Greg Adkins, you'll always have my vote!

It's election time around the country and the political campaigns are in full swing.  I think we get 3 or 4 pre-recorded campaign phone calls a day (lovely).  I promise this "house blog" isn't going to turn into a political discussion, but in light of the current elections, I wanted to give a "shout out" to our City Councilman, Greg Adkins.  Greg Adkins, you'll always have my vote (well, that is, until our house sells, and we resettle in another town.)  Here's why, as long as we're residents of 330 Lynn Drive, we'll always want Greg Adkins representing our great neighborhood.

When we moved to 330 Lynn Drive in January 2006, we had lots of friends and family visiting us in our new home (which we LOVED!).  However, we had quite the dilemma!  It was always hard to explain which street was "Lynn Drive."  When you turn off of Harding Place onto Danby, you come to the intersection of Danby and Lynn.  Normally, there's a nice little green street sign atop the stop sign that would be visible for our friends and family to see.  However, there wasn't one.  Well, actually there WAS a street sign atop the stop sign.  See, the stop sign is right here in this picture.  You see it, right?  Behind that tree.  It's there, I promise.  I know you can't see it, but it's there.

 

Maybe this arrow helps.  See it??  It's behind the tree there on the left.

Okay, so it's really not that visible, so I'll zoom in a little here.  Now, you can see it.  Right there by the arrow.

This stop sign is situated behind this 20 foot tall tree, so the "Lynn Drive" sign was there telling my friends and family that they had arrived at our street.  Sadly, however, they just couldn't see it.

So, I decided that I should contact my City Councilman to see if it was possible to get an official "Lynn Drive" sign atop the stop sign on the east side of the Danby Avenue/Lynn Drive intersection.  Our neighborhood has a fabulous little newsletter about happenings in the neighborhood, and in the newsletter, I found contact information for Greg Adkins.  I emailed Greg and explained the "hidden street sign" dilemma.  I had a response from Greg within 24 hours.  He assured me that he had forwarded my email on to the city and that they would take care of this.  Being the skeptic that I am, I thought, "Yeah, right!  They'll NEVER do anything about this."

Thankfully, I was wrong!  Within 2 days of receiving Greg's email, the city had a crew on our street.  They moved the "Lynn Drive" sign from the stop sign on the west side of the intersection to the east side of the intersection.  See the results here?

It was so nice to have this done!  It was so much easier to direct people to our home after that, and we've been enjoying it ever since!  So, when you turn onto Lynn Drive to come "home" to your new home or when you're able to direct friends and family to your home with ease, just remember to thank your Councilman, Greg Adkins.

Old house = old trees

We're selling our sweet, little house and moving because of my husband's new job.  We have looked briefly at homes for sale in the town where we're moving.  The town is actually relatively "young."  As HUGE fans of old houses, it's been interesting to find out that there aren't many of those in this town.  Most of the homes have been built in the last 25 years.  As we peruse the internet looking at various houses, there's one thing that we've noticed.  Most homes do not have mature trees growing on their lots.  Of course, this makes total sense since the homes are newer.  Since we've only lived in older homes, we've always enjoyed mature trees with shady yards.  So, when we move, one of my first tasks will be to plant trees around our house.  Hopefully, we'll live there for years and years and years and get to watch them grow and eventually enjoy their shade.  I've gotten spoiled here at 330 Lynn Drive because we have shade trees growing all around our home.  It's been DELIGHTFUL for when our kiddos play outside, and it's also been easy on the wallet!  The shade from the trees help us use less energy to cool our house in the spring and summer.

The TALL trees in our backyard!  I couldn't get  tops of the trees in the picture because they're SO HUGE!

These pictures were taken at 2:00 pm on one of the hottest days (low 90s) that we've had in about 6 weeks.  Yes, it IS the end of September, and it's almost Fall!  No, I don't know why we're having 90 degree weather!  :)  I digress.  You will enjoy the beauty and shade from these fabulous trees at 330 Lynn Drive!

