AGES: 39 and 46

OCCUPATIONS: Michelle, stay-at-home mom; Kaylee, software engineer at IBM

CHILDREN: Alex, 6; and Zoe, 4

ADDRESS: 101 Deer St., in Plantation Acres in Carrboro

SQUARE FOOTAGE: 2,553

ACREAGE: 0.63 acres

DETAILS: Two-story house with front porch; screened-in deck with door and stairs to backyard patio; and two-car garage. First floor: Two-story foyer opens to stairwell, guest bedroom and full bathroom with bedroom and foyer entrances. Open design to kitchen, dining and living areas. Playroom and deck off living room, which has fireplace and built-in entertainment center. Kitchen has farmhouse sink, granite countertops and island with extra sink and breakfast seating. Mudroom and laundry room off kitchen. Second floor: Master bedroom; master bath with double vanity and mosaic glass tile surrounding air tub and enclosed shower; large, walk-in closet off bathroom. Three bedrooms, one used as a craft room, and full bathroom with repeated mosaic glass

tile around tub. Large, walk-in closet at end of hallway with walk-up attic entry.

Move-in Date: August 2007

Nearby Landmarks: McDougle schools, community garden off Hillsborough Street in Carrboro

As told to correspodent Catherine Wright

Where We Live

Kaylee: It's a very livable house. It's got a yard for playing and a patio for grilling and a very nice, open floor plan downstairs so that we can all be together but not on top of each other.

Michelle: Yeah, that's a good way of describing it. It's very livable and practical. It fits our family perfectly.

Kaylee: The thing that I love about living here is we've got deer families that are always in our back yard. We have lots of bluebirds, lots of hatchlings. We've got the best of both worlds. It feels like we're not in town and yet we're in town.

I love to be in walking distance to school for Alex and soon to be Zoe. I can hop on my bike and be at Weaver Street in five minutes.

Alex: I like it because I like to bike here. It's a nice place. Nice neighbors. And there's lots of nice restaurants around here.

Michelle: There's something that I really love about Alex's room. We just feel that we're in the Magic Treehouse. We have this beautiful, old hickory tree. When we're in here reading the Magic Treehouse books with Alex, lying in bed and the sun going down, we absolutely love it. We feel like we're in the Magic Treehouse.

Why We Chose Our House

Michelle: We bought the location. We chose the location because we wanted to be within the McDougle school district. We wanted to be within walking distance of it.

Kaylee: For me, I wanted new construction. With the prices in Carrboro, it seems like you can buy a fixer-upper but it's not cheap. After the amount you sink in to fix it up, you might as well buy a new house and get it exactly as you want it.

Michelle: It's not exactly as we want it. The location is exactly as we want it.

It definitely was a compromise. I would have been more inclined to look into an older home in Carrboro and do a remodel.

We had built our dream home in Orange County, so moving was an extremely long, hard decision for us. After we had children, we felt like we were a little bit isolated and wanted to be closer to town. But it was hard to leave our dream house, so we took a lot of time thinking about what we wanted. This lot was here, and we kept driving by it. At one time it was under contract and that fell through, so we kind of took that it was meant to be for us.

We talked to the builder who owned the lot and worked hard to come up with a plan that we really liked and had some of the features of our home that we really liked, like the openness of the kitchen, living and dining areas. One of the really good things about this builder was he said, "Tell me where you want windows and I'll put them in." I thought he was kidding. He wasn't. We have so many windows. It is so bright.

Kaylee: It's been a great compromise, a very good fit for our family.

Advantages

Kaylee: Walking to school, biking and public transportation.

Michelle: We're on a very direct bus line - the free bus line - so we've been using that a lot. We absolutely love that.

We're also close to town, and we have a beautiful yard for the kids to play in. Our yard is the best of both worlds. It's the perfect yard. It has old hardwoods and grass underneath, so in the summer we have a lush yard and shade. We get a lot of birds, a lot of wildlife. It's fairly level, and we have the option of putting in a treehouse one day if we want to.

Kaylee: I know for me one advantage is I work at home a lot, so it's really nice to hop on my bike and go to Weaver Street for lunch. It makes for a very nice, laidback work environment.

Michelle: That [farmhouse] sink is definitely my favorite part of this kitchen. That was an impulse buy but one I will never regret. It is like having a mini bathtub. It is so utilitarian.

Kaylee: But it won't do the dishes for you.

Michelle: But I love doing them. It makes it so pleasurable.

Kaylee: Well, then get over here and do them. (Laughs)

Disadvantages

Kaylee: The deer are a mixed blessing. We love watching them, but it really limits what we can do landscaping-wise. I wouldn't wish them away though.

I don't like the dirt road. It would be nice to have a paved road.

Michelle: It's probably not on the town's priority [list] to pave it, but it would be nice to have it paved.

I said I had to have an air tub, and I'm so bummed about it because it's so vigorous that I can't get in. I can't stand it. But the kids love it.

Our Community

Michelle: I love the cluster of homes that are back here, how nice the neighbors are and how it feels like a little community in the back. The neighbors that we have, because we have woods across the street, are all in the back and to the side. Our two closest neighbors, our back yards all kind of converge. We all get along nicely, and it's really nice to see them and talk to them. They have children younger than ours, so we're really looking forward to them getting older and all the kids playing outside. We really like our "backyard" neighborhood.

Zoe: We have nice neighbors.

Making Our House a Home

Kaylee: That's mostly Michelle's doing.

Michelle: No, no.

Kaylee: Yes, it is. We focused on it being comfortable. There are no formal spaces.

Michelle: We focused on not having any room that's off limits to the kids. We tried to make sure that we all could be comfortable here.

Kaylee: I have a very contemporary taste.

Michelle: I have more of a casual taste.

Kaylee: Cottage. The combination of the two turned out nice. Contemporary can be kind of stark and not cozy. Michelle figured out how to make it very cozy.

We have little pieces of art work, even poster art, that we've collected in our travels and such.

Michelle: We both really enjoy local art, so we have a lot of local artists' work in our house. It makes us really feel more a part of our community.

We also put up a basketball hoop, which makes it kind of fun. We have friends come over and we all go out and play with the kids. We try to balance those three things -- comfort, fun and ...

Kaylee: ... a place we enjoy sharing with family and friends.

Michelle: There's a lot of love in the quilts [in Alex and Zoe's rooms]. They were made by Kaylee's father's wife, who is a very devoted grandmother. That was a big deal. Kaylee gave birth to Alex, and I gave birth to Zoe. The whole dynamic is very different. Here we were doing this, two women with families who were struggling a bit [with it]. Kaylee's father's wife really embraced the whole thing. The embracing by both of our families is very wonderful. There's not only acceptance of our decisions but absolute embracing of our family and complete, 100 percent love for both our children. We have been so completely blessed with so much love in our family and so much love toward our children.

Do you have a special story about where you live? Contact Catherine Wright at catherine.wright@gmail.com.