Montgomerys' 'Extreme Makeover' home is 'so like us'

PHILO – Nathan Montgomery admits his ultra-modern, colorful master bedroom was "a point of controversy."

The rest of the main floor of the new house in Philo is much more traditional in style and color.

Ty Pennington himself, host of ABC's "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition," designed the bedroom. The wallpaper has 1½-inch squares sliced into busy triangles of blue, purple, red, pink and gray. The bed is a big white square. Sparse, white chests of drawers and white candle stands complete the space.

But guess what?

Nathan and his wife, Jenny, really like it.

"I love our bedroom, all the colors and because it's so unique," Nathan said. "We heard the builders' wives were like, 'Are you sure?' when it was being done."

Jenny said, "I have an art education degree, and (Pennington) tied everything together well. And I like color. He said the squares represented how many there are that we have helped. It was very touching how he could get that."

The family of six was chosen to receive the new home largely because of financial sacrifices they have made while helping the poor. Nathan Montgomery's sole job is director of Salt and Light, a nonprofit in Champaign that provides the needy with groceries, clothing and furniture.

At the head of the Montgomerys' bed is a large, framed montage. It features black and white photographs of Salt and Light clients in the background. The center is a red heart made up of collars, cuffs and scraps of clothing and food labels. Inside the heart are pictures of the couple and their four children. It was put together by quilt artist Deborah Fell of Urbana.

Before the family was selected to receive the new house, "ABC asked the finalists what design styles they liked," Jenny said. "I knew what I liked, but I didn't know what it was called. I spent a lot of time on HGTV.com looking at pictures. They call this (house) style Arts and Crafts with a modern twist."

"The house is so like us, it felt like home immediately," she said. "We never called our old house 'home.' It was always just the big ugly green house. I think one of the biggest gifts they gave us was a real home."

The Montgomerys lived in a 105-year-old 1½-story house with a crumbling foundation, moldy siding shingles and a caved-in front porch ceiling.

"Now, it's nice to come home and not have a home repair project to do," Nathan said. "A nice home is a place of refuge where you can unwind, relax and recharge."

The ground-level interior is painted in rich greens, golds and reds. Walls are filled with dozens of family pictures taken by Kendra Pence Photography of Bloomington right before the Montgomerys left on their Disney vacation.

The couple cannot point to anything in the house that they want to change. (In fact, they are under contract to not change anything for one year.)

The copper tile ceiling over the kitchen – 6-year-old Addy called it "chocolate" on the TV broadcast Oct. 25 – is a favorite detail for Jenny.

"We never gave out Halloween candy," Jenny said. "But this year, I thought, 'This is a house people would want to walk up to,' and I said, 'I'm going to give out candy.' There were a lot of children peering in, and I'm sure one-fourth of them did not realize that the kitchen ceiling was not chocolate."

On Thanksgiving, the family probably will celebrate twice, as usual – once at Jenny's grandmother's house in St. Joseph and back in their new house with Nathan's family.

They plan to buy a new artificial Christmas tree and light the outside of the house in time to be part of the Sidney Christmas House Walk scheduled for Dec. 6.

The Montgomerys have a joint family tradition of breakfast at their place on Christmas morning.

"Now we'll really have room for everyone," Jenny said.

They have left large decorative items right where designers set them. A large copper bowl with moss-covered sticks remains in the center of the kitchen island, and a long sculpture of vertical black tree branches and white candles sits on the breakfast table.

Their multicolored $1 plates from Big Lots have been replaced with multicolored dishes from Pennington's line of kitchenware.

The Montgomerys tend to eat most meals from the kitchen peninsula, which is outfitted with tall chairs.

"But Benjamin tries to corral us into the dining room, what, once a week?" Jenny asked.

"More," 9-year-old Benjamin said from the leather living room sofa.

The dining room is under a tower and has a 21-foot-high ceiling. One of its main decorations is a framed picture of the house surrounded by an extra-wide mat filled with the signatures of project volunteers. Nathan's aunt provided that.

The family kept two pieces of old furniture: an unusual wooden chair that the TV team furnished with a new seat and put by the living room stone fireplace; and a tall, narrow chest that designers repainted for Addy and 4-year-old Lilly's candy-store-themed bedroom.

Thinking of the four children and two dogs, the couple specifically asked for no wall-to-wall carpeting. Dark wood floors the living spaces; lighter wood covers bedroom floors, and the bathroom floors are tiled.

The family had been sharing one bathroom, but now there are three full baths and one powder room. Two sinks in the boys' bath and two sinks in the girls' have basket weave designs. Jenny wiped toothpaste out of one as she showed them off.

"It takes longer to clean this house, so I try to do a little every day so it doesn't get away from me," she said.

She pulled out narrow storage areas between vanity areas in the children's bathrooms that hold narrow plastic trays for small items. She opened closet doors to display built-ins for every family member.

"Their attention to detail is just amazing," she said of the builders and designers.

Benjamin's army-theme bedroom has camouflage designs on one wall and a bedspread, a small climbing wall to reach the upper bunk bed with a trap door, hanging Nerf-ball guns and his own TV.

The robot-themed room for Ashton, 13, has a silver high-tech upper bunk with a computer and TV underneath and lots of sports gear that he has since added.

The girls, 15 months apart in age, share a candy-selling counter, bed pillows shaped like candy on bunk beds and a tea party table.

Even after living in the house for two months, the family still is learning how things operate in their new quarters.

"We had to get used to these," Jenny said of the elongated bowl sinks in the master bath. "We kept splashing water out of them."

As recently as Wednesday, she was trying to figure out the "timed oxi" cycle on the front-loading washing machine.

Their first electric bills in the new house have been high, so they are switching to more energy-conserving light bulbs and turning off more appliances and lights when they are not in use. They haven't really tried the geo-thermal heating system yet.

"Even when it's in the 40s outside, the insulation is so good that this house stays so much warmer than the other house," Jenny said.

Other than utilities, the Montgomerys do not have any financial upkeep bills.

"Our $40,000 mortgage on the old house was paid off, and that was a big relief," Nathan said. "ABC has worked out a lease where they own the house for the 10 days improvements are being made so we're not liable for income taxes (from a gift).

"The house will be re-assessed, and our property taxes will go up," he said. "We don't know what they will be yet, but we can handle those."

The Montgomerys still have glass doors covered with stuck-on plastic sheets. They were necessary for filming and now provide some privacy from anyone who passes by and wants to peer in.

"We are busy people who are gone a lot," Jenny said. "There are Ashton's games, my school and Nathan's meetings."

Jenny is a teacher's aide at St. Joseph Middle School but goes to school three nights a week at Eastern Illinois University. She is seeking certification to teach special ed.

"Back when we were finalists, we looked at this from a faith perspective," Nathan said. " We said, 'Whatever happens is because of God, not what we said or did.'"

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