Enjoy a fun afternoon in the shady backyard!

12 minutes

I drove from 330 Lynn Drive to Costco (our family's favorite!!) in Cool Springs.  It took 12 minutes.  Ahhhhhhhh, I LOVE our location!!!

Are those monkeys that I hear?

Yes, those are monkeys that you're hearing especially if it's 9:00 a.m. or noon at 330 Lynn Drive!  Our neighborhood backs up to the southern perimeter of the Nashville Zoo.  There is a back entrance to the Zoo that is in walking distance from our house!  (Too bad it's an Employees Only entrance!).  We have THOROUGHLY enjoyed living 2 minutes from the Nashville Zoo.  We've gotten a Zoo membership every year (thank you, Grandparents!), and it's been WELL worth it!  We love to go in the late afternoon about an hour before closing and let our kids have free reign of their MASSIVE playground or go right when they open in the mornings as the animals are first waking up.  We love going at odd times to beat the crowds.  It's a great zoo, and it's improved by leaps and bounds in the 4 1/2 years since we moved here!  My kids love the farm animals, meerkats, flamingos (which just arrived this month!!), and the monkeys!!

Speaking of MONKEYS (Gibbons to be exact!)...the Nashville Zoo has a very cool habitat for Gibbons.  The Gibbon Island is one of the first animal exhibits that you'll see when you visit the Zoo.  If you've been to the Nashville Zoo, you'll know that these Gibbons yell, hoop, and scream at different times during the day.  They do this as a form of communication with each other.  It's hilarious (and quite loud) when they get their windpipes going!  My kiddos always love it!

The funny thing about these Gibbons is that you can hear their yells at our house!  We don't hear them every day and it is a faint noise, but you CAN hear them!  My kids love it!  They start yelling (almost as loud as the monkeys themselves!), "Monkeys, Mommy! It's the monkeys!"  So, not only do we have lots of wildlife in our yard--squirrels, chipmunks, and the occasional duck visiting our creek--we have the occasional monkey communicating to us!  :)  I'm sure that I could ask one of the Zookeepers to find out the reason for this, but we only hear the monkeys at 9:00 am and at Noon.  Maybe they're singing for their breakfast and lunch!

I still remember our first week in our house.  I went outside one morning to get the newspaper, and I heard this faint yell.  I immediately panicked!  I thought someone was in danger, and I immediately began brainstorming how I could find out where they were in order to help them!  Once I stopped and listened more closely, I realized that it wasn't a woman yelling for help, it was one of the Gibbons from the Nashville Zoo!  ha!  So, when you move in and get settled at 330 Lynn Drive, don't panic when you hear a scream, it's probably Bahari or Muppet singing for their breakfast!

I love my SINK!!

Do you remember this post when I told you about the overabundance of peach inside 330 Lynn Drive when we bought her?  Yes, we parted ways with the peach all over the house.  The kitchen was one of the last rooms where we bid the peach paint farewell.  As we were remodeling the kitchen, the guy who put in our countertops asked us if we wanted to change out the sink when he installed them.  YES, YES, YES, YES!  This was our immediate reply! 

The sink that was in the house when we bought it reminded me of the sink in my first apartment.  The wells of each side of the sink only went down about 4 inches, and they were shaped in a perfect square.  So, if I put a couple of SMALL things in my sink, it looked like the dishes were falling out of the sink onto the counter!  I LOVE to cook, so anytime I used my 9x13 dish or any of my pots and pans, they were almost impossible to get clean.  The square shape made it hard to corral the dishes, and it was tricky getting them under the faucet just "so-so" in order to clean.

Viola!  Our new sink has been my BFF these past 4 1/2 years.  With an 8-10 inch depth in both wells, I'm able to easily, handily scrub my pots and pans sparkly clean.  If you'll notice in the picture above, the 2 wells in the sink are 2 different sizes.  LOVE IT!  My 9x13 pan easily fits on the left side; I always have to leave it in to soak for a while (thanks to my Baked Oatmeal dish that we have each morning for breakfast).

