Month: October 2013

Leverton Brothers

Band topping the charts

Story by Carolyn Stern
Photos by Michael Callahan

The Leverton Brothers Band hardly had time to pack up their instruments between shows in the past few months. This local group is gaining recognition all over the county and beyond, and Benny (Benjammin) and Randy Leverton are realizing a lifetime dream.

More proof of “breaking out,” comes from the popularity of their single, “Polecat Holler.” It recently hit Number 1 on the Indie World Country Chart. The “holler” is an actual spot located between Gadsden and Guntersville. Bill Moon, who knows a lot about that area, wrote the lyrics, and band members came up with the music.

This recognition builds on the popularity of last year’s hit, “Take Me Back to Alabam’” written by Randy and Letha Leverton.

Brothers Benny and Randy are the founders of the band. Both have been musicians most of their lives. “I started playing guitar when I was 10 years old,” Benny says, “and I’ve been playing and writing songs for more than 30 years.”

Randy, who mans the drums and sings, has taken very much the same course. “Each of us played with different groups for a while,” he says, “then we got together and picked up other members along the way.”

Managing to keep their day jobs, the brothers grew their audience by performing as much as possible. Randy has owned RTL Printing and Signs in Pell City for 20 years, coincidentally, the band’s direct source for its t-shirts and CD covers. Benny is retired from CenturyLink Telecommunications. They split the band’s business between Randy’s Studio 1 in Cropwell, where the recording is done on Benny’s Benjammin’ label.

The band’s song list covers blues, country, rock and soul. Much of the music they play is written by one or more of the band members.

Talent binds the present crew. Benny’s wife, Paula, says, “Sometimes we sit in the studio and toss stuff back and forth. Somebody comes up with a tune, somebody else throws in some words.” She joined the band in 1990, plays percussion, sings and writes songs. She also has a day job as Executive Assistant-Nursing Administration at St. Vincent’s St. Clair.

Barry McNair, a classically-trained pianist is on keyboard. He began playing piano when he was five. His day job is teaching electronics for the Etowah County Board of Education. Barry moves between electronics and music with the ease of a man who enjoys both.

J.J. Jackson says he “hit the road in his teen years and has been wandering ever since.” He’s played bass guitar in a number of bands. “My favorite was the Crimson Tide band in the ‘70s.” It had nothing to do with the University of Alabama, he adds.

Phil Harris, acoustic rhythm guitar, is a seasoned songwriter who’s been performing for 20 years. Recently, he recorded “11 o’clock” and “Where Have All the Heroes Gone” at Studio 1.

Whether performing in front of a crowd or jammin’ together, there’s no stopping the music from flowing. As Benny puts it, “We just write about life, and we just love music.”

On a Mission

Christy Minor follows in her grandparents’ footsteps

Story by Carol Pappas
Photos by Michael Callahan
Submitted photos by Christy Minor

It’s a legacy of mission work that has taken Christy Church Minor halfway around the world and back again — six times. But it’s a calling to a continent she seems to have been destined to fulfill.

Her grandparents Clyde and Anneli Dotson were missionaries in Africa for 40 years. Her mother, Margaret, grew up as the daughter of those missionary parents in Rhodesia. And although Minor is a judge’s wife, a mother of two and an elementary school librarian in Pell City, Alabama, Africa has become a place that beckons her every summer.

Fresh from a mission trip to Swaziland, a tiny country in South Africa, Minor shares her experience from the comfort of Coosa Valley Elementary’s library, surrounded by Pell City children eager to hear her story about this faraway land.

A month earlier, she was wrapped nearly head to toe with the warmest clothes she could find. It’s winter there while Alabama children swelter in the heat of the summer sun. As a member of the Pell City First Baptist Church mission team, her work at an orphanage in Bulembu was getting its library in order in a building with no heat.

By the end of the week, neat shelves packed with books in orderly fashion replaced the titanic piles of books strewn about the floor that Minor had encountered upon arrival. She went through them all, discarding what wasn’t needed or was out of date and then transformed it into a real, usable library. “They were very happy to have a librarian,” she notes.

