Chris Roovers firmly believes Gull Cottage lured her to Lake Erie. The beachfront cottage in Port Stanley, Ontario, seemed to know her predicament—the tragic death of her husband of almost 30 years, the oppressive weight of a four-bedroom, four-bathroom home plagued with reminders of a different life, and the recent departure of her three children from the nest.

"I knew I was in trouble in that house... I had to make a change," she explains.

Looking back on it, Chris describes the move as destiny. "Something was pulling me here. One day I just got into my car and started driving, and ended up in Port Stanley at a real estate office."

Although the property wasn't currently on the market, the agent told her she had something she might like coming up in a couple of weeks. Then there was the word "Port" coming up everywhere, and the fact Chris's father was named Stanley. As soon as the high school teacher from Aylmer, Ontario, saw the property, she was in love.

And who wouldn't be? The open concept beachfront property with massive deck is certainly easy on the eyes, but she was also drawn to the cottage's hands-free details. "My old property was just too much house for one person," she says. "The thought of maintenance was daunting."

In contrast, Gull Cottage was freeing—with no lawn to mow, controlled landscaping, and a modern building plan. With the aim to simplify, Chris sold her English Tudor and almost everything in it and moved to Gull Cottage. "It really was the right thing to do," she says of her decision. "Good things started to happen as soon as I moved into this house."

To Chris, every aspect of her new home seems to draw out positive, healing energy. From the "dream" kitchen that encourages gourmet adventures and makes doing dishes a panoramic pleasure to the easy-care porcelain tile that forgives all sandy feet and blurs the line between outdoors and in—it's the best of a cottage built into a year-round home. And the effect on Chris has been therapeutic.

"I see the boats... the water, and I feel the stress leaving me. I feel myself melt."

Chris confesses she didn't know how popular she was until she moved to "Port," and now has to schedule weekends with friends. There are always people dropping by to join Chris on the deck with its built-in fire pit, hot tub, outdoor pool table, and spectacular lake views.

She still pinches herself and ponders her own personal metamorphosis from her early years in Toronto dealing with her mother with Alzheimer's, and her father's cancer.

"I used to be a city girl from the West Village and now I find myself here... it's like looking at a different person. I used to fall asleep to the sound of buses and sirens at Jane and Bloor—now it's to the sound of waves and wind."

So was it destiny that lured Chris to the safe haven of Gull Cottage? She prefers to call it synchronicity. "I was compelled to come here... and I belong here. Whatever you put out in the universe comes back to you. We women don't fold when life gets the better of us."