Magnolia House

A Few Before and After's

I've been neglegent in posting to our blog here, as I've been sharing more on Facebook this last year. Here are some before and afters of what's been going on the last 10 months...

Bed Room

Last summer we had our friends Matt and Carly Cross coming to stay with us for a few months, so we did a quick flip to one of the downstairs bedrooms. We painted the floor, repaired woodwork, painted walls, and added a chandelier. Boom.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back Porch

We had a vision of steps cascading down onto a new patio, and we made that happen this last fall. The old porch was sitting on a brick foundation and after 100 years had its share of rot. Sitting on new concrete footings, the new porch has stairs to the side as well as steps off the back. The rails were fun, but the angles... well, in the end I was able to use some engineering skills to get the right angles!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Studio

This ended up being a year in the making, between resurrecting the old shed, laying a brick patio and adding a cover. It's a fully operational pottery studio now!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back Yard

This has been three years in the making, from the initial clean up of Mr. Allmen's rock collection, demo'ing old sidewalks, pulling out pipes set in 2 feet of concrete, acquiring a couple of mature pygmy palms and various other plantings, refinishing a used fountain, running sprinkler lines, and laying a paver patio. We recently added a Jacaranda tree as well. It's starting to feel like an oasis...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sun Room

This room is our absolute favorite in the house. The Allmen's were good to us in closing in this part of the porch. We  live in this room, and so does everyone who visits us. At a party we held, I counted eleven people jammed in here. We replaced the aluminum sliders with french doors, addded flooring and repainted the wood work. We refreshed the windows with lace curtains, and you'll find us here every morning having coffee.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Furnace

When we were buying the house, our inspector told us the old furnace had plenty of life left in it since they get used so seldom here. I got excited to sand of the rust and repaint it this fall. We custom fit some shelves and now we have some cubby holes for our shoes and gloves, as well as a more presentable furnace in the back porch.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back Door

I couldn't part with the back door, but we didn't need a cat door. I spent a Saturday rebuilding the bottom of the door to install a new panel, refiitted the window, some paint and new hinges and we kept one of our favorite old house features; the sound of an old screen door going "kerslam" when it closes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What's Next?

Well, we've been adding trees. 8 of them. 5 new Magnolias, a Crepe Myrtle, a Tulip Tree and a Jacaranda for the back yard. We tore out the front yard in November, and started to make plans for some water conserving plantings, some grass, and a picket fence.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Special thanks to Curtis here, for helping dig all these big holes! Oh, and check out the irrigation tubes for deep watering. Yes, Oregonians, we have to water trees in California! More in another month or so!

 

 

 

 

Roof!

OK, here's what a white translucent roof looks like from our bathroom window.

Bam! There it is.

But underneath the cover it's perfect.

We'll get the kilns set up and we're off and running studio wise.

Next up is an arbor over the "secret garden" and some vines. That will soften the look.

Plus we have a tropical garden to plant in front of it to create the "secret."

While we have a lot of fun doing this work, some times we forget how far we've come.

I go back through this blog every once in a while to keep perspective.

And then I stare at something like the foot of the new bath tub on the new tile floor and I smile.

The simple things in life like fixing up an old house.

 

 

Studio Patio and Cover

It's starting to take shape... The brick patio is in place, and the framework for the cover is there. This weekend we'll add some polycarbonate panels to the roof and set up the ceramic kiln area.

We had so much fun with laying the bricks that we're already starting to plan the big patio and new back porch.

 We did the whole process here...

For the patio, we excavated the area, layed and compacted four inches of gravel, screeded sand to 1" thick, layed the bricks, and compacted them again with joint sand.

The patio cover is set on 12" footings and built to code with 5/8" bolts. I'm pretty sure the posts will withstand an earthquake. Everything else...?

Cynthia bought me two Bird of Paradise to keep me inspired. I'm excited to see some plant life taking root in our tropical/mediteranian back yard.

Studio Patio at Casa Magnolia

The excavation is done for our "studio patio." We'll use the old bricks around the house to make the paver patio, after adding some gravel and sand to the mix.