And just like she does on a regular basis at Coosa Valley, she would read to the children of Bulembu. Their favorite, just like back home, was “No, David!” And as Minor recounts to the Coosa Valley children about sharing the children’s book with their counterparts a world away, the look of familiarity is evident in their faces.

While where she was in Bulembu was an orphanage, careful attention is given to avoid the stigma of children with no family. They live in individual homes with “aunties” caring for them. She lived in one of the nearby homes, visiting the children each afternoon after school and working with them. She , too, became known as “Auntie Christy,” she tells her students in the best South African accent she can muster.

But by the end of the week, when the Bulembu children would see her on the playground, they reminded her of the joy they found in what they learned from the book she had shared. If imitation is the best form of flattery, they certainly discovered it. They would smile, hold up a single finger and say, “No, David!” to her as she passed.

Bulembu is actually a real-life lesson to be learned in and of itself. It was a deserted mining town bought by the not-for-profit Bulembu Ministries Swaziland just seven years ago. Swaziland fell victim to the AIDS pandemic and has the highest incidence in the world of this deadly disease. As a result, thousands of children have been left orphaned.

Bulembu, in which Global Teen Challenge plays a major role, was created with a vision to make it self-sustaining to give those children a chance to rise above the abject poverty that has controlled their region for generations. And it’s working. It is now 30 percent self-sustainable through a dairy operation, bottling honey, a bakery, a water bottling plant and timber sales.

“It is very encouraging,” Minor says. Teachers come from all over the world. “They said, ‘We just came here for a few months’ ” and seven years later, they’re still there.” She is convinced in seeing firsthand what goes on there — a challenging curriculum, medical care, love and guidance — “they will be the future leaders of the country.”

Because of this ministry, the benefits and accommodations were not what she had come to expect from previous trips. “I am used to going to remote, really destitute areas” — places where Malaria reigns and swollen bellies from malnutrition are the norm. But in Bulembu, “It was truly a trip of hope to see what can happen when God’s people come together to help children.”

It also made her see that she is needed elsewhere, in places where the visitors aren’t as numerous nor the opportunities as plentiful.

She wants to go back to those remote areas “where they need medical attention and where they have never heard the word of Jesus Christ.” That is her calling, she says, just like her grandparents before her.

Just after Minor returned to Alabama, her grandmother was to give a talk about missionary work at her Oxford church and asked her granddaughter to share her experience as well. “She was able to share about what was happening 50 years ago, and I shared what was happening five days ago.”

To them, it is a legacy of love and compassion that lives on. “I have always felt called to the continent of Africa,” Minor says, her eyes reflecting an unmistakable longing to return.

For her, it is an obvious conclusion. “My heart is intertwined.”

The Cane Makers

A stick and a knife are tools of their trade

Story by Tina Tidmore
Photos by Michael Callahan

Walking stick, cane, hiking pole and pilgrim’s staff: just a few of the terms that refer to the humble weight-supporter often associated with disability, the elderly and ancient Biblical characters walking through a desert. At least two St. Clair County woodworkers add creativity to the sticks they find in the woods, giving them eye-appeal in addition to a practical use.

Marvin Little, a retired insurance adjuster, takes a simple approach in his creations. His focus is on using a variety of woods and a variety of handles. He retains the bark and enhances the natural beauty of the stick.

Little’s interest in making canes started when he moved into a new home 15 years ago. While walking through the woods, he noticed some small trees and branches that would make good walking sticks. He has learned many of his techniques through online cane-making clubs where ideas are shared.

His own sharing sparked interest from another would-be cane maker. Cook Springs resident Jackie Stevens, who retired from the banking industry, remembers her interest starting when Little regularly brought his canes to the old St. Clair Federal Savings and Loan in Pell City to show the employees.

Little tried to get her involved in the Logan Martin Woodcarvers group, but she regularly declined. Finally in 2006, “I went to a meeting and became hooked,” Stevens said. Then, with a few unprepared, seasoned sticks Little gave her, she started creating her own canes.

