Our journey at El Sueño began April 15, 2020, when we moved into our home. It is a much larger home than the two of us need, but at the beginning of the pandemic, it was a steal. Our house is 6,700 square feet and sits on 11 acres on a hill in historic Lincoln County, NM. Friends who came for dinner all made the same comment: this is the perfect place for a wedding. We have 360 degrees of mountain views. Our UPS driver said, "This is the best view in Lincoln County, and I've been everywhere in the county." So, with all the feedback from everyone, we decided to open it as a bed and breakfast and wedding venue.
We needed to choose a name. We went through a lot of choices and had friends weigh in. Eventually, we decided on "El Sueño," which means "the dream." We had the name welded onto our gate.
Contractors were able to work during the pandemic, and there was so much to do. The home had been one of four homes owned by an elderly couple from west Texas. It had been neglected over the past few years.
The first thing we did was to turn the back room to an outdoor area. It was glassed in with doors leading to the deck. All of the windows were covered with blinds that prevented us from enjoying the magnificent view. We knocked all of that out and added tile to the flooring to protect it from the weather.
Thus began a series of projects, including:
replacing bathroom carpet with tile (who puts carpet in a bathroom?)
replacing the chain link fence with a larger pipe fence, increasing the back yard area
installing an RO System so the well water was drinkable
installing a circulating pump to access hot water faster
purchasing furniture for most of the house
One of the larger projects was painting most of the inside of the house. Each bedroom is painted a different color to go with its theme (Mescalero Room, Hollywood Room, New Orleans Room). The most dramatic change is the difference in paint in our personal bedroom. When we bought it, it reminded me of a cave. It had brown carpet, peach walls, a brown ceiling, and dark green blinds on all windows. Even the skylights had coverings in them. We kept the carpet but lightened up the entire room, as seen in the pictures below.
But we painted throughout the entire house.
That was just the work on the inside of the house. Then, there was the outside. First, we replaced the electrical lines from the pump house up to the house. That took some very heavy equipment.
Then, there were the trees. So many of our trees looked like bushes, so hubby used a chain saw to trim all the lower branches of many of the trees. Since the rolloff bin was located in one location, he used his golf cart to pull branches from one side of the property to the rolloff bin.
Eventually, we filled a total of 5 rolloff bins of limbs and branches. Each one holds 30 cubic yards of material, so it was a lot of work. A friend loaned us his four-wheeler with a trailer, which was much better than the golf cart for hauling. We also had subsequent rolloff bins placed in different areas so the hauling wasn't quite as far. The next outdoor project was the parking lot and pathway up to the back wedding venue area.
There are still a few projects in the works. We are putting in the wedding pathway, which will wind from the house through the gate and out 100 feet to the wedding platform (also being built). We are waiting until mid-May to put in the grass. It will be buffalo grass because that grows well in New Mexico. We had an artist do a rendering of what the back venue will look like.
All projects will be completed before our first wedding in July, 2021. So far, we're enjoying the journey, but we really look forward to having all of this done. Who knows what's in store for 2022? #nmweddings #ruidosonm #ruidoso #NewMexicoWeddings #elsuenoweddings #newmexicobride