Good blog and great pizza

Happiness is...learning enough about the blog settings that you finally figure out how to cut out those spammers who have such lovely offers to make more money and enhance yourself in interesting ways.  So, hopefully from here on out I have defeated the spammers!

Happiness is also a great big slice of pizza from Goodfella's.  A wonderful Downtown hole in the wall where you can buy just a slice.  A bigger-than-your-head slice of the best (per my daughter) darn pizza in town.  Or, a whole darn pizza that I promise you only barely fits in the trunk of my minivan.

Standard Thursday night operating procedure for Mathews' family dinner:  Minivan pulls up on sidewalk across Mill Street from Goodfella's after picking up ballet dancers.  Ballet girls (as they are now known at Goodfella's) hop out with $20 in hand to fetch one 1/2 cheese/1/2 chicken & bacon pizza.  Girls leave store straining to carry this over-sized monstrosity as mom pops trunk and girls wedge it into a hopefully empty Honda Odyssey trunk. Change from the $20 is given back to mother.(amazing). Carpool riders are dropped off and much happiness ensues at the Mathews' house as Mathews' girls attempt to get 3 foot pizza box through door of the house.

Ahhh, such delicious specialness.  If you haven't been to Goodfella's, you've missed one of the best deals in town and maybe the experience that Lexington is a little bit New York cool afterall.     

(Above photo was taken on an Actual Thursday night -- ballet girl is at the counter in there!)

A love letter to Messrs. Dacci

My fingers are finally warm as I write this in my home office.  A lovely change from the chill 60 degrees experienced this morning as my little frozen children huddled by a space heater for warmth as they dressed for school.

Sometimes it is time to say good-bye.  Farewell upstairs furnace who successfully outlived your design life by a good twenty years!  You were a faithful source warmth for much longer than anyone ever anticipated.  I would be sadder except that we have known since the day we bought the house that you were long past your expiration date.  Every day with your heat was a bonus.  Were you milk, you would have been down the drain.

And, to my dearest Dacci brothers, Bud and Jim.  I love you, man (okay...men)...You guys are the bestest HVAC people a homeowner/Realtor could ever hope to have.  Thank you for getting enough kick into the old girl to last me until you can call me with the cost of a new one.  And my deepest thanks for keeping her alive these many years and not issuing her death certificate before her days were truly done. There's something to be said for honesty and truth these days.  Jim, Bud, you all are the best!

P.S.  Sorry that I didn't offer you that space heater sooner, Bud.  I promise you can put the garage door down and use it when you come back to put in the new furnace.

Homes in a year?

Anybody curious about how many homes a Realtor shows in a year?  I am!  Okay, I'm actually curious about how many homes I (notice that in bold) show in a year.  So along with tracking my mileage for my accountant, I've decided I'm going to track how many homes I show a la the Julie-Julia blog recipe count.  Now, I just have to figure out how to add that as a gadget somewhere here on this blog.  Isabelle, are you there????

I'm at 7 houses for 2010.   Six of those today which included tromping in the snow and discovering my new Honda Odyssey is WAY better on steep, icy hills than the old one! 

Great local talent

On this snowy morning enjoy a wonderful song by Perry Ritter, a student at Henry Clay High school and son of good friends, Dave and Kathy.  It's really special. 

http://perryritter.bandcamp.com/

Let me know if you like it.  And,  if you do download and pass it on.

Snow Day

9 degrees at 8:30 a.m., 8 degrees at 9:20 a.m.  What?!!?  That's just wrong in Lexington but makes for a well-worth it Snow Day!  Congratulations Fayette County Public Schools for making a good choice in closing school yesterday. 

By the way, those are ducks and geese out on the lake late yesterday afternoon. 

and an attempt to see if the Lake really was frozen enough to stand on.  Answer:  yes.

There you go.  Blizzard in the 'hood.

...and the hill was fast!  We'll be off to Lexington's best sledding hill at Shriner's Hospital this afternoon. 

More snow, please!

Boones Trace...

I may have confessed previously to being an Inside New Circle Road snob when it comes to my personal life. But that said, I'm not above pretending that if I didn't like my own neighborhood so much, I'd live in ____________ (fill in the blank here).

I think today, I'd live in Boones Trace. This great neighborhood is just across the Fayette County line in north Madison County. My favorite part of Boones Trace is the drive across the Kentucky River which can be achieved on the big I-75 bridge or the little blue Clays Ferry bridge underneath. I prefer the latter. I have a wonderful listing there at 143 Gleneagles Boulevard which every time I visit wish was my house. Last week driving from there I slowed for three deer crossing the road to the Clay's Ferry-first deer I've ever seen in my life in Fayette County proper!



