Changes Through the Years

Hooray!  Spring/Summer continues... today is glorious. 

Yesterday in conversation with our visitors Rohan and Colleen we mentioned the changes we have made to our home through the years.  I realise we left some out. 

For the record:

We moved here in May 1986 right at the beginning of Winter.

The house was a three bedroom, one bathroom, kitchen, dining room/lounge area with a long dilapidated sun porch on part of the north side. 
The outbuildings were two servants rooms, two outside toilets, a coal shed, a garage and a single carport.
In the back yard was a Sauna and a Swimming Pool.
The walls were precast on three sides and brick on the street side with a pedestrian gate and two swing single driveway gates.

The first thing I noticed as we lived here was that during the first serious frost the garden looked devastated, drab and dead.
I decided that before the next Winter that had to change!
I set about planning a garden that had some elements of it that would be evergreen.

We also had a straight cement path from the front gate in the middle of the property to the front door.
Straight concrete paths, especially cutting up lawned areas, do not do it for me... that had to change.
So the first change was... a garden plan for the next five years, and implementing it.

Sometime around this time someone shuffled into our property and up to the then front door and I was frightened (which I very seldom am). We moved from a house with good burglar bar protection to this house which had poor burglar bar protection.  That was a priority for me also.  I needed to feel we were safe.

In 1987 we started with some of the structural alterations.

We added a bay window to the then-second bedroom and made it a main bedroom.
Glenn built bedroom cupboards in the bedroom which was now our main bedroom.
We changed the existing small cupboard area in the second bedroom into a door into the adjoining bathroom, making it a main en-suite bathroom.
We rearranged the only bathroom and added a shower and tiled the whole area floor to ceiling.

We also made alterations to the kitchen at the same time:
We bricked up the existing back door.
We took out the wall between the kitchen and dining room.
We took the end part of the long kitchen and made it into a second bathroom and also tiled it floor to ceiling.
We installed kitchen units and a new stove in our new open-planned kitchen.

We altered the existing front sun porch at that time too.
We extended it from a two-room-size open plan sun porch area to a three room-sized area, added walls, thus creating three spaces -  two extra bedrooms and an entrance hall between them.
We added a new front door with a little step area outside.

We also changed the small semi-circular step outside the back patio door into a useful large patio.

We carpeted the whole house in the areas where there weren't existing carpets.
And Spanish burglar bars were fitted to each window, and security gates to each door.
At last I felt safe enough.

We lived comfortably (space-wise) in our home which now was a five bedroom, two bathroom home which meant there was a bedroom for each of our children.

The primary school was two blocks away. Douglas caught a bus a couple of blocks away to his high school in Johannesburg.

Sometime during the intervening years we bricked in the pedestrian gate, took up and grassed in the cement path, widened the driveway and fitted a chest-high sliding gate at the driveway entrance.  We had a simple double car-port put in.

We replaced the existing gutters with seamless aluminium gutters.

At a later stage when Angela got married we added a glass roof to the back patio, making it a more useful area.

Later still we added built-in cupboards in the spare room when Dianne returned to live with us for a while.

At another time we took the leg space from the L shaped lounge dining room area and created another room which is now our library area.  It was a useful space when little grandchildren came to visit because I could close, and sometimes lock, the doors and the little ones could not get to the books and the piano.
Now our lounge/dining room space is a rectangular space rather than the L shape it originally was.

We fenced the pool and rebricked the paving.  We have also replaced the pool motor a couple of times.

About 15 years ago we had the whole roof Harvey-tiled.  I remember saying to the contractor "Now I don't have to worry about my roof any more.  It will last me until I die."  He gently brought me down to earth by saying  "Don't count on it..."  Indeed.  Maintenance never ends.

At another time Doug took the servants quarters and garage area and created a flat for him and Nadia to live in when they first got married.  At the same time as the builders were on the property Glenn added a gym attached to the flat.
Also while Doug was building Glenn had a new L shaped workshop added to the front and side of Doug's flat where the previous carport was, and I had a new storeroom included in the whole project.
We also built a bigger and more robust carport at that time, put palisade fencing on top of the boundary wall, and fitted a higher, more secure driveway gate.

In due time as our children moved out Douglas used first one of the spare bedrooms as a workshop/office, and then took over two spare bedrooms one for a workshop, and one for an office.  Originally he had the original main bedroom as his workshop.  I had the bedroom at the east end of the sun porch as my counselling room.  Doug's workshop was next to our bedroom.  I didn't like him working late at night and disturbing us unintentionally so we did a swop.  Now he is far from where we sleep.  The arrangement works for us! 

That is when Glenn built the bay door for me.  The original main bedroom now became my counselling room.  It has been a very happy space for me to work for many years.

When Douglas moved out of the flat he created on our property to his own home, we bought the flat he had built from him.  Over the years we have done additional projects in there.  It always was a really lovely space, it is now more finished.

At another time we added a utility room to the west end of the previous sun porch, now store-room for Douglas' workshop area.

At another time we widened the double-to-single driveway to the street to a double driveway all the way.  We also motorised the gate.

One year my requested and much appreciated Christmas present was the pedestal basins in the two bathrooms being replaced with new basins with cabinets.

A couple of years ago we added lighting illuminating the carport and the way to the back flat.

And all the time... never-ending maintenance!

The evolving of our house to suit our needs has been interesting and satisfying to me.  I am grateful for the outside contractors through the years, and Glenn,  and now Doug, and sometimes his two workers who do a bit here and a bit there for me/us.

Now it is time for more structural changes.  The kitchen needs up-grading and the house will be dividing in the next little while.  Watch this space!

Some "after pictures"  which are the "before" pictures of our next venture...

Above:  The almost not visible present front door behind the silver birch tree.

 

My latest garden project is doing some crazy paving

in the areas where the grass struggles to grow in the shaded areas

in the foreground.

The crazy paving stones are the broken up pieces of the

first driveway widening exercise that became compromised and

needed to be replaced a couple of years ago.

 

All through the years one of our motto's has been

"Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without."

It has worked for us.

 

I hope in the future we continue to make

this old pioneer couplet work "for" us

and realise the point at which it then starts to work "against" us.

 

Below...

 from under the carport

a view down the driveway towards Glenn's workshop area.

You can see the bay window on the now main bedroom

and the bay door on the original main bedroom.

 

Below:  A view of the flat to the left and the gym to the right. 

These used to be the servant's quarters and original garage.

The long ladder is there because I was working on the gym roof. 

Below:

You can see our "new" front door/entrance hall area. 

We replaced the first front door about seven years ago.

This door design is called Happy Door.

This door makes me feel very happy.

 

To the extreme right is Doug's workshop,

and to the left is his office.

 

The name of our house is "Mulkerrin" which means to me:

"Faith and hope in the face of seemingly impossible circumstances."

 

When the bay door was created for my counselling room

I called my new space

"Mureth" which means to me:

"Place of Joy, Peace and Healing."

 

We are investing time, talent and money into making progress in

Harmonious and Honest Living,

and Caring for our little Piece of Property.

 

I am glad for the progress we have made.

I look forward to...

"Onward and Upward!"

in our years ahead.

"Righteousness and Peace"

are my watchwords.