A Seller’s Reflections: Living in Stone Canyon

Remembering a warm welcome home

Parents shifting their family from one state to another have thousands of things to worry them (if not tens of thousands), and it was no different for Heather when she moved with her husband and several kids from a big city in the midwest to Lyons, Colorado. But she remembers the moment she could release the worries about the family finding friends in their new home: It was the neighborhood block party they stumbled upon the day they moved in.

“The neighbors were so nice,” Heather recalls. “Going back to school in August, the kids knew people already. If you need to borrow anything, you just knock on the door and people are willing to help and pitch in. We were friends right off the bat, and the kids found friends right away -- which was such a relief for me.”

Now it’s time for Heather and her family to step away from the home they’ve grown in for five years and for someone else to step into the space at 123 Peregrine Lane and see what the future holds for them.

Finding the house

Aerial photo of Lyons, Colorado.

Heather had heard of a place called Lyons when she and her husband were originally trying to build a place out in Brighton that would accommodate their large family and active lifestyle. But between the building process and the soil testing involved, they were backed up at least nine months in the process.

“So I told my husband, ‘Drive west,’ and we landed in Lyons and had lunch at the Barking Dog,” she remembers. “I was just amazed that this small little town had so much activity going on.”

On the recommendation of a local woman, she and her husband carted the kids to what’s now known as LaVern M. Johnson Park and was then Meadow Park.

LaVern M. Johnson Park Lyons, Colorado

“I was amazed. I thought it was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever been a part of -- walking in with the red rocks and wildflowers everywhere; it was so hot that day that we just got in the river with our clothes on,” she says. “Some people let us borrow their tubes, and we probably tubed 20 times up and down the river. I was like ‘People live here? Do kids just come to this park every day?’ It was so beautiful.”

Stone Canyon Neighborhood Lyons, Colorado

The next day, they came back -- with bathing suits -- and she waited for her agent to let her know if there was anything available in the area. “I remember him calling, and he said, ‘There are a few homes in Stone Canyon.’”

‘The Christmas tree goes right there’

“I loved the vaulted ceilings and the space that it provided,” Heather says. “Whenever I walk into a new house, I always think about where I’m going to put my Christmas trees, and the house on Peregrine has a huge area that’s all window that faces the canyon. And I thought, ‘I’m putting the Christmas tree right here.’”

She and her husbands brought the kids back to see the house on their second visit. “And they loved it -- running up and down the stairs and calling dibs on all their rooms,” she recalls. They made an offer at that second visit.

Life in Stone Canyon

In the room where the Christmas tree sits during the holidays, Heather and her husband often sat to watch the storms come and go over the mountains. The view is “unreal,” she says. “Every room has a different view of all the mountains that surround us.”

On the patio, “you can see satellites and shooting stars -- it is so quiet and so peaceful.” She and her husband spent many nights together enjoying a cocktail while the kids made s’mores at the fire pit.

That’s after a long day of running around -- Heather and her husband “wake up to the smell of coffee and the smell of alarm clocks,” she laughs. “But we have enough bathrooms for everybody, so there aren’t any jams.”

She has her own favorite spots for coffee and landscape-gazing, though, when she’s got time for it. “In the morning I love sitting on the front porch,” she says. “The sun’s coming over the mountain and it’s not blazing hot because there’s a beautiful tree in the front yard that shades you.”

They get milk delivered to the house on Tuesdays, and the kids are used to getting themselves off and running in the morning and back home in the afternoon. “They come home, get a snack and do their homework at the kitchen table, watch some TV, go out and play with the dogs and do their chores -- sometimes they go play with a neighbor after they’ve called me,” she says.

There are also walking trails behind the house. “It’s great for dogs and laps,” Heather describes. “Every turn in Lyons, you come across nature, and they’ve updated the sidewalk all the way up to our subdivision, so you feel really safe walking into town.”

It takes about a mile to get to some of the prime restaurants in downtown Lyons -- Smokin’ Daves, Oskar Blues, The Dairy Bar, La Mariposa and more. “I love the 20-minute drive to Estes Park, where there are tons of festivals -- not to mention all the music festivals we have here,” she says.

Downstairs, they refinished the basement and put together a movie space where the family can gather together in the evenings or on weekends -- or where she and her husband can watch Game of Thrones. (That’s if Heather isn’t soaking in a bubble bath in the garden bathtub.) From her bedroom window, “we have a great view of the mountain behind us where you can see storms coming in, and deer and elk,” she says.

And although it’s time for Heather and her family to step into a new home -- and someone else will start building their own lives at 123 Peregrine Lane -- she’s going to miss the place that established her family in Colorado, and most especially the view of the night sky.

“Those dark nights where you can see into the abyss of the sky -- it’s just amazing to me,” she says.

Brilliant Evening Sky in Stone Canyon Lyons, Colorado

For more information about 123 Peregrine Lane, Lyons... please contact Laura at 303.931.8080.
Offered at $679,500

Family Photo Credit: Caroline Colvin Photography