This picture is taken from Avawam Drive (i.e. The Main Drag through BT) looking over and across the river to the I-75 Bridge on a stark winter day. If you live on the right side of Avawam, you have the spectacular view of the Kentucky River.

If I lived in Boones Trace, I might even try to play golf.

Snow in Kentucky...

I try hard not to envy my friends in climates with oodles of gorgeous white snow but I'm happy to say that Kentucky winters provide just enough snow for adequate winter entertainment. With an insider's knowledge of the right sledding hills, you can achieve maximum sledding! And, with the right assistance, a good four-foot snowman is possible with just an inch of snow.

Bybee Pottery

My name is Gwen and I'm a Bybee Pottery addict. It started about 20 years ago. I had just graduated from college and I needed a few things for my new apartment. My sister suggested that we take a trip to Berea (I'll get to that in another post) and why not stop at Bybee Pottery on the way there. And so we did, and that's where my troubles began. A few coffee mugs, a butter dish, a pie plate or two from the seconds shelf. Today, we dine off Bybee plates, eat cereal from Bybee bowls and if you ever get a plate of cookies or a pie from me you can bet it's on Bybee!

Bybee Pottery, in Waco Kentucky, has been in business since 1809. Their distinctive primitive style is familiar to most Kentuckians in Bybee blue as well as their very attractive speckled finishes. While you can find Bybee at various gift shops around the South and at the occasional quality garage sale, the best way to get Bybee is to get it yourself. A worthwhile visit to Bybee means being out the door by 7:10 a.m. from Lexington to make certain you are in line for the sale room's door opening at exactly 8 a.m. Pictured above we stand with our recent Bybee purchases in mid-December. When shopping's completed you can give yourself a tour of the pottery (also pictured above). We always like to see what's being made, talk to the craftspeople AND as we discovered on our recent chilly morning -- stay warm from the fiery kiln. Little has changed in the way the pottery is made in the last 200 years. The clay still comes from a short distance away and rumours are always in circulation that the pottery is soon to run out of clay and will close its doors forever. I no longer believe those rumours but I like to use them as an excuse to stock up whenever I'm there. Did I mention my addiction?

Important to remember for shopping at Bybee: doors open at 8 a.m., what's there is what's there and that's it for the day. They don't take credit cards but they do take cash and checks. You can order things but don't ask when you can pick the order up, it's worth the wait anyway. Don't touch anything on the floor -- that's somebody else's stuff so make your own pile on the floor when your hands get full. You will get dusty. If you like something just take it and put it on the floor -- things go quickly and she who hesitates will lose that piece of pottery. So, keep in mind that some of your fellow shoppers are dealers on buying trips. Grab quick, because if you don't, they will. Oh and have fun, it's one of those things that make living in the Bluegrass special!

Happy New Year!

from chilly Lexington on this cold, cold Saturday morning!

I'm thinking Spring! Anybody have any advice on where to buy an attractive indoor compost bucket to sit by my sink? One of my 2010 resolutions is to be a better gardener which shouldn't be difficult. I'm resurrecting one of the nice composters the previous owners of my house had built (the other has had the wood salvaged by Will to build a ladder up one of our pine trees) and looking forward to some soil improvement!

Ideally, I'm looking for one that looks like a canister, not like a plastic compost bucket...

Sotheby's eGallery

As much as I always say that I love real estate for the people, the truth is some mornings I could stare forever at the Sotheby's eGallery houses playing in the widescreen monitor in our office lobby. In addition to beautiful Central Kentucky homes, the eGallery flashes Sotheby's listings from all over the world. Excellent fodder for the "if money were no object game" I like to play sometimes. If you had $5 million would you choose the rustic cabin home in Whitefish Montana or the Greek cliff side home over the sparkling waters of the Mediterranean. Tough call, I know! You don't have to actually stand in our lobby though (not that it's not fun to do that with a latte from the Starbucks next door) you can view the eGallery homes on-line at www.sothebysrealty.com -- click the title to access the site directly.

Today's interest rate

4.75% on 30-year fixed. Incredible. So, that plus an $8,000 first-time buyer tax credit. Could there be a better time to buy?

Cost vs. Value

One of my favorite real estate tools is out...Remodeling Magazine's annual Cost versus Value Reoprt. I'd love to put the whole thing here on my blog but apparently I'd be arrested by the internet copyright police if I did. I do have a link to the report though (just click on the title above) and you can research your area for average job costs and the percentage of return you can expect for individual home improvements. To research our Central Kentucky market, the best comparison is probably using Louisville as Lexington's not on there. That's my advice anyway!

Hmmm...interesting, maybe? The best return is on a new front door. Also, wood replacement windows rank pretty high -- plus you save on utility bills and they're just plain nice -- been there, done that myself! Worst return on investment...home office remodel!