One of my neighbor's two barns across the street. These barns are enormous and beautifully kept. The last photo is his other barn. Working barns. 
Old barn on Aldergrove
Working barn on Olsen
I have a confession to make. I love big old barns. I mean, I don't just like barns, I desire and covet them. My children roll their eyes and say "m-o-o-o-o-m," but when I see a particularly lovely barn I stop the car and drool for a while. My idea of a great way to spend a sunday afternoon is driving around the county looking for cool barns I've never seen before. Right now, a property that I drive by almost every day is for sale, and I am dearly hoping they have an open house, and that if they do, they will let me tour their barn, which is truly a beauty, one of the best preserved and largest classic old barns in the area.
There was a smallish barn on the little farm I grew up on. In retrospect, it was a terrifying death trap, a tragedy waiting to happen, but at the time it was the coolest place to play EVER. There was a big hayloft with a trapdoor and we could jump through it and land in the hay underneath. Once I caught my armpit on a nail sticking out from the side of that trapdoor and got a hell of a scratch all down my side. Another time I stepped on a nail sticking up from a board and ran all the way back to the house with a piece of two by four clump-clump-clumping along with me. There was one baby goat (forget her name) who could climb the ladder and get up in the hayloft with us and we just thought that was the funniest thing in the world.
Now I have two stupid little pre-fab barns from Home Depot, which were expensive and make me feel like a poseur. But what are you gonna do? As much as I adore and admire beautiful big old barns, I'm actually kind of glad I don't have one. I understand they are murder to maintain.
Thanks for confessing your barn fetish! I have one, too.My parents' farmhouse has a big one that I also played in as a child. It doesn't have nearly as much character as the ones in the photos that you posted. My hubby and children think that I am positively insane. I love driving through Pennsylvania when on a road trip. The barns there are to die for. In addition to a barn fetish, I think I also have hayloft envy!(sigh)
ReplyDeleteI have a barn fetish too! I thought it was just me...maybe we should start a support group!
ReplyDeleteI love those old, big barns. In my teenage years I was working with a horse who was kept on a property that had an old, huge barn. It had stalls, a tack room, all kinds of neat things and a hay loft and one of those big doors in the front of the hay loft for loading hay from the outside. I have fond memories of eating McDonald's pizza and talking with my husband (then a new boyfriend) in the hay loft, our feet dangling and looking out over the pastures from that old barn.
I know of a couple in MO that actually remodeled an old barn into a house. It was so neat, she is writing a book about it I think.
That's very cool. I know of two, possibly three barns around here that have been transformed into homes. It's difficult to find barns in that good of shape anymore.
ReplyDeleteNails in armpits? yikes! I think I'm too much of a coward for all that. However, I can appreciate a good barn lover story! lol :)
ReplyDeleteDid you see that Homero is trying to influence your poll?
ReplyDeleteBTW, never thought to ask before, what's spanish for "D'OH!"?
"caray!"
ReplyDeleteOh, I so love the big old barns too. I have photographed many in our county with the idea that I will paint (watercolor) them before they fall down. I finished one last summer and it got blown down this fall.
ReplyDeleteI completely understand. I have this obsession too. We bought a farm with an old barn. I was so hyped up to salvage it. The pros told me that the foundation was leaning and unstable and all the wood was rotted. That is would cost me much more to salvage what was there than to build a new one. Waahh!
ReplyDeleteBTW, Love the pictures and your blog!