Simple Living with Wanda Urbanska

Wanda's Diary Entries

Friday, March 14, 2008

I had the privilege of moving back into my new home—the Sunflower House—two weeks ago. It is everything I’ve dreamed about in a house and more. A healing environment, in the words of Carol Venolia, my green architect friend from Northern California, aptly describes the place after its recent, four-month green remodel. A soothing environment it is when the ceiling fans hum gently overhead, circulating air and our cat Whiskers finds an accommodating lap and begins his contented purring.

It is a place that shows many hues as light slants through the matchstick blinds and sheds new, sometimes intricate shades of color on the the gold walls with the richness of the artwork added into the mix. Everything in my home has an association. I smile each time I see the beautiful house plant that was given by Poppy Jackson, delivered by her amazing daughter Meredith on the “final” shoot day, for our green remodeling show. I take in paintings by the mothers of dear friends Liz Brody and Krysia Lindan. (Their mothers have enormous talent, just like their daughters, I think.) I am still looking for a place of honor in which to hang my framed photo of President Jimmy Carter inscribed in silver ink (of all things!) to Henry, which makes me remember our time with him in Plains back in 2005; the former president stands as a continual reminder of the value of courage, tenacity and good character in our lives. A sense of coziness and well being is triggered each time I look at and touch the luscious hemp window treatments that adorn the windows in the living room and dining area and in my bedroom and my son’s. And I’m even enjoying the fast-acting warmth inside the home—especially in my bathroom—since the installation of a new high-efficiency HVAC system and high-performance foam insulation in the attic and bathroom walls.

This past week, Wednesday, March 12, I staged my first birthday party in the Sunflower House. The guest of honor was none other than my octogenarian mother who brought in a bottle of champagne to celebrate not only her grand day but to christen the house. I had the best time cooking up an old-fasioned, slow-cooking pot roast, using hormone-free beef combined with every vegetable imaginable: turnips, carrots, celery, onions, sweet and Irish potatoes, broccoli and cauliflour. (I had purchased some brussel sprouts but found that there was no room in the pot for them so had to hold off till another day.)

Henry loves to bake as well and so we initiated our oven on the Tuesday night before the grand event with our first szarlotka—a Polish apple cake from a recipe scrawled in pencil by my late father, maybe 45 years ago. Boy, that cake was tasty. Next time, however, I promised Henry, we’ll use fresh apples rather than the applesauce of this go ‘round.

The lesson of the Sunflower House to me is that a place of beauty, a house with purpose, with consciously chosen components, makes an enormous difference to the well-being of its occupants. Even Whiskers the cat seems happier here. He spends most of his waking hours outside climbing the tall trees and hiding in the established bushes; he’s slimmed down and savors his food and drink when he comes in for the evening. He’s even made new friends and draws caterwauling cats into our yard from the neighborhood on a nightly basis.

Already, blessedly, my calendar is filling with friends who want to come visit and stay at the house. My friend Sarah Susanka, who sketched the plan for the laundry room-cum-sunroom on the back of a paper napkin at West Coast Green this fall in San Francisco, will be coming for lunch in June. I think of Sarah often in this place and her inspired idea of the “not-so-big” house as the ultimate in residential harmony. (I am so proud that this phrase she coined has caught on in the popular parlance.) Friends from New York, Kentucky and North Carolina have made plans to come. I am hoping that at least some of my friends and family from Poland will visit this summer. Finally, I have a guest room that will heal, sooth and pamper my friends from far and near.

Of course, like any home, a green house is a work in progress. There is always work to be done; there is much not yet done. Landscaping and gardening remains in the future. So, too, are spot solar panels and maybe a wind turbine. Would that fly in Mount Airy? But what matters most at this moment is the reaction of people when they step in through our yellow front door for the first time.

“A happy home” is what our Simple Living intern Allison Carroll said when she set foot in the home for the first time. She nailed it. A happy home.