Have told you that we are planning to renovate our house? We have been thinking about it for a few years now and have finally come up with a plan that we hope works. So exciting!! To get things underway we need to do some tweaking in our garden. This has also been an opportunity to make a beautiful new chook/duck house. I'm pretty excited about that too! Our yard has been eerily quiet lately.
So far we have pulled down the small side tool shed that rested up against our garage. It has left such a big space in the yard as we also took down a small chook fence, and the little red cubby where our ducks once lived. I love the exposed wood & the way everything now looks so different. I didn't at first though, it took me a few days to adjust, that's for sure.
The little out house, above, has been here since our house was built, around 1900. It was used as a bedroom by us and the original family. We 'joined' it onto the side of the house with a little alcove but with our new plans it really has to go. It would have been cheaper and easier to demolish it, but I really wanted to find a way to keep it. It's such a charming and sweet little building.
So here's the plan. A nice bloke called Col is going to back his crane down our driveway and lift the little house onto stumps between the tree, above right, next to the shed/garage. It will sit towards the back with it's door facing the house. I hope to have a little path leading towards it. Lucy tells me it's to be a 'club house', which sounds fun. I can't wait to see it in place.
This is what remains of our chook/duck house and yard. Before Tom began to pull it apart I said a little thank you to it for giving us many years of happy chickens and ducks. Many years of eggs, ducklings, baby chicks and the lovely sound of clucking and quacking. I am such a nostalgic girl, too sentimental for this world at times I think. Anyway, all good things must come to an end and really, it was time to rebuild after losing all our lovely birds to foxes recently. You can only patch up an old pen so much.
I'm super excited about our new yard and pen which will look quite different and be FOX PROOF!
We are going to orientate it a different way and have the open yard facing the washing line and house. It will be so lovely to see the chooks while I'm hanging out the washing this summer. Of course they will be free ranging most of the time. I can't wait! I've been thinking about what type of chooks to get. Isa Browns are such good layers but I'd love to get a couple of fancy chooks too. Any suggestions?
With all this pulling down of sheds and coops comes a lot of rubbish. Luckily we are able to re use quite a bit of material from the shed etc which is great but this lot above is heading for the tip asap.
We have such a beautiful big garden, it's one of the things that I fell in love with when I first saw our house, back in 2004.
While it looks a bit bare and messy right now I'm seeing past that and dreaming of what it will become.
On my wish list is a pond, maybe a creek (!), frogs, veggies, hidden corners, grass to run on, swings and lovely spots to sit and just..be.
Over the next little while I'll be documenting the changes. I haven't even told you what we are planning for the inside! This is the back of our house at the moment, with the little shed and it's green roof. Imagine the day the crane comes to swing it into it's new spot..wow!
How are things in your world? Are you planning anything new, fun or exciting? Are you glad it's almost Spring or are you heading into autumn? Changes happen whether we like it or not, don't they?
I guess it makes life interesting. See you soon, lovely ones xo