Who knew what JOY would be found at 330 Lynn Drive when we replaced our sink!  I think I'll have to replace the countertops at our next house JUST to have an excuse to put in this same sink!

Fresh Green Beans+Moon Pies=Good Neighbors

We love our neighborhood for millions of reasons, and one of the reasons is our great neighbors!  The picture here captures the generosity of our neighbors, who we are so thankful for! 

One of our neighbors has a vending machine business.  Can you guess which item came from him?  Last week, our kiddos ran inside our house with eyes the size of half dollars when our neighbor gave them this box of Moon Pies.  He gives them treats like these all the time, and they adore him for it!  With both sets of our children's grandparents living outside of Nashville, they're thankful to have been adopted by Mr. Wes next door!  We're also thankful that Mr. Wes has tons of tools and equipment that he lets us borrow.  Thanks to him, we've never had to buy a ladder since we moved in!

The fresh green beans appeared on our front door last week from our other neighbor.  I've had some good laughs with her, too.  She also has 3 kids of the same gender like me.  Both of our kids are spaced apart exactly the same, and our last 2 children both had the same birth weight (a whopping 9 lbs. 2 oz.!).  Her kiddos are all in their 20s and have left home.  She tells me that I'm living her life 20 years later.  We've traded out toys for her grandchild, and she was so gracious to let me borrow clothes her grandchild had outgrown when we had our latest little one last year.

I think it was Robert Frost who wrote, "Good fences make good neighbors."  I would add that Moon Pies, ladders, fresh green beans, and children's clothes do too!

Reason #1,048 why we love our creek...

This is how we spend our Saturday mornings at 330 Lynn Drive!  Our kiddos LOVE exploring in the creek, looking for water bugs & tadpoles, and getting into some good ol' dirt!

Climbing Tree

We LOVE this tree!  Over the last 6 months, our oldest kiddos have found a new use for the tree--climbing!!

A NEW favorite spot...

As I mentioned in the previous post, we love the Ellington Agricultural Center for its creek, trails, horses and peaceful serenity in the heart of Nashville. We REALLY love that it's 5 minutes from our house! One of our newest discoveries is the Seven Mile Creek Greenway, which is also 5 minutes from our house!

It has a great paved road that is perfect for our boys to ride their bikes, scooters, and tricyles on! It's flat and an easy distance for our little guys (about 3/4 mile one way). They love riding on it and observing bugs, bamboo, butterflies, and other aspects of nature. We enjoy this activity that we can all do together as a family. The boys love ending their ride on the "trail" (as they call it) by playing on the playground or baseball fields of Whitfield Park, which is where you park your car and enter the greenway.

The GREATEST discovery about the Seven Mile Creek Greenway is that it intersects with the Ellington Agricultural Center, so we can ride our bikes from the greenway down to the creek! Our boys love riding on the "trail" and stopping by to cool off their toes in the creek.

A favorite spot...

Since moving to 330 Lynn Drive, one of our favorite spots has been the Ellington Agricultural Center. I've taken many, many pictures of our boys at the gazeebo and fish pond beside the Iris Garden. We've also enjoyed hiking around many of the trails on its grounds, and my husband enjoys running on one of the trails, too. We've gone to some of the Summer Fun days that they have each July. Our boys always enjoy seeing the horses, which live on the grounds. These are the same horses that are the mounted patrol for Metro Nashville Police. (How cool is that?!?!) Here they are...

In January, while taking the boys for a hike, my husband and oldest sons stumbled upon this beautiful, secluded creek at Ellington.


They love to wade in the creek and look for critters, minnows, and any other critters there eyes can see. I love that we can enjoy peaceful serenity while being in the heart of the bustling city of Nashville.

