Steeles move into new home next door

FAIRFIELD — The Steeles were feeling a little cramped in their house.

Don and Debi Steele lived in a house just east of Fairfield on Business 34. It was a three-bedroom house, but only one on the main floor.

“I had a baby crib in the living room, and my grandkids’ toy box in the living room,” Debi recalled. “I like to do cricket [weaving], and my desk with my cricket stuff was in the living room.”

Don chimed in, “The kitchen and dining room were great, but they were closed off from the living room.” Debi said that made it harder to monitor their grandkids.

That home the Steeles were in belonged to Don’s grandparents, and he and Debi had modernized it since its construction in 1961, but the layout just wasn’t working anymore. They needed a home with an open floor plan. In September 2020, they decided it was time to build a new house.

The Steeles bought ground from Don’s mother, who lives next door to the west. They converted what was a cornfield into a 3-acre lot.

The couple had never met contractor Judd Connor, but they were familiar with homes he had built in the area, and liked what they saw. They came up with a floor plan of having five bedrooms, three upstairs and two in the basement. One of those is a home office where Don had been working for the past two years ever since the COVID-19 pandemic arrived in the spring of 2020. Don said he just returned to the office in March.

For most of the pandemic, Don was working from the old home, in a room in the basement. The room had undergone some remodeling and the windows were removed, so Don was spending most of his day under artificial light without the sun to brighten his spirits. That was one of the drivers of creating a home office in the new house that did have natural light.

As for the home’s color tones and style, Debi said she gets many ideas by watching HGTV. She liked a two-tone color scheme of white and gray in the kitchen and the bathroom.

With the open floor concept of their new house where there are no walls separating the living room, dining room and kitchen, the Steeles were going to lose a lot of cabinet space in the kitchen. That’s why Debi liked the idea of an island in the middle of the kitchen, which not only had a nice countertop for preparing food by also supplied plenty of cabinet space below.

The Steeles decided they wanted a new house in November 2020, but there have been delays along the way from both the weather and the supply chain. Construction started in mid-April 2021, which was later than the couple hoped because of a wet spring. Don and Debi said their contractor reported delays in getting materials for the garage door, trim, and stone outside the house, which was ordered in August but didn’t arrive until January.

When the Steeles decided to sell their old home, they had already found a willing buyer before they could put out a “for sale” sign, just by word of mouth. Within three days of a verbal agreement, the Steeles had a signed contract.

This was great news for Don and Debi’s finances, but it also meant they were under a time crunch to move out of their old house. The Steeles moved into their new home on Nov. 9, 2021, before the interior doors were installed. That didn’t stop the couple from hosting their family’s Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings.

Don and Debi like living a mile outside the city, because they don’t have to drive far to enjoy Fairfield’s amenities, but they also have the space and privacy of a country home. Their 3-acre lot has an enormous backyard complete with a trampoline, and Don said he’s looking forward to putting together another play set for the couple’s 10 grandkids to enjoy.

Call Andy Hallman at 641-575-0135 or email him at andy.hallman@southeastiowaunion.com