Category: The house

My driveway has been in place since last March, but now that the house and grading are done, and the boundaries of the yard are clear, I’m making a little parking and turn-around area to the left of the house. A big load of gravel was delivered today. There was no way to get the gravel in place with the dump truck. We dumped it in four piles near where it’s needed. I’m spreading the gravel with hand tools — wheelbarrow, shovel and rake. One pile down, three to go.

I did take a break during the holidays, but I’m now jumping back into the building process. I believe I’ve lined up contractors for all the interior work — electrical, plumbing, heating and air conditioning, insulation, drywall, and cabinets and trim. I’ll have more posts soon as this work gets under way.

Well, y’all, here are the final exterior shots, the morning after completion. The crew have removed all their equipment, and the litter piles have been cleaned up. The house is now surrounded by a band of packed red dirt. Next steps: the final grading and starting on the up-close landscaping. With luck I’ll at least have a bit of grass and some daffodils around the house come spring. This construction project was incredibly smooth. I fretted more than necessary about the formalities of inspections, and the mud and the mess, but I don’t think I ever lost a minute’s sleep during the whole project. The contractors and their crew did an outstanding job. If anyone in this area is looking for a contractor, please email me and I’ll put you in touch with them. I’d recommend them very highly.

Because of tricks of the surrounding terrain, the house can pretend to be lost in the woods, though it’s really not. The house faces what I’d call a dell, with a high ridge on the horizon about a quarter of a mile away. To use an old-fashioned technical term, I believe this place is a croft. In these photos, the sun has just cleared the southeastern ridge, and the first morning light is falling on the house (about 8:15 a.m. this time of year). Unfortunately my camera is too automatic to take a night shot. I’d never get the exposure right. But the house, seen at night from up close, with the stars behind it, has a completely different mood. It looms tall and mysterious and ominous, and it looks like a set for a scary movie for teen-agers.

The back and the uphill side.

The back and the downhill side. This photo was taken yesterday evening when the sun was low in the west.

They finished the exterior today. The house is now weathertight. The house is more photogenic in morning light, so I’ll have more photos and more angles Wednesday morning.

The exterior of the house is almost done. I haven’t put up any photos lately because I thought I’d wait until the exterior is done. Here’s a little preview, though. This is the uphill side of the house. I should have the final exterior photos Friday or Saturday, or, if it’s raining, I’ll have the photos Sunday. To get the light right, the photos need to be taken around 8:15 a.m. as the sun is coming up.

Update, Sunday, Oct. 19: Rain slowed things down a bit. I’ll have updates as soon as possible this week.

Standing in the hall and looking out the back door, across the deck, and into the woods. This actually is a shotgun house. That’s what Southerners call a house when you can shoot a shotgun through the front door straight out the back door.

The Gothic window array from the upstairs master bedroom

The trapezoidal windows in the upper living room, seen from the upstairs master bedroom. The trapezoidal windows had to be custom made.

Standing in the radio room (which is a balcony) and looking down into the living room

Interior framing detail on the Gothic window array

The Gothic window array, from the living room

From the front

I scattered a few packets of flower seeds this spring and made no attempt to cultivate them. Only the cosmos thrived.

This late watermelon is still growing.

The roofers ran out of ridge shingles, and we’re waiting for that to be delivered, but the roof is pretty much done.

Also yesterday, the county inspectors signed off on the foundation’s French drain.

There was quite a large crew working today, and a lot got done. I should have charged for parking. Here they are roofing the uphill face.

The two custom-made windows were delivered today. I believe the shape is a trapezoid. These two windows are part of the symmetrical window assembly of four windows that flank the fireplace in the living room. The windows in the living room will reach almost to the full height of the living room — 21 feet.

French drain is not very photogenic, but it’s very important. It’s a perforated pipe embedded in gravel and covered with a filter screen. There are, I believe, seven tons of gravel in the drain system. Very nice.

A half profile with the uphill face roofed.

Half profile from the downhill angle.

Roofing around, and flashing, the dormers took some time.

We’ve had more than two inches of rain here in the last week. It was the remnants of a tropical storm that came in from the southeast off the Atlantic. It came down slowly, and it soaked into the ground instead of running off. As a consequence of the rain, work has been on hold. A large load of gravel arrived today for the foundation drain system. I believe it’s called “French drain.” I have no idea what’s French about it, but it should do a good job of protecting my foundation and keeping it dry.

The day lilies loved the rain. The grass and clover I planted last week is germinating profusely. The new grass and clover is too tiny for my camera to photograph.

It continues to amaze me the resources nature has for holding onto, and creating, soil, as long as there’s some light, some water, and some nutrients. This fast-running weed seems to particularly like stony ditch areas. This is brilliant, because plants without runners would wash out before they get a strong purchase. There’s something for every niche. I have no idea how the seeds arrive to give these things a start.

Speaking of Lilies, this one is growing too. She weighed 6.2 pounds when she went to get her shots last week. She’s four months old now. The state she is in here is deceptive. She is not in a stop state. It is more a recoil state, because in just a few seconds she will spring up and storm down the hall. And speaking of French, she has learned to say, “Je suis terriblement mignon, non?”

Oui. Insupportablement.

The Princess Lily state — L’état, c’est moi.

What’s the matter? Don’t all y’all get enough cat pictures? The Internet is flooded with cat pictures, but people keep asking me for cat pictures. This is Lily at four months old. I have been calling her Princess Lily. She was found in the woods, scrawny and pathetic, but now she thinks she owns the world and that, at four pounds, she can tell the world what to do. Oh well. I tried to raise her to be confident.

She has four states. Asleep, run wild, the Princess Lily state, and the state of indignant that I won’t immediately grant her wishes. Who knows. By the time she grows up we may discover a fourth or fifth state. That wouldn’t surprise me, because she is very smart and can predict my behavior as easily as my old colleagues back at the San Francisco Chronicle.

The run wild state