Article content continued

“Sometimes, kids are there for years waiting for transplants and stuck in the hospital because an organ could come at any moment. They need to be on site. And we want to make them happier.”

Photo by Bill Smith / NHLI via Getty Images files

The other challenge that Skille embraced was making Denver his off-season home. He connected on and off the ice and with a passion for the outdoors, he found something in a city where you can either get away from it all in a hurry or immerse yourself in the culture.

“There’s just so much to do,’ said the former first-round draft pick (seventh overall by the Chicago Blackhawks in 2005). “You’re 30 minutes away from the mountains and I love hiking and biking and just getting away from the big mess of a city. You get the best of both worlds, great restaurants and great people. They’re active and fun and being there just one summer, I made so many friends.

“You know you can call it home when you go someplace else and I can’t wait to get back there. I went back to Madison and there was nothing left for me. I was getting anxious to get back to Denver.”

And back to another project that mirrored The Money Pit movie, a 1986 comedy in which Tom Hanks and Shelley Long disastrously attempt to renovate their recently purchased home.

“I don’t want to watch it (the movie) because it will take me back to those nightmares last summer,” said Skille.

What could go wrong? Surely, there are good contractors who could have turned the old bungalow into a new-age place of comfort.

“I did my renovations and I don’t know if I ever want to go down the road again,” he stressed. “I was naive. I thought it would be bing-bang-boom and done in one week. It turned into a three-month process. I took down down three walls, opened up the living room and actually wiped out a bedroom to make a gigantic living room.

“I had to get a 22-foot, 500-pound refurbished wood beam from Louisiana to go straight across (the living room), and that was quite the process to just get it in the house.”

bkuzma@postmedia.com

Twitter.com/benkuzma

CLICK HERE to report a typo.

Is there more to this story? We’d like to hear from you about this or any other stories you think we should know about. Email vantips@postmedia.com.