Their Old House: Three Carroll County Families Are Enlivening the Homes They Grew Up In

Written By Anne Blue

When Kelly Chiavacci, Tom Welliver and Kevin Stewart watch their children playing in and around their houses in Westminster, they cannot fail to call up fond recollections of their own childhoods.

The recall is easy because the Chiavaccis, the Wellivers, and the Stewarts are among the fortunate few who have returned to raise their children in the very houses in which they were raised.

As they rear another generation of children, the three families have discovered that they not only cherish living in a familiar community, but also enjoy being in a home where every room, even every cabinet, is linked to their families.

The Chiavaccis
Kelly Chiavacci, one of four children of the late Frank “Tommy” Thomas and Sue Thomas, grew up with her three brothers in a home on Willis Street in the heart of Westminster.

The three-story red brick home was built in 1910 by the Mather family and purchased by Kelly’s parents in 1970. It has 11 rooms, including five bedrooms and two and a half baths.

When her father died in 2000, Kelly’s brothers insisted that their mother couldn’t live in the big house any more. They urged Tony and Kelly to buy the Thomas family home, and after some thought the couple agreed.

“This is the silver lining,” said Kelly. “It is the best decision we ever made. Everyone in my family loves that we bought this house from my mom. The only real problem we have had is when my brothers visit and they can’t find the cereal. We keep it in a different cabinet than when they were growing up here.”

Now the Chiavacci family of seven — Tony, Kelly, and their five children, Jenna, Dominic, Lindsay, Georgi and Luca — once again fill the red brick home with the sound and laughter of a growing family that enjoys frequent visits from aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents.

“We made it clear to my mother and brothers that this is still their family home,” said Kelly. “They are all very comfortable here and spend a lot of time here with us.” In fact, the house overflows with extended family during holidays and other celebrations.

“My mom left us the family table and the corner cabinet in the dining room,” said Kelly. “Both pieces fit the room perfectly and because the table expands, we can fit well over 20 people for big family meals.”

Inside the house, the old fashioned sleeping porch on the second floor is a favorite for another generation of children.

“When I was a girl,” said Kelly, “I slept in the bedroom that opens to the sleeping porch. I used to love sleeping there in good weather and spending time there with my friends.”

The bedroom now belongs to 15-year-old Jenna who generously shares the sleeping porch with her siblings. Jenna has updated the furniture and added pillows and cozy blankets for cooler weather, but the porch remains a favorite spot for sleepovers and hanging out with friends.

The Wellivers
In the same year that the Chiavaccis were moving back to Kelly’s family home, Tom Welliver brought his wife, Margaret, and their children, Daniel and Diana, back to Westminster to live in the home that was designed and built by his parents, the late Dr. Dan Welliver and Mary Ada “Tata” Welliver.

Margaret Welliver vividly remembers a comment that her husband made many years ago, when they were just dating.

“He told me he wanted to move back to his home town, live in his parent’s house, and have blonde children,” said Margaret. “We had two blonde children while we lived in North Carolina, then Tom got a great job offer in Baltimore and the rest of his dream came true.”

The Welliver family home, completed in 1966, is a seven-bedroom, three-and-a half-bath Williamsburg Colonial that graces a one acre lot in the Westminster’s Winchester Park neighborhood.

Tom’s parents built the home to accommodate their family of four children as well as live-in grandparents and many frequent visitors. They included many unique features, some of which were considered quite innovative at that time, such as an intercom system, a large second floor laundry room, a central vacuum system and wall mounted toilets for easy bathroom cleaning.

“I can still see my father in everything that he designed in the house,” said Tom. “He planted every tree in the yard and laid the brick walkways himself.”

The house still holds many family treasures, including antiques collected by Tom’s parents and mementos from his father’s 43 years as a much-loved Carroll County physician.

Tom and Margaret enjoy following many of the traditions of Tom’s childhood days and open the home for family celebrations, particularly Christmas, when the house fills with several dozen members of the extended Welliver family.