Using a knife, Stevens actually carves shapes and figures into the sticks, including one she worked on of two snakes this summer.

Both Little and Stevens said a love for working with wood was passed down to them in their families. “I enjoy making something with my hands,” Little said. “It’s always a challenge to make something pretty and useful out of wood.”

“I even love the smell of wood,” Stevens said.

Little’s approach is not only to provide something attractive and unique, he likes knowing he is making something with practical use that is helpful to people.

But Stevens’ focus is on adding to her personal wood-carving collection or creating artistic pieces for decoration or display. She has given some as gifts or done commissioned pieces. They are strong enough to be useful, but that’s not her main focus.

Because their canes have different primary purposes, they have different price ranges. He sells his canes at local festivals and is careful not to invest too much time or supplies into them. “You have to make something that will sell at the venue where you want to sell it,” Little said. So his price points are $18 to $28, which generally amounts to enough to cover his expenses. He’s not making any profit or even paying for his time.

Similarly, Stevens isn’t in it for the money, even though she’s sold one at $60 and others up to $400. She started her cane-carving while seeking a stress-reliever. “My shop is the only place that I can completely lose myself with no worries or fears and lose all track of time,” said Stevens. “To me, the entire process from harvesting the wood to applying the final finish is rewarding.”

But she avoids turning it into a job. “I want it to be my idea, my style, no demands,” Stevens said. “I bowed out of the real world and come into my fantasy world.”

In 2006, when Stevens first attended the Logan Martin Woodcarvers, she was the only woman. But now others are involved, and they have taken up carving dolls. “The biggest thing is the friends I’ve gained in the group,” Stevens said.

Cane-making Process

Making a walking cane starts, obviously, with the stick. Marvin Little, who lives just north of Pell City, has used sassafras, hickory, oak, bamboo, sourwood, cedar and many other species. “A lot of it I don’t know what it is because I cut it in the winter when there aren’t any leaves,” Little said.

Some are branches, but most of the walking canes started as trunks of young trees. Little often turns the root ball into the cane handle. Broken limbs lying on the ground cannot be used because they are weakened by bugs. “It has to be something that feels good in your hand,” Little said.

Both Little and Jackie Stevens say “twisties” are highly favored. They are trees that have been twisted into a cork-screw form by vines. “If I find a good twisty in the woods, I’ve got to have it,” Stevens said.

Both Little and Stevens have friends offering them sticks and other wood. “I hate to see wood discarded,” Little said.

The harvested stick must be allowed to season for a year. Then, Little cleans off loose bark. It’s at that point that he decides what he will make with that stick. Some need to be straightened using water and a clamp. Sanding and painting are next. Then he puts on the handles and adds the protective clear coat.

In addition to the joy of creating something attractive, there is the challenge of doing so within the limitations and features each piece of wood has. “The wood has to talk to me,” Stevens said in reference to what she decides to do with it.

Much of the character of a walking cane is in the handle. Little has used a variety of items to create decorative handles, including doorknobs, deer hoofs and elk horns. Even a golf ball has been turned into a cane handle.

The most unusual request Little received was to create a wood-carved human skull as a cane handle. He has been asked to do canes shaped like snakes. But he has refused. Why? Simple. “I don’t like snakes,” he said.

To be functional and stable, the top of the cane must be in the same plane as the bottom, even if the middle is twisted. Also, the height of the cane needs to come up to the person’s wrist. Shorter or longer and it will not provide the stable support needed.

A cane Stevens is most proud of is one that used material from the former Avondale Mills in St. Clair County. “I made this cane in the memory of my Big Daddy McCullough, who worked in the mill all his life,” Stevens said. As the Mill was being dismantled, she asked for some of the remnant material.

She got some wooden thread spools and a 1902 sprinkler head that she made into a cane that she treasures. “I took several of these old spools of various colors, stacked them on each other and ran a quarter–inch thread rod the length of the cane and then put the sprinkler head on top,” Stevens said.

