YOU ARE HERE Each month, we’ll throw a dart at a map and write about where it lands. LOCATION: Ashbrook-Clawson Village
E ER LAN HEATH
Kickin’ It With the Heatherwood Gang THE BIRDS SING HIGH IN THE TREES on this sunny Sunday on Heather Lane, and the humans settle into their favorite weekend afternoon routines: A pack of parents kicks back in lawn chairs on Chris and Anna O’Neal’s driveway as a gaggle of kids plays board games and rides scooters in the cul-de-sac. It’s exactly a one-mile walk from this spot to the entrance of bustling Park Road Shopping Center. But this spot is as quiet and peaceful as some place in the country. It’s been a decade since the O’Neals bought their two-story colonial with blue siding, and about three years ago, as they planned for a second child, they found
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themselves in a quandary right out of HGTV’s Love It or List It. They needed more square footage but hated to leave the neighborhood and their 15-minute commutes to their uptown jobs. “It was not a very hard decision,” Anna says. They tacked on a two-story addition and soon welcomed a baby girl, who now toddles along with the rest of the “Heatherwood Gang.” That’s what parents affectionately call their preschool and school-age kids, who roam Heather Lane together on weekends and summer days. People don’t often move away from Heather Lane, and the “underground rumblings” about the rare homes for sale
are constant, says Dabney Estile, who lives in another blue house across from the O’Neals: “People are always saying, ‘If you hear of anything, let us know, and we’ll take it before it goes on the market.’” And homes on their end of Heather Lane aren’t cheap. Lately, they’ve sold for as much as the mid-$600,000s. But for now, the Heatherwood Gang is staying put. On this Sunday afternoon, the kids pack up their board games, tie on Rollerblades, and take a few final spins on their bicycles before it’s time to go in for dinner. —Cristina Bolling
SHAW NIELSEN; CRISTINA BOLLING
Parents and kids play in their oasis a mile from Park Road Shopping Center
