377 Colebrook Road

While living in our 2-family house in downtown New Haven, I gave birth to our first son. We had some fun times there during his first year and I pushed him all over the city in the stroller or wearing him in my moby wrap and mei tai. When he was nine months old I found myself pregnant again and we decided it was time to leave the city and move to a different part of Connecticut.

We had always wanted to live in rural, northwest CT and we had some family in the area. In fact, we searched there when we were looking for our first house. But at that time it was too far away from our jobs on the shoreline in Fairfield County and we couldn't afford to leave those jobs. In retrospect, buying in the suburbs (Southbury) was an excellent choice for our first home since it gave us privacy and we basically made a big profit on a house we made virtually no improvements to over a three-year period. We also sold it ourselves, no realtors involved and went on to buy our first New Haven house for $100,000 less.

Interestingly, we spent more money on that first house than any of our subsequent houses, but it was completely updated and in perfect move-in condition, sitting on over 4 acres. A pretty good deal for being commutable to lower Fairfield county, although it was a long commute.

Upon finding out about my second pregnancy, and after searching all over Litchfield County, we settled on the house on Colebrook Road. This, too, was a compromise. While the town was tiny and remote, the location was on a main road and not quite as private as we would have liked. However, the house was in decent shape if EXTREMELY outdated in its decor, and it also sat on over three acres of woods. Overall, it was the best house in our price range (and we were somewhat limited considering we weren't selling our New Haven investment house).

We are slowly making it home and after seven years there's been noticeable progress. We didn't do much in the first couple of years with two boys under age two to chase after. But we are finally getting projects done and are slowly making this house a priority over our investment properties and finding a balance so all the properties get maintained and updated.

Before & After Shots

(Click on the Text to See the Changes - this house is still very much a work in progress.)

Gardens	Living Room	Kitchen
Dining Room	Family Room	Sunporch
Master Bedroom	Boys Room	Guest Room
Master Bath	Boys Bath	Powder Room