neighbor to the north. In this picture I am positioned along our lot line so all the trees in front of me are on our land. These trees will mature in about eight years, at which point we will reclaim the land. We haven't as yet introduced ourselves to either the tenant or the owner. I hope this meeting will go well and stay as friendly as possible. I even hope they throw in a Christmas tree, or two, per year.

If you look real close you can see two markers with pink ribbons down the center of this picture. The land on the left side belongs to us.

First Some Background

Larry and I married in August 1997. Aside from Larry's dream of building an airplane (which is weeks away from being completed, however, we're in NC and the plane's in Wisconsin), we both dreamed of living somewhere more bucolic than Mundelein, IL. Our search took us to Galena, IL (when the dream list included enough land for a grass landing strip); outside Asheville, NC (when Michael Ocker and family moved to NC the first time); Grafton, IL overlooking the confluence of the Illinois and Mississippi rivers (near Judy and Dave Sanford); and Brown County, IN (we'd driven through and seen pretty pictures). Then at a family party at my sister Jeanne's, I asked her in-laws, Carol and Sandy Goldman-- world travelers -- where they felt was one of the prettiest spots in the U.S., with milder weather than Chicago. Without hesitation Sandy said, "Grandfather Mountain and Blowing Rock, North Carolina." Since Michael had recently moved back to NC for a new job we thought we'd check it out.

In August 2006 we spent a couple of days with a Blowing Rock realtor who kept showing us houses after we'd told her we were interested in land. Then we went over to Sparta, NC to see if there were any bargains to be had. The views just weren't "big" enough.

In my travels, I picked up a copy of "Homes & Land of the High Country" and saw a listing: Large high elevation tract just outside Banner Elk, 4200' elevation, very good views possible; 13.49 acres, TBD Old Beech Mtn Rd, Elk Park. I emailed the realtor, Will Buckner, in October to ask if this was really the view from the property or one of those "...similar view from neighboring property" deals. He laughed because he was familiar with how some realtors will do this, but he said he definitely took the picture from the property. We asked Michael and Cherell to please go look at it for us. They reported back, "You've got to see this." Less than a week later we walked the property.

So, okay, the picture in the listing was taken from the property, but he took the picture standing on one leg in the very corner next to the road. The land was completely wooded. He assured us, and Larry assured me, that we would find our view. The price was right. We nervously plunged in. Well, I was nervous, Larry was confident. We didn't even ask for a perk test contingency because we didn't know where the building site would be and, hey, with 13 acres we'd have no problem. More about that later. Here's the view from the neighbors on both sides:

The two pictures above were supposed to be at the end of this post. I'm sure there's a way to get them there but for now I can't figure out how.