A patio cover will be added as well and this will become the kiln area. Then we'll be ready for some start to finish ceramics at Casa Magnolia.

As a part of this work comes the installation of the courtyard fountain as well.

The trench is done for the electrical, and a footing is ready to be poured.

We have the old fountain we bought that needs refinishing (what doesn't around here?).

Another four weeks and this should all look like something!

We spent some time yesterday at Embassy Suites taking pictures of their landscaping and it's time to start choosing some plantings.

On a side note, I read an article in the paper yesterday that stated houses with names have a higher resale value.

Hey, our house has a name, we call it "Magnolia House." Cynthia is toying with a change to "Casa Magnolia."

We'll see which one sticks... Not planning on selling anytime soon....

Studio move in ready

It's been a longer road than we thought, as weekend warriors... turning the old shed into a pottery studio.

This is what it looked like at one point. Now it's all tightened up, has power and water, and a new outlook on life.

Things to do include setting up the studio with shelves and work spaces, creating a brick patio area and patio cover, adding an outside sink, and placing the kiln.

Then we move on to back yard landscaping, including a new back porch, a 500 sq. ft. paver patio, a 700 sq. ft. courtyard of decomposed granite, our fountain, and some lush tropical landscape.

When we're done, we hope for a little oasis.

What do you want to bet we don't get that all done before we do the kitchen?

Backyard War-Zone. Last Dumpster (I think)

Once again, we have used the side yard of our house as a junk yard, as debris from the latest clean-up and refurbish has accumulated. I think this is the last one for a long while.

This is mostly rotted and termite eaten wood from the shed, and some of its contents (old shelves and the like).

So now our yard it pretty close to being a blank slate, and the landscaping can begin in months to come.

We still have a pile of rocks that are all pretty cool from Mr. Almen's rock-hounding days (the previous owner), and a stack of used bricks.

We'll figure out how to incorporate them in the yard somehow. In the mean time, visitors enjoy the opportunity to dig through the rock pile for treasures.

Our friends Wade and Jenn visited last night, and their three boys left with a couple of bucket fulls of cool rocks.

The pile in the middle of the back yard is a three tiered fountain that will be one of our features in what will be a garden and patio oasis. Needs a little rework, but what hasn't?

The new back fence was painted by our roomie Sascha. She endearingly refers to it as "my fence." She did a great job.

 

Studio South Wall

So here's the latest progress on the studio, The south wall is pretty close to done.

The barn doors have new supporting posts and a threshold. They still need a little care, but I'll save that for next weekend.

The door came out of the garage attic. The horizontal board is where our old cast iron laundry sink will go, so Cynthia can clean the clay and glaze off of things, including her hands.

Here's a reminder of where we started. An old garage on a wood foundation, with 1 X 12's as walls (and no studs!).

It's all sitting on pole barn type construction now, with new 4 X 4 posts all the way around.

 We managed to reuse about two walls worth of the old boards, and had to go new on the others.

Another couple of weeks and there will be pottery happening here!

West Wall and Gate

Here's Miss Cynthia putting the finishing touches on the rebuilt west wall of her studio. Upper portion is original. Bottom portion not.

This next weekend we're going after the south wall, then we'll be closing in on completion. Cynthia's ready to move in and I'm, like, "in another four weeks..." And she says "I want to start throwing pottery now!"

Patience...

 

Here's what the wall looked like at Lowes...

Oh, and here's our new back gate...

 

Best Looking Alley on the Block...

Here's the studio north wall all painted...

Remember that fence that fell down? Here's a new one...

I'm

pooped!

 

 

My son Chris kidded me that we will have the best looking alley on the block.

I'm not sure about that, but, it's getting better!

Studio north wall...

This is the before picture and the shed's north wall. Pretty badly termite damaged...

When I straightened the building up (car jack and a 2 X 4 against a fence post) the fence tore off of the building and fell over in the alley...

The posts were rotted off. So that's another project.

 

 

Here's the after.

I'm sure all my neighbors driving down the alley will like it even better when the fence is repaired and everything's painted...

The fence is being held up by some 2 X 4 scraps screwed to it and the shed.

lol...