Gray Gables, A back story~

I wanted to share a little background on Gray Gables Farms.  It was built in 1892 by a successful Timber retailer, Aaron Chesbrough.  He was a wealthy, to-do, who lived in Toledo, Ohio.  I have been unable to find out his reasons for purchasing the land which soon after housed Gray Gables Farms, also referenced as CHESBROUGH Farms.  I assume it was a summer home, since it is very close to Maumee Bay State Park, which was a recess outlet to Lake Erie.
I believe the house was built for Aaron and his two sons and daughter and late wife, Mattie.  She passed in 1898 and it arises questions in me, as to whether she was able to stay in the home at all.

Aaron remarried in 1904.  He also had one of the first automobiles in Toledo, Ohio.  I found a newspaper clipping from 1910, in which another wealthy, to-do was driving his automobile from Chesbrough Farms and was involved in an automobile accident with a local transit bus downtown. This was an exciting find for me, proving that Aaron had used the home to entertain!

The house was sold in the early 1920's to a J. Casper family.  There is some proof that the house was powered by underground gas.  I have connected with some past residences who occupied the home in the 1940's who remember some sort of generator in the basement of the carriage house.

The house changed hands again in the late 1940's to the Toth Family.  They lived in the home until the late 1990's.  Since then, the house has turned hands a few more times than I am sure it would have liked.

We obtained the property in March of 2012.  It was in bad shape!  It was on the condemn and demolition block and after a small bidding war, we were able to obtain ownership.

The house has a lot of awesome architectural details. The ceilings in the living room and dining room are coffetted mahogony wood.  It also features a giant stone fireplace.  An englenook also occupied the space next to the fireplace for additional seating.

There is also an old window in the dining room and a portico which houses a massive porch underneath and driveway area.

The house had original cedar shake and a tiled bathroom, ceiling to floor.  We did remove the bathroom, although neat for its day, it was very dated.  We also had to replace the cedar shake, it was in bad shape and falling off with a single touch. We updated with a vinyl cedar shake fake.  We had to stick with the gray, it is Gray Gables after all!

We have been working very hard to maintain the old world charm that the home brings, but updating it to the twenty first century.  We also had to add our own spin on things.  We took the five bedroom, one and a half bath house and converted it to a 3 bedroom, 2 and a half bath home.  We sacraficed two bedrooms to make a master and master bath.

We have a long road ahead of us.  We added a pond and pole barn to the property as well.  We had to move in on October 01st of this year, which was LONG overdue!  We are making it all work, even though we are missing the flooring in the kitchen, upper cabinets, stove!  We also do not have a completed laundry room, deck and our backyard is dirt and weeds!  But this is small potatoes in the grand skeem of things!

We are making it work!  Our lives have been turned upside down for the past two solid years and we are stronger than ever!

I am making this work for my kids.  Their transition to these new things has been my number one concern and as a Mom, I think I am doing ok.

I want to use this blog to reach out to those of you who might be going through the same adventure.  Have you heard your friends say to you, What the hell are you doing??   We have been hearing this for the past two years!  But in the end, we upgraded our 1800 sq ft living space for the 3000 sq ft living space and we are customizing it to fit our life!  That is exciting in my book.  Now, dont get me wrong, it has been nothing but a big challenge and broken major relationships, which is a sad thing, but as much as I wish we would have jumped on the plane and high-tailed it to Arizona, I feel at peace being where we are right now.

I am also addicted to Pinterest- a lot of my house has been from pictures from Pinterest - and we have put our own spin on a lot of things.   I am also a Mom, and I have tips, tricks, and fun stuff to share!


So, if you are here, reading my pen to paper, welcome!  Please join me on my wild, crazy adventure and I will share my philosophies of life, and feel free to share with me your thoughts and experiences also!  I love to relate!  This is all new to me too!!

Thanks for the read!!!  ~looking forward to the future, one day at a time....