Also, just a note about the picture above. If you haven't heard, Nashville had one of the worst floods in the history of our state. Ellington experienced flooding as well. In the center of this photo, you'll see a large pile of boulders leaning against the large pipe. These appeared post-flood. The rocks are enormous and were literally washed away from who knows where, and they landed here on the pipe. Unbelievable!

Going Green @ 330 Lynn Drive

When we moved to Nashville 5 years ago, we spent our first 6 months in an apartment in Bellevue. We enjoyed our time there, but we were VERY thankful to find a great house to buy here @ good ol' 330 Lynn Drive. We didn't realize it at the time, but by moving to Crieve Hall, we landed in a great location that's convenient to EVERYTHING!

One thing that I enjoyed about Bellevue was that they had this great recycling drop-off facility. So, in our little bitty apartment, I would collect our recycling, keep it sorted, and ever-so-frequently drive with my newborn down to the recycling facility. Whew! Lots of work, but I was excited to have the opportunity to recycle. The community where we lived prior to Nashville had no such recycling facility.

However, when getting settled at 330 Lynn Drive, I quickly noticed two trashcans behind our house, one brown and one green. After inquiring about these with our neighbor, I learned that the brown one was for trash, and the green one was for CURBSIDE RECYCLING. WOW! This was exciting news to me! I was amazed at how simple it was to recycle now. Just throw it in the green can, no sorting required, and they picked it up at the front of our house! So, I quickly bought 2 large garbage cans for our kitchen: black can--trash and gray can--recycling

After only a couple of months, we realized that we were recycling WAY more than we were throwing away. The recycling pick up comes once a month, and we quickly outgrew our 1 container from the city. We were excited to learn that you can request a SECOND recycling container FREE, so we did just that! Our second container arrived 3 days later, and we've been maxing out both of them for the past 4 1/2 years! Ironically, we have so little trash in the brown container that we could roll it around once a month (instead of weekly) and be okay! So, if you visit our house, THIS is why we have these 3 guys (instead of 2 like most households) around back.

We've never really considered ourselves "green" people, but when we saw the impact from recycling, we got adventurous! As things around the house needed updating or replacing, we tried to be more energy efficient if it was feasible. The boys' rooms needed new light fixtures, so we found some that were certified energy efficient. When the ol' shower head died, we opted for a Waterpik Low Flow Shower Head. I was skeptical of the 'low flow' before I used it, but I'm definitely SOLD on it now! It has great pressure, and it's saving us money at the same time!

Being intentional with our choices around the house has allowed us to keep our electric and water bills pretty consistent over the past 4 1/2 years despite the fact that we've grown from a family of 3 to 5 during that time! I was excited that our electric bill was only $92 this month...amidst the heat that descended on Nashville these last weeks of May and first weeks of June! You're going to LOVE living here!

A favorite spot...

We spent the morning at the Nashville Zoo. This is one of our favorite places in Nashville! I love that it's a 5 minute commute from our house to the zoo. You're going to love living here!

330 Lynn Drive: A familiar sight

These boots are favorites of our boys!  They were lined up neatly in our garage this week, and it made me smile.  This is just a glimpse into our home and the home that our house at 330 Lynn Drive has become.

In case you're wondering, the other 'cow' boot was outside drying in the sun.  Son #1 wore them down to the creek, and "It just fell in, Mommy."  Does the fact that he was talking on my cellphone to his grandmother have anything to do with it just 'falling in'?  I'm sure that it did.  Never a dull moment at 330 Lynn Drive!

Saucer Magnolia

Thanks to the help of my aunt & a dear friend I've solved the dilemma about the tree in our front yard.  I've wanted DESPERATELY to know what kind of tree it is, so I'm thankful to have learned that it's a Saucer Magnolia.  Yes, we WILL be planting one of these at our new house when we move.  It will always remind me of this sweet little house that I will dearly miss.

Here's what Wikipedia has to say about it if you'd like to read more.  Enjoy!

