aaaah i'm in love

Dan's parents are visiting Maine this week and we're having a blast.  Last night, Dan and I showed them this really cool house that's for sale.  We always slow down to admire it when driving by.  It's in Rockport (Camden's southern neighbor), for sale for $399,000, was built in 1850, has 3886 square feet that are made up of (in part) 7 bedrooms, 1 full bathroom, 1 three quarter bathroom, and 1 half bathroom and is listed "for the creative and adventurous buyer." Until today, the best I could get was looking at the little flyer I grabbed from the for sale sign.

Today when we drove by, Dan's mom had us stop so we could peek in the windows.  When Dan, his mom and I were out back looking into what should be a kitchen (but is in fact just a big, empty room with plywood floors), his dad knocked on the window at us....from INSIDE the house!! Turns out the front door is unlocked! So, we all snuck in and looked around.

I. am. in. love.  The good and bad thing about this love is that there's no way it could ever be mine.  Unless the sellers would consider accepting a $100 down payment, that is.  Dan always tells me not to get my hopes up about things and at least with this, even I know it would be absolutely absurd to even think about somebody buying this house for me.  So, instead, I will just dream about how I would decorate it if it were mine.  And that is almost as fun as actually decorating it.  And certainly comes with a bigger budget and fewer headaches. Would it be creepy if I became a squatter and just decorated it as if I owned it?

Although it would take a lot of money to make this house live-able (boring things like new windows to replace the ones that are original to the house, new electrical system, probably new plumbing and parts of a new roof, just to name a few),  I still do believe it would be a great investment for somebody who had the time and money to fix it up.  It would be relatively easy to add in more bathrooms and the closet space was surprisingly not terrible.  The molding is absolutely gorgeous.  The floors really aren't in bad condition.  And most of all, the blank slate is a total dream.

I guess my only absurd hope (in this situation) is that the unbelievably lucky people who do end up buying this house will let me decorate it for them.