The crisp Autumn air is turning our thoughts to buttoning up for Winter and also Thanksgiving! More on that later!
Our timeline for getting in to our dream farm has been accelerated, beginning with Mona getting a job in our new community. We buckled down and made our little farmhouse livable. And we moved in May 2018.
Of late, our sights have been focused on the amazing opportunities to increase our animal family. Perhaps a little sooner than planned, but fitting into the longer range plan.
Fiona is now overseeing a wonderfully sweet donkey and two San Clemente Island goat babies. (four months old).
Their job, and they are already crushing it, is to eat back and reclaim the areas where the brush has over run the property.
And between Fiona and Whiskey (Donkey) their job is to monitor and keep everyone safe.
We envision a peaceable kingdom, where all our animal friend coexist. We humans can do the same.
Next addition….CHICKENS!!
Can’t wait to put in gardens next year. Our compost pile is ‘da bomb!
…and so we have not posted in a while. Our renovated farmhouse is finished on the inside! It is very homey and comfortable, and we have turned our attention to outside projects. More on that later…
Here are a few before and after pictures.
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The kitchen “before” and …
…the kitchen after!
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The sunken den/a.k.a master bedroom “before”
…master bedroom after!
So while Kevin and I are working away at reclaiming our few acres….
We are wishing y’all a Happy 4th of July!!
Keeping the same “footprint” of the house was an option for us because of the two “bonus” rooms on either end of the building.
One room was once a carport that had been enclosed and used as a sunken living area with three steps down that led to a cement floor at ground level. The other has a hastily built closet and was used as a bedroom even though it was also the front door entrance. Both areas are contrary to any sort of traffic pattern that we wanted to establish once we transformed this place from “fixer-upper” into “fabulous”.
The old carport room will be raised 18-20 inches to become the Master Bed Room with an en suite bathroom. The rough dimensions of the space being about 16ft wide and 24ft long with a hall that will lead into the Dining/Living Room and then on into the Kitchen. The “front door bedroom” is on the other side of the kitchen and it’s best use will be for it to become an Entrance Foyer at the front, and a Utility/Laundry at the back of house, with a French Door and outside deck to be added to the outside wall between them.
Off the kitchen there are the original two bedrooms and bath that we want to salvage and use for family guests and visitors. The bath will get a total renovation and update but we’d like to restore the bedrooms with their hardwood floors and old woodwork.
In order for the guest bedrooms to have more privacy, and to keep the bathroom door from opening into the kitchen, we’re going to pull down a chimney stack, that is no longer needed, and use the extra space for a hallway connecting the bathroom with the bedrooms. The brick chimney stack was about 2ft by 2ft jutting out into the room and is concealed with studs and drywall as seen behind me in the selfie picture. The “open” floor plan between these original rooms and the kitchen is wide enough that a four foot hall will still leave a four foot wide access into the kitchen from dining/living room.
Pictures will be added soon to help better visualize the above description. -Kevin
After 4,000 years of being considered a building material asbestos was found to be dangerous to any creature that breathes air. It was banned from use in construction a few decades ago but, not before it was tacked to the side of our house in the form of cement siding known as ‘Transite’ panels.
A common practice is to leave the panels undisturbed and either hope they don’t break or crack or cover them with aluminum or vinyl siding. We felt there was no other environmentally friendly option than to have them removed and put on new, more attractive, and safer, clapboard siding.
Safe and proper removal, handling, and disposal was a concern so the next step was finding an authorized demolition contractor who knew local codes and disposal laws. We found two companies that we were fully confident could handle the job and both estimates were between three and five dollars per square foot removal fee.
Asbestos, though ‘all natural’ like arsenic and anthrax, should be avoided. -Kevin
The first project we’re tackling is removing trees near the house and outbuildings.
Ten trees grew close enough to the main house to overhang the roof, casting shade that allowed a bountiful crop of moss to grow on the shingles, and deposited enough leaves over the years to fill the gutters with compost.
So, before plowing too much money into the renovation of the house and other structures we want to make sure that no branches, or the trees themselves, could fall and do damage to the new work.
One surprise we found was that some of the trees had a bluish-purplish core, as you can see in the photo, that varied in width from tree to tree. Old-timers told us the discoloration is from metal nails, pins, or wires driven into the trees. They also said that copper driven into a tree will kill it. This was all news to us! – Kevin
It is the last day of an exciting year for Fiona and her humans. We (Kevin and Mona) have shared a common dream for most of our lives…to have a small, sustainable, and self-sufficient farm.
This dream is presently being realized.
We plan to have small farm animals, berries, vegetables, and herb gardens for starters, and look forward to keeping it local. We want to network with local folks and perhaps join or form a coop for the purpose of supporting our neighbors..
Our new home is in a lovely rural community.
We have found our farm home after a long search. The home and land is in need of plenty of TLC. Much of the land is clear but more of it will need to be reclaimed.
We found additional outbuildings as the scrub brush died back in late fall.
We are loving the restoration project and Fiona has her hands full supervising…
Stay tuned. Exciting times ahead! – Mona