She has agreed to have her canes included in an exhibit at Heritage Hall Museum. Little plans to be selling his canes at this fall’s Homestead Hollow.

But beyond that, they do it just for the joy found in creating a work of art with a knife and a stick.

Fifteen and Fast

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Pell City’s ‘Coyote’ Cole Daffron
a force to contend with on the race track

Story by Graham Hadley
Photos by Michael Callahan
Track photos courtesy of
Kelly’s Racing Photography

Though Pell City’s William Cole Daffron can’t legally drive on the road without an adult in the car with him, he already has one national championship under his belt on the track and has his sights set on ARCA and eventually NASCAR.

With help from his family, friends, supporters and sponsors, “Coyote” Cole has been working his way up the racing ladder, starting out on the go-kart circuit and moving up to Pro Challenge 3/4-size trucks in the past year. They have a dirt track car ready and are putting together a pro late-model racecar — possibly the last step before moving on to ARCA and similar competitions.

“Cole has his eyes locked in to the ARCA series as the next step to NASCAR. He is currently running a dirt crate late-model on a limited basis to get that much-needed experience,” his father, Scott Daffron, said.

The Pell City High School student is only 15 years old — he has his learner’s permit thanks to his mother Tracy Partain mailing him the paperwork when he was at the beach. While he is learning to drive responsibly on public streets, Cole has hit speeds of well over 100 mph on the track.

Cole started racing go-karts in 2007 when he was 9 years old. His father had been racing cars off and on for years and helping other racers, with Cole often following Scott to the track to watch.

Cole said he tried out baseball, but did not like it much — he knew he wanted to get behind the wheel. The decision to start racing was mutual. Cole wanted to race and Scott wanted him to do it too, but did not want to push him.

“It was his decision. He had to want to do it. I wanted to be sure he was living his dream and not mine,” Scott said.

For Cole, the choice was simple — he wanted to race. In fact, that is his core goal, to make a career on the track.

So Scott bought a racing go-kart. These are not your run-through-the-yard domestic karts many children have. They are miniature racecars and are almost as complicated as the larger vehicles, costing in the thousands of dollars. Scott started out with a used one in case Cole decided he did not want to keep racing.

But he took to the sport like a natural — and has a room full of trophies and winner’s checks, not to mention a national-championship ring, to prove it.

Cole started racing at the Talladega Short Track in 2007, pulling a respectable third place track championship that year. The following year, he earned a track championship, and by 2009, he won both the Alabama-Mississippi Series championship, champ kart, and the Maxxis Tire national championship, flat kart.

“That first race, it was exciting, different from anything I had ever done. It was the best time I ever had,” Cole said, though he did note the national championship race was the most exciting time he has ever had.

Scott said it was during those early racing days Cole earned the nickname “Coyote” — based on the coyote character from the Roadrunner cartoons. He was racing more experienced drivers who had already made names for themselves, “and I told him if he beats those guys, he would be the Coyote. … and then he started beating them.”

As the wins kept coming, with success across the Southeast in Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, Georgia and other states, Cole stepped up to the next level with the 3/4-scale Pro Challenge trucks, graduating at the same time from dirt to asphalt, once again proving himself a natural behind the wheel.

To date, Scott said Cole has not had a Pro Challenge finish lower than fifth. Just this September, he set a new track record during qualifying at Sunny South Raceway in Grand Bay, Alabama, and went on to win the race there for the sixth time in a row.

Even before that race, the PCHS teen had already been tapped as the 2013 rookie of the year for that series and is in a “three-way battle” for second place in the national championship, he said.

Scott and Cole say they fully expect him to be in an ARCA race by 2015.

Dedication, hard work
and more than a little help

Though Cole is the one driving the car, there is a whole network of support behind him making his racing career possible.

“A lot of people don’t understand this is a full-fledged racing program,” Scott said. The go-karts cost thousands of dollars, the Pro Challenge car costs thousands more, and the dirt-track car and the pro late model cars cost in the tens of thousands — and that is just to purchase the vehicle and get it race ready. That does not include maintenance and parts — especially tires, and the transportation to and from the tracks and other expenses.

