all grown

I never did take nice 'after' landscape photos with everything in bloom but after finishing up the railing I took the opportunity to snap some photos in the fall.  The flowers are gone and the leaves are starting to fall but this gives an idea of the changes we'd made over the years to the landscape.

housekeeping

Springtime always calls for exterior updates and this year we had even a few more items to tackle.  The railing on the deck needed to be replaced and the guest house (aka the playhouse) had a rotten porch.  We simply replaced the railing with new 2x4 boards and repainted to match the old ones.

Not very exciting so far but the guest house needed much more work (it really does have a door, not sure why it's always open in pictures).  The slide and balcony were made from plywood that 5 winters of peeling paint later could be punched thru. The beams under the balcony were starting to rot and mildew and the railing was seriously peeling.

We removed the slide altogether and scraped the rest of the trim and railing.

We replaced the plywood on the balcony with 2x6 planks finished with white stain and repainted everything else including the beams underneath to protect from any further damage. 

We also decided to add lattice around the bottom to hide the storage area below.  The plan is to add a planter bed at the base of the lattice and grow vines to cover it.

We had a roofer out to patch up a few spots on the house we had them replace the part of the guest house roof that had broken as well. We were ready for guests again but somehow didn't take a finished after photo so imagine the below but painted nicely, slide posts removed and a non-broken roof.

freebie

The other 'hey look what I did while you were away for the weekend Bryce' project I decided to tackle was the newel posts.  The geometric circle on squares was far too geometric 80's for our 1908 house.

We had actually added the globes as a temporary filler but I came across a better option while cleaning out the material library at work.  The new newel posts were leftover from a old project and were no longer needed which made them free to me.  I decided to remove the top wood square (I don't believe these were original to the house), added my new newel posts and repainted everything to match. 

These are still not exactly what I'd pick if I had a large range of options but they're much better and for free I'm not going to complain. 

clean up

Before putting away the painting supplies I had a weekend home alone and thought I'd tackle a few more less-necessary projects solo.  First up was the supply closet by the back door.  

The inside of this closet hadn't been touched since we moved in and since we had left over paint from the bench project I decided it was a good time to update it.  There are two poorly placed shelves at the top of the closet leaving little room for actual cleaning supplies.  I painted the inside of the closet, adding some stripes because....eh, why not?

I added a wire organizer along the rear wall to hold cleaning supplies, hooks to one side for brooms, dusters, mops etc and clear office file holders to the other for paper bags.

I used bins on the shelves to hold light bulbs, vacuum accessories, cleaning rags etc.

Room on the floor was left for the stand up vacuum cleaner which used to barely fit (the flooring in here is some old carpeting that was left when the Pergo was installed; I kinda dig it).  

kick off

As it usually does, one project led to another and while we were making trips to Home Depot to patch up the holes in the closet and kitchen ceiling, we went ahead and purchased materials for another project we'd been planning on since moving in.

This nook by the back door was great for storing shoes but the freestanding shoe rack needed upgrading.  

We started by removing the flooring (uncovering some awesome linoleum) and trim and built-in a bench of ply-wood with shelves below for shoe storage.  We left the shelf above with baskets for hats/gloves/scarves and covered the rear wall of the nook with bead board to give it a true built-in look.

  

The bench and bead board were painted Behr 'Decorator White' and finished off with some trim and the globe light was replaced.

catch up

For a moment there I was almost blogging in live time but these silly AREs (architectural registration exams) really put a damper on my momentum.  We've completed a few projects this spring/summer but first I owe some 'after' photos from a project we completed last fall- the driveway.  I had progress and completion photos from when we were actually working on the driveway but they were all lost in the great hard drive crash of '11.  Here are some pics I took earlier this spring and I have to say I think Bryce and I were both surprised the driveway was still in such great shape after the winter.  The landscape fabric we used kept the gravel from sinking into the muddy ground and we didn't even have to add more which we assumed we would.  So without further adieu, here's another before which is actually an 'after' (note by the time we got around to this project we'd been driving over that grass for 4 years so picture more of a dirt/mud pit)

and the much after 'after' photo

and just for giggles, here's a photo from when the previous owners were moving out

I explained the process in the last post but here are some close up pics of the gravel blend we put together to add some tans as well as the pavers we used on their sides to act as a border.

And here's the driveway addition looking from the back door of the house.  We didn't want to (and actually probably wouldn't be able to because of regulations) widen the curb cut so we angled the end of the new section.  It's not the easiest park job between the angled entrance and narrow carport but we get our small SUV in there just fine.

Here's a recent photo of the carport as well just to show how the space is utilized these days.  You can also see the door to the garage with updated light fixture and hardware which have been installed throughout the years.  The items stored in the carport here are the trash can, recycling and compost bins (not smelly!).

 

wired for sound

Always one to take advantage of the situation, Bryce immediately went to work on an item off his list while he had access between the first and second floors...

speakers.  He was able to run wire from the receiver in the living room TV cabinet under the baseboard in the living room, thru the wall into the lazy susan in the kitchen, up thru the corner cabinet, across the upper cabinets and (with the access provided by the hole in the ceiling) into the upstairs bathroom cabinet and master bedroom closet.  My one condition was that he use wire staples to keep the cables in order and they're completely undetectable except for in the upstairs cabinet when it's open; and even then they're hardly noticeable. 

In addition to the speakers we already have outside on the deck, now we can have music playing throughout the house as well.  I have to admit, this is actually pretty awesome.