My Back Side

Since the Online Publications class is almost over, I wanted to at least bring things full circle between now and the last day of class. I was trying to figure out how I would do this, but since my last post, it has kind of segwayed for me.

Here is the back of my house as it is seen from the fire-pit.

 

My house is nothing special as you can see. I do have future plans for my backyard. I would like to expand the deck as far to the left, right under the small window you barely can see hidden by the tree hiding our air conditioner unit. That corner of the house is our Master Bedroom. My hope is to take that window out and put a walk-out door so that we can access the deck. The little skinny appendage is the gas fire place for the living room. That area will be covered in stone tile with an electric outdoor fireplace mounted. The existing deck is rather small. The gazebo is 10 x 12 but our deck is 12 x 12. Just to the right of the fireplace appendage is the door to the living room and to the right of it is the dining area picture window. When we rebuild the deck, it plan on taking the door out and replacing it with a window so that there will be window flanking the fireplace in the living room. In order to access the deck, then the picture window will be replaced by frech doors. The deck will at least be covered, and later on, we will probably make it into a 4-seasons room.

I word of advise if you are purchasing outdoor furniture/decor. The gazebo was bought through Sears. It is a metal structure with a cloth cover that you can shift from side to side to shade. It was regularly priced at $599 but right before Memorial Day, it was on sale for $399. online, $425 in the store. If you don't know, Sears own K-mart, so I decided to price shop. K-mart had the same item for $350, same brand, same everything. However, K-mart didn't have any in stock...Sears did. So, I went to Winston-Salem to see if they would price honor. They said they would...and they did. Long story short...always, ALWAYS price shop before you make big ticket purchases. It'll always be to your advantage.

Since we've had the gazebo for a year now, the cloth, which they said had a 5-year warranty, did not hold up especially with all day sun, and our violent storms. When it would rain, the cloth would sag with the weight of the rain and eventually drip through like a sive. Replacements are around $99. On day, my husband, being the jerry-rigger he is famous for, came home with an idea. He went a bought the fiberglass panels (smoke color) and mounted them to the struts on top of the gazebo, which channeled the rain and protected the cloth covering. You would never know it was there. Everything under stays nice and dry and we don't have to replace the cloth every year now. For once, He was right !....You will never hear me say that again.

BTW....here is a close up of my eclectice flower pot that was in the previous posting.

It's my Thriller, Spiller, and Filler.......mostly Filler. But, I will know what to do for next summer for sure!