Luckily for Cole, help is in no short supply.

His grandparents, Bill and Patricia Daffron, “are probably Cole’s biggest sponsors and his biggest fans. They make sure we have what we need to race. They are very supportive,” Scott said.

In fact, it is partially because of Bill that the family got into the racing business. He left the car dealership he had been working at to start a salvage yard and body shop. It was that car-filled environment that Scott grew up in that he credits with getting him hooked on racing (and restoring vintage vehicles, but that’s another story). Though his father still runs the salvage yard, Scott handles the body shop.

It is this family-run business and its resources that form the backbone of Cole’s racing operation.

Because of his quick success at the track, Cole has already landed one sponsor — Amsoil D&S Lubrication through Dennis Crowe, which has brought in some much-needed financial support.

Then there is Carl Dieas, who helps out around the shop and can always be counted on to track down parts — sometimes from very far away and on very short notice.

“I just help out a little here and there,” Carl said, but Scott was quick to clarify exactly how important a role Carl really plays.

“He has done a round trip in 13 hours for parts that had been ordered but did not come in time. If he had not done that, we would not have been racing that weekend. It’s hard to do this without Carl,” Scott said.

Cole and his Dad also throw credit to Scott Honeycutt — Cole’s spotter during races and his “right-hand man.”

“He is the best spotter I have seen. He can talk Cole through any thing, a wreck, whatever, on the track. … But he does not try to tell Cole how to drive,” Scott said.

For all the help he receives, Cole does his part, too — aside from just driving.

Between training and maintaining his vehicles, Cole says he does not have much free time. “I come in from school and start working in the garage. We take a break around 5 and eat dinner, then come back out and work some more,” he said, adding that the races take up “just about all my weekends.”

And though he is only 15 and can’t legally drive on public streets without an adult, he is preparing for the day he gets his driver’s license, too, by building his own truck in one of the family’s garages. He has already made solid progress on putting his 2009 Chevrolet together.

The thrill of racing

For Cole, all the hard work is more than worth it when he gets out on the track and it’s all about the racing.

“The first time I won a truck race, we had been working so hard. It was the last few laps and I was in front. The spotter was telling me where the other guy was behind me on the last lap. You pray you don’t mess up, and then you win,” Cole said, emphasizing that the excitement of those moments is almost beyond description.

Scott shares the thrill from afar, but gets equally excited. He remembers the national championship race in fine detail. “It was my most exciting moment. Watching him come around the corners in front. Cole was breathing so hard, his mask would fog up and he would fall back. The kids kept trading the lead, then we came out ahead.”

Along with the excitement of the race, Scott admits that, as a parent, there is also concern that something could go wrong.

“My heart feels like it is going to beat out of my chest every time somebody gets close to Cole on the track or something happens,” he said.

Luckily, Cole has not had any serious accidents to date, though he did flip a go-kart off a berm one time.

“We were coming out of a turn three wide,” Cole said. The karts got tangled up, and “I hit a berm and flipped in the air, landed on all four tires. It was pretty intense.”

“Thank God he landed on all four — there is no roll cage on those,” Scott said.

“And no seat belts,” Cole added.

Given his track record and continued winning streak, Cole said he thinks he has a solid chance of one day racing NASCAR.

His Dad agrees, but says they still have a ways to go, both as a team and Cole as a driver.

“I want to make sure he is mature enough. So far, everything has worked because we have been taking it in steps,” Scott said, pointing out that time behind the wheel is really the key to being a good driver. Right now, he wants Cole to race cars on the dirt track because, even though they can top 100 mph, the slick dirt will help prepare him for the day he races stock cars on asphalt and the tires heat up and become slick.

And, as Cole builds up his driving skills, Scott hopes to attract more attention to what they are doing, possibly even finding more sponsors and supporters.

“We are still in development. We are learning as we go along,” he said.

