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Building Blogs
Amanda Forster photographs her husband, Aaron, for their blog as he measures a basement window for framing.
(By Katherine Frey -- The Washington Post)
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Who's Blogging  |
"I can see why they call it 'house porn,' " Peter said during a tour of his mostly-gutted three-level Victorian.
Although they have never met in person, Peter and the Forsters have been in contact through their blogs. They even link to each other.
For all their desire to showcase their works-in-progress to the world, Peter and the Forsters do practice some restraint to protect their privacy and themselves. Neither site divulges a significant amount of personal information, nor do they list their addresses or places of employment online.
When they first started, Aaron Forster's mother worried that someone would break into the couple's home and steal their dogs. That has not happened. But, as a testament to the bloggers' sense of community, when someone stole an Arkansas blogger's tools, the Forsters sent some of their old ones to help soften the loss.
The blogs are also a way to showcase for far-away friends and family the work, or sometimes minor victories and setbacks, that they have faced: a neighbor who dumps dirt in an alley, a bathroom that is nearing completion, a flooded basement.
For Peter, the blog is a way to keep himself honest about his ongoing renovation. If he writes in advance about a new project he plans to tackle over a weekend, he tries to follow through for his readers, who include his family in New York.
"If I say, 'I'm doing X this weekend,' then I usually end up doing it because if I don't, I'm sure someone will ask me about it," he said.
Aaron Forster's family in Ohio got a surprise when they recently visited the Nightmare on Elm Street. "What's funny is that his family hadn't looked in like three or four months," Amanda Forster said of her in-laws. "They were like, 'You're redoing your basement?' "
By the looks of the basement, the Forsters will have many more nightmares to write about on their Nightmare in months to come. Just don't expect too many do-it-yourself lessons to originate from the project. On this one, they might need a lot of help.
But that doesn't worry Amanda Forster. "There's a lot of support," she said.
