[MUSIC PLAYING]
Hello!
Come on in.
I'm Lynette.
And I'm Clint.
We live in the "Up" house.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
We met in ninth grade and then started dating in high school.
Our first date was senior prom.
And so yes, we're high school sweethearts.
And yeah, we've been married for 18 years.
LYNETTE: Yeah.
I always say to the kids, I'm madly in love.
Right now, we're at our house, our own.
It's a replica of the Disney Pixar house from "Up."
I was in the military.
I had just gotten a new assignment in California.
My grandmother lived in Salt Lake at the time.
She wasn't doing so well, so I came out to Utah to see her.
So when I was visiting, said, hey,
we've seen stuff on social media about this "Up" house
that they built in Herriman.
And I'd like to go see it and take some pictures
so I can show the family.
And it was an open house.
I said, oh, wow.
Nobody lived there yet.
I'm just geeking out, just beside myself, total Disney
nut.
I'm like, hey, we're looking for a house.
Would it be crazy for us to possibly move
to Utah, buying this house?
And yeah, I don't-- how crazy does that sound?
The phrase "adventure is out there"
is very prominent in "Up."
And to us, one of the takeaways was you
can find adventure in anything.
When I was visiting my grandma, just
asking her how she's doing.
And she had this big smile on her face.
And that's always how she was.
I just asked her, how's it going?
And she said, you know, death is a great adventure.
Yeah, this is-- this is a cool thing.
And so I fly into Oakland Airport.
As soon as we land, I turn on my phone,
and I get a text message saying that my grandma
had passed away.
So as I'm walking down the jet way, lined up with the jet way
is Fenton's Creamery.
They have a little kiosk in the airport.
So I happen to pull into the gate that's straight
in front of Fenton's Creamery.
And I'm like, all right.
[LAUGHS] What's going on here, all this universe alignment
stuff?
And it was like another sign.
We could not believe it.
So when he was like, so what do you think?
I mean, like, I'm stationed out here.
It wouldn't work.
And I was like, we'll make it work.
We can do this.
CLINT: So we started talking to the home builder.
Blair Bangerter, this was his brainchild.
When I saw the "Up" house, I thought, now
what is that style?
Is that kind of a Victorian style?
And the house was so gorgeous and so cute.
And it was such a big part of the film.
Well then I thought, hey, I wonder if we
could do something with that.
And at first he wasn't--
he was like, no, it's not really for sale.
I just kept having an open house.
I never listed the house for sale.
They had gotten a lot of people saying,
we want to buy this.
This is amazing.
We looked at each other.
And we're like, we're not going to accept no as an answer.
No, this is our dream house.
Clint walked in.
I could tell he was serious.
And when he talked to me about his love for Disney and Pixar,
that was the start of the purchase of the home.
CLINT: Coral and Gunner just absolutely
were beside themselves when they saw the house.
Everything felt magical.
Everything about that whole process felt magical.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
This is the front room.
Here is where Carl and Ellie sit.
GUNNER: You may recognize this, how he steered his house--
the coffee grinder.
Right here, we have the mantle where
Ellie will straighten the bird.
Then they have the painting that they
painted on here of their house on Paradise Falls.
Right here, this is what I sleep with, Kevin,
if you recognize her.
She really matters to me a lot.
CORAL: We are very happy to live here.
It's so magical.
You feel like anything can come true, honestly.
So we are in the secret playing room where me and my brother
hang out.
And I'm going to be playing a little short song for you.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
LYNETTE: When we went up to the nursery
for the first time, that's when I lost
it, when I saw the nursery.
And then coral pointed out, oh, there's a pink cloud for me
and a blue cloud for Gunner.
CLINT: Yeah.
And I was like, oh.
CLINT: We had a similar situation to Carl and Ellie
when we first started trying to have kids.
There were a couple of miscarriages.
And I think they were very difficult.
So that was one of the reasons we latched onto the movie
so tightly when it first came out.
Our son Gunner was 3?
LYNETTE: 3.
CLINT: He was at an age.
And we were just kind of connecting the dots ourselves.
I had been noticing there is something different about him.
And so there was just these signs.
And people would touch him and he would shudder.
And then the delayed speech--
he spoke, but not a ton of words, all these little signs.
So I took him to this place that diagnoses autism.
And so she analyzed him.
She was like, yeah.
He definitely is on the spectrum.
It's those true moments that a lot of people go through.
And you got to dig deep and get through them.
And it's OK.
He is beautiful the way he is.
When we moved in here, it was almost like--
LYNETTE: Gunner had a happy meltdown.
CLINT: Yeah.
LYNETTE: Remember, he ran up to the door
and was knocking on the door and trying to open the door knob.
He was like, "Up" house, "Up" house, "Up" house.
And it was like this real--
it was a real connection of something that was--
he had only seen on TV before as a cartoon.
It was this interesting thing with him where it was oh, cool.
I'm in the movie now.
And something clicked.
And he attached.
Yeah, he got really happy.
He started talking more.
He connected with things.
He started opening up.
And it was just-- it was a very noticeable change.
He was able to just feel safe and connected.
It just brings up a lot of emotion.
Yeah.
We are so blessed with how Coral and Gunner
interact with each other.
They are best friends.
CLINT: Coral is super sweet with Gunner.
She's very understanding, very patient.
We're a really close brother and sister.
We were thrilled that a young couple with kids
were able to move in and enjoy the house.
He told us on a number of occasions
that he felt like they were building the house for us,
for our family.
That's probably one of the sweetest things
I've ever heard in my life.
LYNETTE: You're the family we built this for.
That's what he said to us.
This house was so dear and near to my heart
that whoever was going to buy it,
I just felt we were going to be close.
And that really has come true.
It's been awesome growing up here.
It's cool to have parents that are super into magical things.
Well, Clint and Lynette, they have the personality
that just is magnetic.
And they have so much fun with it.
I mean, they've been embraced the uniqueness of the home.
And they are able to share it with others in ways
that is quite unique to them.
When you watch the movie, Carl and Ellie, I mean,
they just fall in love with this house.
And then they make it their home.
And that's what makes them the absolute best
owner for this home.
CLINT: Everyday life can be an adventure.
And you need to find those little adventures
in those moments.
There's always an adventure around every corner.
Just do something new.
Find a change and go after it.
We live in a house inspired by Disney Pixar's "Up."
And that's what makes us Disney people.