You can Follow “Coyote” Cole on Facebook here.

Features

Around the Next Bend

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Sugarbush Farm: Antiques
and so much more

Story by Carol Pappas
Photos by Michael Callahan
Submitted Photos: Sugarbush Farm

If you weren’t looking for it, you just might miss the small sign out front that says, Sugarbush Farm. But if you passed by what lies just beyond it, rest assured, you missed out on something mighty special.

Tucked snugly behind the home that is barely distinguishable from others along Pell City’s Wolf Creek Road South is an 1850 cabin restored on the property and connected to the existing house. A few feet away stands another relic, a motel room from the old Rose Hill Motel in Irondale, which thrived in the 1930s and 40s.

But just around a dirt bend above the home of Jo and Paul Harris are the stables that once boarded more than 20 horses at a time. The covered arena across the way was once alive with the sound of children, horse hooves, riding lessons, shows and the nationally sanctioned Wolf Creek Pony Club.

As she turns the pages of photo albums and books, the familiar look of remembrance is unmistakable. So is the smile that accompanies it.

Jo and Paul moved to Pell City in 1973. He was a familiar face around St. Clair County, having graded cattle herds for the Extension Service. He judged 4-H and Future Farmers of America steer shows as well.

Paul had been a partner in a cattle corporation, sold his partnership and bought his own herd of Polled Herefords for breeding, leasing land around the county to raise his cattle. But during the Nixon administration, interest rates stood at 21 percent, and the president put a freeze on cattle prices. “It put us out of business,” Jo said.

But the couple was not to be deterred by the setback. Jo remembers telling Paul at the time, “You had your turn, let’s try horses.” Horses had been a passion of hers from an early age growing up in Oklahoma.

They secured their first boarder and “built from there,” she said. They developed a riding school with summer camps. She became certified as an instructor in the American Riding Instruction Certification Program. “I was working with an accounting firm and spent summer vacations with riding camps.”

Paul built the covered arena, and they would hold adult riders dressage clinics with a United States Dressage Federation instructor.

In the late 1980s, the Pony Club was chartered by the U.S. Pony Clubs – no small feat for a tiny town 40 miles outside the big city. It drew members from Moody, Talladega, Anniston, Birmingham and of course, its home in Pell City. “On Sunday afternoon, I gave lessons, and we held weekend competitions. We had a lot of fun,” she said as she thumbed through dozens of old photographs.

Sugarbush Farm was on the map as a pony club. “I’d like to think I made a difference with the kids,” she said. “I can’t say how many kids over the years, but my first student, Carrie Henderson, is now giving riding lessons in California.”

When health took its toll and she was unable to ride any longer, she acquired a Meadowbrook cart. In 2004, she traveled to Beaver Dam Farm in Nova Scotia to take a driving course. “That was the only time I got to ride on the beach.” She drives it now on a trail behind her home.

The cabin that Paul built

Jo and Paul’s homeplace is far from typical. They bought the 1850 cabin near the Shiloh battlefield in Tennessee. It was dismantled and moved to Pell City, where it took Paul two years to reassemble it. “You can still see the numbers on the logs,” she said.

There seems something familiar about the interior, perhaps because it was the setting for a handful of Southern Living Magazine photo shoots for various publications and occasions over the years. The coziness and the warmth envelops you as you enter, and the antiques Jo has collected over the years are the picture-perfect complement. Century-old quilts, shaker boxes and a cavernous fireplace as the focal point cannot help but send any visitor back in time.

Not your typical antique store

Step out back just across the gardens, and you’ll discover another remnant of days gone by – Jo’s antique shop. Sugarbush Farm Country Antiques and Folk Art is more than a sight to behold. It’s a treasure to savor.

Jo had passed by the vacant Rose Hill Motel many a time, seeing the motel cabins and wishing she had one. Her son discovered later they were for sale, and they bought two — one for her antique shop and the other serves as a guest house on her son’s land just across the way.