Christmas trees sit in the same place every year and the arrangement of food and dishes in the kitchen cabinets has not changed since Tom’s childhood.

“My children enjoy doing everything I did as a kid,” said Tom, “from where we threw balls up against the wall in the driveway to sledding down the hill to playing hide and seek inside the house and roasting marshmallows in the fireplace.”

“The whole family was so excited to have Tom and Margaret move back in to the house,” said his mother, Tata Welliver. “I never thought about one of the kids wanting it, but it is a real thrill for all of us that it is staying in the family.”

The Stewarts
Linda Stewart echoes Mr. Welliver’s sentiment. Her son, Kevin, and his wife, Karen, bought the small family farm from his parents in 1994.

“Kevin never wanted to let the property go,” said Linda, “and it is just wonderful to keep it in the family.”
In 1977, Linda and her former husband, Frank, were looking for a place where she could keep her pony when they found the farm on Kate Wagner Road. The farm house, circa 1900, had been vacant for five years and was in terrible shape but Linda fell in love with the barn and they bought the property. They named it Good Feelings Farm.

Linda and Frank spent the next 17 years raising their two boys on the farm, boarding horses and dogs and spending countless hours restoring the old house. “When we moved in, water poured through the leaky roof and down the walls and we didn’t have a working bathroom,” said Linda.

When Kevin married Karen they lived in Ellicott City but frequently made the trek to Carroll County to spend weekends at the farm.

“I thought it was heaven being out here with all the animals, especially the cats,” said Karen. “I loved the idea of the farm, but didn’t want to move here.”

Kevin slowly changed her mind and they got serious about buying the farm. Karen remembers a conversation with Kevin’s dad: “Frank sat with us on the front lawn,” she remembered, “and told us if we were truly interested in the property, this is what comes with it: ÔMaintaining fences, weeding, mowing, taking care of trees, and more.’ It was a long list.”

Despite the daunting work ahead, Kevin and Karen knew it was the right move.

“With all the work Kevin’s parents did here,” said Karen, “I would have hated to see it go to anyone else. It only took a day of living here as owners for me to fall in love.”

“My parents had done a lot of work inside the farm house,” said Kevin. “We have built on that, trying to modernize the inside without losing the old farmhouse feel.”

Inside the four-bedroom, three-bath farm house, the front parlor is decorated in Victorian style, just as Linda Stewart left it. The family still eats in the kitchen at the big farm table from Kevin’s youth, surrounded by beautiful pine cabinets his parents had built from reclaimed wood.

The couple has added granite countertops in the kitchen, new windows, central air conditioning, gas heat, a master bathroom, and a central vacuum system.

They have also created a mud room from a former side porch and added a full bath and large laundry room to the first floor, an entertainment room with a 28-foot wooden bar, and a large family room where comfortable sofas frame the fireplace.

Although the interior additions are many, the Stewarts have also spent hours transforming the outside.
The exterior of their home is covered in almond-colored wood capped by a hunter green metal roof. The wide front porch wraps around both sides of the house, and decking opens the rear of the house to the yard and woods beyond.

Kevin has restored the 100-year-old bank barn and silo, creating space inside the barn for the offices of his home building and remodeling business, Stewart Homes, LLC. Horses still graze in the pastures around the barn and dogs and cats greet visitors.

Although all of the physical changes have led Linda Stewart and others to dub the 14-acre property “the most beautiful farm in Carroll County,” what matters most to them is family and friends.

Kevin and Karen’s three children – Kelsey, Patrick, and Collin – have the run of the farm and love spending their days outside with the animals, running around the yard, exploring the woods, and playing in the stream.
“When I raised my two boys on that farm,” said Linda, “life was just wonderful. Now it is great to see my grandchildren being raised the same way.”

What will happen to these family homes when this new generation of children is grown?

If you ask Daniel and Diana Welliver, Diana grins. “I am going to build a bigger house,” she says. But Daniel quickly states what is obvious to him, “I am going to live here.”