The Nashville Flood of 2010 and a sump pump

If you haven't heard, Nashville experienced one of the worst floods in our state's history last weekend.  I can't begin to articulate what it's been like to see friends all over our city who lost everything in the flood.  However, the beautiful story that has unfolded is our city's citizens coming out in droves to help loved ones, friends, and strangers as they seek to rebuild.  WE ARE NASHVILLE is the mantra that we now chant as our community has come together, embraced each other, and fearlessly pushes forward to heal, to help and to rebuild.  If you're interested in donating to flood victims, a friend had a great list on her blog of agencies working w/flood victims.

Before we moved into 330 Lynn Drive, I never HEARD of a sump pump; I had no earthly idea what it did.  The original owners that we purchased the house from had put in this REALLY, REALLY nice waterproofing system including a sump pump before we bought the house. Over the past years that we've lived here, it's worked beautifully when we had an occasional storm, and I was thankful.  However, my thankfulness SOARED this weekend as the STORM of ALL STORMS came through and as I watched our neighbors on both sides (and many others in our neighborhood for that matter) have flooded basements.  Our sump pump was working overtime, and it beautifully did it's job.  I wanted to HUG the sump pump last weekend and even told a friend I wanted to make it some cookies because of my gratitude to it!  And, our sweet little creek in the backyard, oh how it swelled, but it never crept over into our backyard.  How thankful we were for this!

So tonight, we sit in a nice, warm, dry house and so thankful for the foresight of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, the original owners. (Remember, I mentioned they built it like a tank!)  Our hearts, however, are heavy and burdened for those around Nashville who have lost so much.  Please consider giving monetarily to support Nashville Flood victims.

Rain, Rain GO AWAY

In case you missed it, Middle & West Tennessee got hit w/MAJOR rain and flooding this weekend. I must confess that I didn't believe the "hype" that we'd heard from the meteorologists all week long. They kept telling us that we were going to get LOTS of rain. I, honestly, didn't think anything about it this morning when the rain began. However, after running to the post office twice in one hour (it's a LONG story!), I noticed a VISIBLE change in the amount of water on the streets.

When I got home, I looked in our backyard. My husband and I had been watching our creek all morning. The water was clearly rising, and we actually laughed, "Wow, the water's getting higher and flowing quickly." This time, however, I was a big more alarmed as our creek turned first into a raging river followed by a pond; finally, it was a growing lake in our backyard. Thankfully, the water finally subsided, and it never got over the "hill" into our backyard. I didn't get a great picture (I was trying to protect my camera), but maybe you can see how large our lake got this morning.

This will be another story that we add to 330 Lynn Drive's history--the day that the creek turned into a lake. So, we're very thankful that our house didn't flood and are mindful of those experiencing the chaos that these rains have brought.

The Office

I remember the first time that we looked @ 330 Lynn Drive over 4 years ago.  My husband and I were scouting out the basement and downstairs bedroom & bath and immediately thought about the possibility of renting out that space to a single friend from church (which we did for 18 months and was a FABULOUS experience!).  We exited the basement to check out the two-car garage; we were SUPER excited about this "amenity."  Our former house had a detached, one-car garage.  All I could think about was NO MORE DRENCHED clothing on rainy days!!

While scouting out the garage, we stumbled upon an Office at the opposite side of the basement nestled in the garage.  Every wall in the Office was lined with bookshelves.  If the screen porch and creek hadn't already sold me, the Office DID!  You see, my husband LOVES books....like REALLY loves books!  Most of them are in his office @ work, but he still has a ton of others!  The Office was PERFECT! 

After learning more about the previous owners, we learned that they had one son, who lived at home after college and attended law school here in Nashville.  His parents built the Office for him to use for his law studies and the separate bedroom & bath for him.  He, too, loved books like my husband, so we knew this house was a perfect fit!  Man, we're going to miss this place....

