The Building of Our Beach House

On Thursday, Tom and I will celebrate our 15th wedding anniversary. And while this day reminds us of the beautiful September day when we got married, it also reminds us that not even a year later we purchased land in a Michigan beach town to some day build a beach house on to make memories with our future family.

Well, nearly 15 years later we're almost there. We broke ground in June and the house is expected to be done before the end of the year. It took us 15 years. Three kids. Two dogs. Three condos/houses.

We wanted to sell it when the recession hit and we were paying a double mortgage on our two city condos because we couldn't sell one. Luckily we had good jobs. So we held on.

We wanted to sell it when we were paying more taxes for our vacant land than for our condo in the city. But we didn't. We kept paying the taxes and the mortgage.

Eventually, we subdivided the large parcel of land into three lots selling two and keeping one for ourselves and paying off our own piece of land. We bought into the private beach and the tram system that would take you down to the beach instead of walking the stairs when we had the money so we wouldn't have to pay for it later.

We contemplated selling our land again and buying somewhere else in Michigan where we would always vacation but we decided one summer to rent a house close to our land and explore the area to decide once and for all if that's where we wanted to be. After the week was over, we concluded it was. There was so much to do - beach, great restaurants, good shopping, wineries, apple picking, festivals, farmers markets you name it. We were within a short drive of it all. So we stayed.

We always envisioned Adler would be alive when we finally built our beach house. It would be our country home and she'd have a yard and when she grew old we'd bury her in the backyard up there. Our kids will be 5, 9 and almost 12 by the time the beach house is finished. Sadie will be almost 3. It may have taken us longer than we anticipated to build but that makes the story of how it came to be so much better and more special.

It did take time, but time is all we have now to make memories up there with our family and friends.

Side and back view

Second floor front porch w/ view of lake

First floor front porch