Sisters Noreen Bentfield and Gert Brixius
We had heard that the couple who purchased our house on Portland Avenue wanted us to come and see them sometime. When we gave them a call to see if we could stop by, they were delighted to hear from us. We set the date for Saturday, July 20 at 10. We were having a rain and thunder storm that morning. We called to cancel thinking they would not want us coming dripping wet into their home. The gentleman sounded so disappointed that we said okay we will be there at 10.
The yard has a very nice looking wrought iron fence with children’s play equipment inside. We walked up to the door, noticing the welcome sign, and were met at the door by Kyle, Julie, Emon and Vivian Oostra. What a lovely family. Emon, 2 ½, was eager to show us his bedroom. He would have been one very disappointed boy if we hadn’t showed up, as he was the one who did the welcome sign. His bedroom was Gert’s old room. The tiny room next to the bathroom is 4-month-old Vivian’s room. The 3rd floor was filed with toys and Emon’s play area. The kitchen does not fit the vintage of the rest of the house. It has been redone in a very modern style and looks very doable. They had hoped to be able to eat in their kitchen, but with the little ones it does not work, though they plan at some time to get stools and eat around the butcher block. After spending time last summer cleaning out, but not cleaning up the basement, we were both curious to see what that looked like. They had the walls sand blasted and refer to the space as their castle. The walls really do look like castle walls, for example as in Ireland. They discovered with a very in-depth check of the furnace that it was leaking carbon monoxide behind the frame. It had not begun to leak out side of that area, but would have in time.
Emon was eager to serve us the banana bread that he helped his mother make for our visit. The Oostras have met many of the neighbors and a number of the neighborhood children come to play in the yard with Emon. They asked lots of questions about the history of the house, etc. We so enjoyed our visit and asked if they would take the picture with the sign because we wanted to share it with the rest of our community.