Its 192-square-foot frame encases rare collectibles Jo has just displayed for sale. She has reopened the antique shop and is hoping to pique the interest of antique and collectibles enthusiasts. She figures, she said, “If I get rid of it, the kids won’t have to.”

The collection is far from anything to be ‘gotten rid of.’ Hand-woven coverlets from York, Pennsylvania, and a 19th century coverlet hang from a quilt rack. Rows of shelves display her prized Blue Willow china with the buffalo mark on the back, signifying its century of age.

A butter churn reminds her of the days growing up on a dairy farm. “We made our own butter” and cooked from the garden. “I don’t think we went to the store except to buy flour and sugar,” she says.

French flatware, a William Britain Soldiers collection from England and Blue and White enamelware are but a few of the “finds” in her shop. There are delftware made in Holland, Blue Onion kitchen utensils and vintage Spring Bok puzzles, similar to jigsaw. There is even a collection of harness brasses used to decorate tradesman horses in England, the harness brass branded with the trade just as a logo would be used today.

“I have been a collector all of my adult life,” she says. She bought “things my mama used to have. I like to think back to the days when she did her canning.” And she quickly adds, “I don’t want to do it, I just want to remember it.”

Throughout the shop, the cabin and the 30 acres Jo and Paul call home these days, those memories of the past abound.

Jo sums it up in a simple, yet poignant thought that could be applied to antiques and memories alike: “I guess I’m just a collector at heart.”

Features

Wonder in Wood

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Story by Elaine Hobson Miller
Photos by Michael Callahan

When Lisa Phelps tells you she loves wood, you sense a gross understatement. She used four different hardwoods and a lot of pine in the new home she shares with husband, Kenny, in Odenville’s Aradon Farms. That doesn’t include the oak, cherry and maple in some of her antiques. Close your eyes, and you can almost smell the forest.

“I like woods of all kinds,” she says, reciting a materials list that includes cedar, alder, hickory and sweet gum.

Much of the wood in her house has a story behind it, from the cedar tree that provided a stair rail, towel racks, shelves and candleholders, to the heart-pine flooring that retained its natural knot holes.

The use of natural wood accents and textures in home decor is one of the hottest trends in home design. Lisa had no idea she was being trendy, however. She just knew what she liked. “I wanted a rustic look,” she says.

She got it, both inside and out.

Muted brown brick with weeping mortar, i.e., mortar that appears to be ever-so-slightly oozing, dominates the face of the house. Cedar posts top stacked-stone pillars to brace the roof of the porch, repeating the stone in the walkway and steps. On the concrete porch, a piece of driftwood picked up at a local flea market and a willow chair add to the rustic look.

Lisa spent a lot of time prowling antique shops and salvage stores while Benchmark Construction was building the house. She found the antique panels that divide the small study from the great room and entryway at Hannah Antiques in Birmingham. She complemented their wrought-iron insets with wrought-iron handles from HGH Hardware, also of Birmingham. “The handles are one of a kind, because HGH orders them from a company that throws away the wax mold after each casting,” she says. The stained-glass window in the study, which has a starburst pattern, is more than 100 years old. It, too, came from Hannah Antiques.

From floor to ceiling, the great room blends Lisa’s love of wood with Kenny’s love of the outdoors. The floor is unusual because Lisa wouldn’t let the installer fill in its knot holes, the normal practice after laying heart-pine. She wanted them open to make the floor appear older and more rustic. An antler chandelier, made from white-tail deer and purchased from a sporting goods store in Florence, Alabama, hangs from the cathedral-style, tongue-in-groove pine ceiling. Most of the other antlers scattered about the room are from deer that Kenny, his four brothers and their dad shot. Posts and corbels are made of cedar, while baseboards and door frames are made of pine. David and Scott Roy, of Roy Lumber, Bessemer, made the corbels.

Lisa designed several centerpieces based on the antler theme. One, on the credenza behind her sofa, features antlers grouped around a small cedar candleholder that Kenny made. The centerpiece on the glass-topped breakfast table consists of a large hurricane glass filled with antlers, with a candle in the center, on a white charger plate. A floral arrangement in the entryway uses antlers, and the dining room table shows off her grandmother’s wooden dough bowl as a container for pebbles, peacock feathers, an old-fashioned milk jug and a piece of driftwood.

