Christmas at home

Christmas 2011

 Welcome to our home.  Just a little cottage, but we love it.

Dining Room

Living Room

Media Room

Alice Tree in Living Room

Living Room Mantel

 Snowman painted in reverse on recycled window pane

 More mantel

More photos to follow.

Happy Halloween !

A Painted House

To recap -

Then new hardy board ....

The house is finally painted !

No grass in this yard - easy to maintain, plus I am terribly allergic.

Here is a tip that will make your life easier - put a bench next to your front door.  Your groceries now have a "home" while you are unlocking, or you have a seat for taking off shoes or boots, or putting them back on.  Our little church pew also has a lift up lid, where the mail and newspaper go while we are on vacation !  Our bench left the front porch for a couple of days during the painting, and we REALLY missed it !

Next set of pics will be fall porch decorating !!

Brie wins Oregon Mid-Am once again

 Annette made this gorgeous bird bath for us, out of recycled glass. 

 Rain chains installed instead of down spouts.  When the house is done being painted I will get some better pictures.

More glass and ferns and flowers.

Summer is here

Kitchen Nears its End

To recap the kitchen, here is what we had at the beginning.



We decided against new cupboards, as ours, though very old, are in excellent shape. We did not paint, though we will touch up an area or two in the next week. We added new hardware, which the before picture actually shows. We put in a laminate floor, new quartz counter top, a new deep stainless steel sink, and a glass tile back splash.

We had done all new electrical work in the house earlier in the year, and made the light over the sink finally functional.

Here are the after shots.






Pretty, huh. Maybe I will actually cook in here now.

New sink and counter tops

New countertops and sink installed today. All that remains is the plumbing, scheduled for tomorrow, and of course, a backsplash. This look is not too pretty...

The road to Reno

May 2011

Mount Shasta, the end of the four lane highway.

The snow is melting, leaving lakes where the meadows usually are. We are about 4500 feet above sea level here. Unknown mountain, one of many.


Entering Nevada, we have another 4 lane roadway !

Looking mighty Reno-like !

Back in Oregon, southern most coast, this is Harris Beach. Hub is feeding the squirrels

Harris Beach

More Harris Beach.

Sheesh, I think we are back home again.

Exterior

Here are some before and after pics of the exterior. The contractor, Doug Shelley, added hardy board siding to four areas - I have only included the two areas at the front of the house.

Before

After

Before

After

The house will be painted this summer.

Floor - Kitchen, laundry, pantry

We bought a laminate (called barnwood) from Lumber Liquidators, and are in the process of having it professionally installed by Rick Davies Construction. We chose to do it on the diagonal as the rooms are not very wide, and we felt it would give the appearance of being larger. The laminate is very similar to the hardwood floors in the rest of the house. Right now the refrigerator is only 5 or 6 steps from the tv, very convenient. The cost to do it on the diagonal was not substantial, maybe only $150 - $200 more, both for labor and materials.

Once the floor is complete we will have a new dishwasher, sink and countertops installed.