2 Little Ducks...

We had 2 guests @ our creek this week...a male & female duck! My father-in-law was here that day, and he said they were looking for a place to nest. I was HOPING against hope that they would nest in our creek. We would LOVE little ducklings around here (well, I guess they probably would hatch after we move. sigh.). Sadly, they were gone the next morning. :(

We had another pair of ducks a couple of years ago. They were so cute swimming in the creek! We tried to convince them to stay by bribing them with bread. The bribery didn't work for them; they were gone the next morning, too. :( There's lots of wildlife to enjoy in our backyard, which has been a pleasant surprise since we're in the middle of Nashville! Squirrels, chipmunks, deer, minnows and frogs in the creek.

Spring has arrived @ 330 Lynn Drive--Part 2!

I love Spring at our house! I mentioned it previously in this post. I'm IN LOVE with this pink tree in our front yard. I wish, wish, wish that I knew what kind it is because I'm DEFINITELY planting one at our new house when we relocate.

Spring has arrived @ 330 Lynn Drive

I love SPRING...especially @ our house! I'm in LOVE with this tree in our front yard. It has BEAUTIFUL pink blossoms this time of year. Not sure what kind of tree it is. Maybe you can help me figure that out! Also, remember this post when I talked about the flower bed in the backyard? It surprised me our first Spring in the home. The flowers BURST forth out of the ground a couple of weeks ago. The purple hyacinths have finally exploded and are in full bloom. The buttercups WOULD have been in full bloom by now. Do you see the yellow color on the ground behind the hyacinth in this picture? My sweet 2 year old decided to "pick" flowers last week. He picked ALL of the blooms off of the buttercups; they were JUST about to open! Sad that I don't get to enjoy them this year. Did I mention this was the SAME day that my sweet 2 year old "dropped his fishing pole" in the creek? He walks up to me with jeans wet up to the knees. "I dropped my fishing pole and had to get it out," he explained. :) Oh what fun our "big kids" have in the creek!

Reason #738--Why we love our screen porch...

Gloomy, rainy day. Can't play outside, right? Wrong! Picnic lunch on the screen porch with our 2 "big kids" while our new little one enjoys playing in his bouncy seat & breathing in some fresh air. Our poor little winter baby has been outside less than 10 times in his short life. He's squealing and enjoying the fresh, Spring air despite the yucky rain. I love our little screen porch....perfect for days like this!

Old houses = fun, vintage bathroom tile

I remember the day that we first looked at 330 Lynn Drive. My first thought was, "Wow, everything's peach!" No, wait a minute, that wasn't my first thought! My first thought and instinct was to run to the bathroom to check out the bathroom tile. You see, I knew one thing about old houses, particularly those built in the 1950s & 1906s--they all have crazy, funky, vintage tile. Again, these crazy ceramic squares are what I love about the bathrooms in old houses; they add to the character of the home. What fun stories to be remembered and told about them!

When we were first married, we bought a teeny, tiny 2 bedroom house built in the early 1950s. I was as equally attached to that house as I am to 330 Lynn Drive. What fun memories of our little newlywed home. One of our favorite memories about THAT old house was the PEPTO BISMAL PINK bathroom tile. Those of you who've been in or owned a 1950s house know EXACTLY what I'm talking about! We first did not know what to think about the pink tile (especially my "manly" husband), but the black accent tile, which outlined the pink helped the bathroom evolve into a chic, vintage space. Imagine the fun I had filling it with black and white pictures that I took while working overseas!

So, stepping into 330 Lynn Drive--circa 1961--I quickly ran down the hall to the bathroom. I was ecstatic to see the gleam of vintage tile shining & smiling at me. This bathroom was not quite as shocking as the pepto bismal pink! We had two different shades of brown to work with, so I knew we would have fun accenting them! (Can you say, "oil, rubbed bronze"?!?!?) We were able to find a light fixture with Tiffany glass in the same shades of brown and an oil rubbed bronze faucet to spruce up the vanity. What fun to preserve the character of our home and tie in some modern updates. Tear out the vintage tile and start over? No way! No one would recognize our old home with a new bathroom. Well, I guess we could have, but we wanted to maintain as much of her original features as we could.

