Last night while my wife was out and after I had put Smallsteps to bed, I decided to set up some of the outdoor lights that point toward the house. In the Autumn it is incredibly dark in our yard, so any extra light is welcome.
Next week (hopefully), we will have the electrician who did the kitchen, come and put in some garden light posts, though they will be installed in quite a temporary manner. As we don't yet know where they are going to go and winter is fast approaching, instead of digging them into the ground properly so they don't move, we are going to have them sitting in outdoor planter pots held into place with rocks. This way we can adjust them as we need and once we actually do some of the landscaping work we must, we can dig them in properly.
The idea is to have them run on a sensor down the drive, so that when we arrive they turn on and might trigger other lights too, but more importantly, we can see when we are reversing out. It can be very, very dark and until there is snow on the ground, it is a little dangerous with a stormwater ditch along the roadside, either side of the drive.
And, I thought Smallsteps would get a kick out of her home being turned into a house mouse.
With the fire escape ladder, it looks like it is crying.
I would be crying if I had to go down that ladder too though - it is definitely not something built for safety in mind. But with a burning house, I guess the alternative is far worse. Which reminds me, that while we have the networked fire alarms upstairs, we still have to add the ones to the downstairs.
So many things to do.
Owning a house such as this (1960s) means there are always things to do in an endless cycle, with some being seasonally, some yearly, some after a half decade, some every generation or two. We have to get a new roof at some point, but that is going to have to wait, as it is incredibly expensive and I am really hoping that we can put a fully-integrated solar panel array on top.
The garden however, well that needs a lot of work too and next spring I think I am going to have to start hand-digging in some trenches and laying some piping to take the water away that pours in from the neighbors. We are a corner block and both of the neighbor properties drain into ours and it has nowhere to go, so just sits. Running a trench down the back and side to shift it into the stormwater ditch, and then laying a French drain should be enough to take the majority out, so that we aren't living in swampland every spring or, every time we have heavy rain.
By hand it is going to be some pretty heavy work, but I don't really want to have landscapers back in just yet, unless we can afford to do a lot of other things too, like take down a few of the birch trees, as well as a maple that are in the kind of condition that forces our hand. Currently, it is quite an expensive operation, but I am hoping that a friend of mine who is a lumberjack, will do a bit of a deal for us when we are ready.
Even though it would be great to have one of those high-end gardens full of all the flowers that bloom throughout the three seasons they can, I would also like to make it easy to maintain. That wasn't the initial plan, but we bought this place prior to me having the stroke and I am just no longer in the condition or mindset that I am able to get enthusiastic enough to do all the work necessary, as well as do all the other things that I want to do. Just like having limited financial resources, having limited physical resources makes an impact on what is possible to do also.
But, I do think that I will be able to design a pretty good garden that is still relatively easy to maintain also, it is just that it is also going to have to be quite a compromise on my early vision of what it was going to be.
A dream house is only possible in dreams.
What I am looking forward to however is the planning part, as I will get to build it (probably in 3D) and see what it is going to look like prior. Even though I know that once we actually get to start it will change along the way, I enjoy the design work of it, where there is the chance to both problem solve and create something attractive. It is finding a balance between form and function, which I enjoy.
Something to look forward to at least.
Because at the moment, I am already thinking toward the work week ahead and the dread of having to spend morning to evening with colleagues, before culminating in a fancy dress holiday party - and the chosen theme for the event is pretty bad, but the one "decided" upon for our team sucks ass.
But hey, after enough drinks, no one will remember.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]