An Expedition to Appleton, WI - to the old homestead

My father bought this house:

in 1955, shortly before one of my sisters was born. He had three kids at that point, and decided he needed a bigger house. It was 1500 square feet, one and one half baths. Three bedrooms. And it was less than a mile from the house he was living in, a duplex, that he father built. And that he was born in back in 1916. I like to say that had WWII (The Big One) not intervened, he would have never lived outside of Appleton, WI.

The oldest of the three kids he had at the time was seven, the youngest four. So essentially all seven of his kids grew up in this house.

We found some old photos we had not seen before, a favorite being one of my father, which looks like a work photo. Here is brother Matthew, holding up the photo:

Six of the seven kids were up for the weekend. It was, as always, fun to get together with my family, but also sad as we were moving Noey out of the house.

There were a lot of tears as we told old stories and divided up old memorabilia.

But we also had a lot of laughs

Because, well, we are a very close family that loves each other a lot.

It was a good house. It was a great home. We will all miss it.