A Picture Worth a Thousand...

If you don't want to read all about how I finally got something that I've always wanted and how happy it makes me then please stop reading now. Because I got something that I've always wanted and it makes me so happy. And after you read this, you are gonna want one too. If you don't want to want one, you might want to stop reading now as well.


Fair warning.


Up at the top is a photo of our old house. The before photo. And this right above these words is the after. I wrote all about it here. I loved that house. I adored that house. It wasn't perfect by any stretch of the imagination but it was quite beautiful.


Then we had to sell it. And move. I remember when we moved the one regret I had was that I never had one of those artists come and draw my house for me. You know how people have a portrait done of their home? I figured it would be thousands of dollars and I'd have to have some weird person with a beret and big easel sit in my yard for a few days and freak out the neighbors.


Then came Karol. We've been reading each other's blogs for over a year. She's an artist. And a month or so ago she let me know that if I could send her a photo of my old house she could draw it. With colored pencils. I did. Thinking she would draw me a postcard sized house that might resemble the photo. I couldn't wait to see it.


You can imagine my surprise when the UPS man showed up at my door last week with a box as large as our fireplace surround. This non postcard sized rendering was framed and triple matted. And had the unmistakable ambiance of our house. Our yard. Our birch trees with the zillions of tiny leaves that started falling in July. Those shutters that my husband made and I painted Restrained Gold. The painted brick that took me 2 weeks to find the right shade of off white. She got every detail right.


I am madly in love with the newest addition to our home. Karol, you will never know how much I adore this work of art and I'll treasure it forever. We have so many memories there and I love that I can look at it every day. If our house where we live now caught on fire and our family was safely out and I had 2 minutes to grab what I could, this rendering would be in the first trip out the door.


Maybe you are like me and you get a little sentimental about your home. Maybe you had to move out of a home you loved. Maybe your childhood home has special significance. Maybe this is the perfect gift for someone. The great part is that Karol does not need to come sit in your yard. She doesn't need a beret. She can capture your home or a favorite spot from a photograph.


Karol has an amazing website where you can see some samples of her work. Click here to see my house as it was being drawn. I am beyond impressed with her artistic ability. This is one of those items that is worth spending your hard earned money on. It's not cheap, it's priceless. And it wasn't even thousands of dollars.