The rifle on the sweet gum mantel is a reproduction of a cap-and-ball musket and belonged to Kenny’s dad. An Ansel Adams print, a deer statue and more antlers round out the mantel’s adornments.

A maple deer-leg table adds a touch of whimsy. Picked up for $40 at Hoover Antiques, it is topped with a new lamp featuring, you guessed it, antlers. The lamp came from Inline Lighting in Pelham. Lisa commissioned Stray Cats Home Decor of Childersburg to make the small oak sofa table next to the glass doors leading to the screened porch. The table displays a little brown jug, a clock and a lamp on top, along with Lisa’s jar and bottle collection on the bottom shelf.

The 2,700-square-foot house has three bedrooms and 4.5 baths, plus a bonus room upstairs that’s as large as an efficiency apartment. It’s actually a scaled-down version of a 4,700-square-foot home the Phelps saw but couldn’t afford. “We tracked down the architect, Mark Tidwell of Trussville, and got him to draw it smaller for us,” Lisa explains.

All of the countertops in the house are made of granite except for the one in the master bath, which is made of marble. In the kitchen, a hammered-copper farm sink rests in an island. “I chose copper because it doesn’t grow bacteria,” Lisa says. Kitchen cabinets are made of alder, which Lisa deems, “a poor man’s cherry.” Although pot-fillers normally are centered over range tops, Lisa had hers off-set to the left, because she had an accent tile she wanted in the center.

“I had never seen this done before until I built the Phelps house, but it’s becoming more popular,” says Dennis Smothers, owner of Benchmark Construction.

Her only regret in building the house is her choice of refrigerators. She bought a huge Thermador because of a sale. “I bought the fridge, and got a microwave and dishwasher free,” she says. “The fridge was too much money, which Kenny and Dennis tried to tell me, and it just isn’t worth it. I do love my Thermador gas range, though.”

Bathroom vanities are made of hickory, except for the one in the powder room off the kitchen. That one is an antique dresser from Denmark that a friend from church, Jack Collins, turned into a vanity by removing the drawers. The rock sink on top came from Southeastern Salvage in Irondale.

The stairs to the bonus room are located between the kitchen and the guest bedroom. Lisa knew she wanted a cedar hand rail for those stairs, but couldn’t find one the length she needed. So Scott Roy cut down a cedar tree from his own property, Lisa’s son-in-law scraped off the bark, and Kenny fashioned a hand rail out of it. Not one to waste any leftovers, he made several coat and towel racks for hallways and bathrooms, a picture-frame shelf for the guest room, plus various candleholders and bookends.

The master bathroom measures 15 feet by 18 feet and features a fiberglass tub for Lisa and a 4-foot-by-10-foot, multi-colored slate shower for Kenny. Lisa found a bamboo kiva-style ladder that she placed at the entrance-end of the shower for decoration, but with its vast distance from the shower head, it could easily keep Kenny’s towels dry.

Most of the furnishings in the house came from the couple’s former home in St. Clair Springs. They did, however, purchase a few new items, such as the dining room table and its stuffed chairs, which came from Pier I imports in Hoover. Lisa wanted a blue wall in the dining room to pull out the blue in the chair-cover pattern. Kenny and Dennis tried to discourage this decision because they said it made the room look “beachy.” But Lisa prevailed, and the men now agree that it looks great.

Lisa praises Smothers as an artisan as well as a builder.

“He came up with many ideas to enhance the rustic look we wanted,” she says. “For example, instead of crown molding in the dining area, he used cedar planks. He fashioned a triangular-shaped cut-out at the top of the divider between the entryway and the great room, to give the entryway a little depth.”

Smothers can’t say enough about Lisa’s innate decorating abilities.

“I’d hire her as a decorator if she’d do it,” he says.

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