My husband and I talk about the bathrooms of our old houses like old war stories. We now have had pepto bismal pink and retro brown. We're hoping to find an old house in our new town, so who knows what color we'll have next! Sea Foam Green, Goldenrod, Powder Blue....oh yeah! Those could be next!

How it all began...

My husband and I love old houses. When we moved to Nashville 5 years ago, we left a sweet little old house built in the 50's. We knew we wanted to find another old house to love here in Nashville. Four and a half years ago, we were elated to find another "little old house" to love--330 Lynn Drive.

I think that I love old houses because they have such wonderful stories. Part of the reason that I wanted to have a blog about our house, as we prepare to sell her, is to pass along the wonderful stories that she contains. We love this little old house, and we want her next owners to love her just the same. So, welcome to our blog about 330 Lynn Drive!

"The best commute in Nashville"

The title of this post is a direct quote from my husband. 330 Lynn Drive is located less than 5 minutes from the Harding Place exit on Interstate 65. My husband works near Maryland Farms, which is one exit south (Brentwood/Old Hickory Blvd.) on I-65. So, he enjoys a 15 minute commute each day because he's going and coming from work opposite of the bulk of commuters. When I-65 is blocked or crowded, he can just head to and from work on Franklin Road. Oh the beauty of living at 330 Lynn Drive!

One of the things that we've grown to love about 330 Lynn Drive is that we're 15 minutes from most EVERYTHING in Nashville. Being new to town, we didn't realize this when we bought the house. So, as we ventured out around town, we realized how CONVENIENT everything is to where we live! What a pleasant surprise!

From our house...
*It's less than 5 minutes to Interstate 65
*It's less than 5 minutes to the NASHVILLE ZOO! (wahoo!)
*It's less than 5 minutes to Baja Burrito (can I get another Wahoo??)
*It's less than 5 minutes to Kroger & Aldi. (We're going to miss sweet Mrs. Linda @ Kroger, who gives our boys a handful of suckers and stickers every time we're there!)
*It's less than 10 minutes to Brentwood (and for those of you who, like me, love TARGET, it's about 7 minutes to the Target on Old Hickory Boulevard! There's a short cut to getting there; I'll tell you about it @ the closing, deal?)
*It's less than 10 minutes to Nipper's Corner (Edmonson Pike Library, Wal-Mart Market and yummy Jet's Pizza & Las Palmas!)
*It's less than 15 minutes to Green Hills (an abundance of MORE great shopping & eating venues. Can you say Cheesecake Factory?!?!)
*It's less than 15 minutes to Downtown (Including Belmont, Lipscomb, & Vanderbilt Universities. We're frequent visitors to Storytime & Puppet Shows @ the Downtown Library!!)
*It's less than 15 minutes to Cool Springs (all the shopping you can HANDLE...PLUS, Costco--our favorite!)

330 Lynn Drive affords you a wonderful 4 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath home (w/a CREEK and SCREEN PORCH!!!), but one of it's other gleaming assets is that she's close to EVERYTHING! You'll love calling her home.

The original owners

330 Lynn Drive was built in the 1960s, and when we bought the house 4+ years ago, we bought it from the ORIGINAL OWNERS! Isn't that amazing?!?! We'll call this family, the original owners, the Smiths. When we closed on the house, Mrs. Smith, who was now a widow in her 90s, came to the closing. It was wonderful!

I think of Mr. and Mrs. Smith often. I wish I had gotten the opportunity to know them and to learn more stories about our house. After living here, though, I've learned a few things about Mr. and Mrs. Smith. First, they built this house well. I often tell my husband that this house is built like a tank! It's held up well these 50+ years. It appears that anytime they had to repair something in the house, they didn't "cut corners." T hey loved their little house. Second, Mrs. Smith LOVED flowers. In the backyard, she has a special flower bed, which is circular and surrounded by bricks, and each Spring purple hyacinths and buttercups burst forth from the ground. I was surprised to meet these beautiful creations our first Spring in the house. They're beautiful, and I was excited to see them bursting forth again as I played with our boys outside today. Finally, they must have loved the color peach. Ever inch of every wall was covered with that paint color when we moved in. We had to part ways with that paint; we weren't that sad about it, though. Hopefully, if Mr. and Mrs. Smith could look at the house now, they would approve of all the many changes that we made when we moved in.

Kitchen

I love my kitchen...for LOTS of reasons actually! I love all of the cabinet space, the 2 glassed cabinets so I can display my china, AND I love that it's a MASSIVE room! I love what our kitchen has become.

Do you remember this post where I mentioned that when we moved in everything in the house was painted peach? Well, the kitchen and her cabinets were no exception! This was one of the last rooms in our house that we tackled. We dreaded painting the cabinets, but it actually was not that difficult. We loved how they turned out and were so glad that we painted them. As I packed up some pictures this week, I found a picture that I had taken of our son shortly after we moved here. The picture was taken in the kitchen, and those GLORIOUS peach cabinets w/BRASS handles were GLEAMING in the background. Speechless was I; really glad we painted those cabinets (and ditched the brass cabinet pulls).

Before my husband and I moved to Nashville, I worked at a university and coordinated service project trips for the students. Most of these trips were over Spring Break, and several of these trips occurred in other countries. I had the privilege of going on two international trips a year. Before taking that job, I actually lived for a year in Egypt. Transitioning to a stay-at-home mom, I wanted some way to see those places and remember them; primarily, I wanted to remember the people that I'd met in the dozens of countries that I saw. I had this CRAZY idea to display my favorite pictures from these international travels; of course, the shots had to be in black and white. I wasn't sure how to "pull off" my crazy idea UNTIL we bought this house! With such a massive kitchen and consequently, massive wall space, my idea became a reality! It helps that my favorite color is gray, so we "grayed" the kitchen, which perfectly coordinated with all of my black and white photos. I love that I can see all of these beautiful places and people each day! I get to relive each trip on a daily basis!

The Creek

One of my OTHER favorite things about 330 Lynn Drive is that there is a CREEK at the back of our property. Just follow this little wooden bridge seen above, and you're there! When we moved here, our oldest son was 6 months old, and I knew immediately that the creek would provide us hours of fun! It DEFINITELY has now that our family has grown to three boys! They love to play in the creek, throw rocks in the creek, go "fishing" in the creek. We've even had ducks stop by for a short visit in our creek! We fed them bread hoping that they would stick around and become the "pets" of our creek, but sadly, they flew on. Who knew that in the HEART of Nashville, you could have a CREEK in your backyard?!?! It's nice to live in the city, but have some amenities of the "country" like this creek.

The Screen Porch

One of my FAVORITE things about 330 Lynn Drive is the SCREEN PORCH! This was definitely one of the reasons that we bought this house! We've enjoyed this "room" of our house so much! It's been a wonderful space to enjoy the cool weather of the Spring and Fall without those pesky mosquitoes! With the ceiling fan, it makes it pleasant even in the midst of these hot Tennessee summers! One of my other favorite things about the screen porch is that it has been a GREAT play area for my kids! They can still "play outside" when it's raining outside--glorious! The screen porch is located right off of the kitchen, so I've been able to easily prepare breakfast, lunch, or dinner and keep my eye on them.

2 1/2 Baths

Here are some shots of the 2 1/2 baths!

Bath #1 (Full Bath off Main Hall)

Bathroom #2 (Half bath--off of Master Bedroom upstairs)
Bathroom #3 (Full Bath off of Downstairs Bedroom)