Ebay wins: lamp and planters

I'm a sucker for stained glass and oak... so when I saw this lantern I couldn't resist.



From the description:
A very attractive and ornate 1930's Arts and craft or Art Deco hall or porch ceiling lamp... The lamp is in very good original condition no broken glass, can do with a little light restoration, a number of woodworm holes to the top square the widest point (unknown if treated) one joint is a bit loose and a couple of beading strips missing, easily replaced, Size; 53cm height (without the chain & gallery) 10.9cm square at the at the widest point.

I also recently got a bunch of old planters. They were billed as being stone but I'm pretty sure they are just concrete. But, they were nearby so easy to collect, and I quite liked the designs, especially of the square-ish ones. They also have the aged-look to them already. For now they will do great service in our garden here, and we'll decide closer to the date whether its worth sending back to Amherst.

There are 6 of the square type, and 2 each of the others:

Talbot Farmers Market

Talbot is a little town of great charm, about 10 minutes drive from Amherst, and only 15 minutes outside of Maryborough. Once a month it stages a Farmers Market which is among the best I've ever seen.

It's been going for around 5 years now and proved so popular that ABC Radio (the biggest radio broadcaster in Australia, like the BBC in the UK) did a special segment on it.

You can hear it in the video below accompanied by photos taken at the markets.

If you ever get a chance to visit Talbot Farmers Market I highly recommend it; and if not this video will give you a little taster of what you're missing. :-)

tweak needed to veranda ceiling

So... while working on the verandah, Dave and Dad ran into another little hiccup, relating to the ceiling lining.

The problem is that the top of the eave, where the ceiling lining level occurs naturally, is 2300mm and approximately 300mm lower than the top of the old window in the lounge.

So, if we are to make the verandah ceiling flat, where it joined the wall would knock out part of the window.

Dad's recommended solution was to have a sloped lining on the front part of the verandah, so we don't have to change the window there. And then change it for the long part of the verandah to be flat, and just use a shorter window on the side (given there is no window there at the moment). He suggested we use the bay window for this.

I had a play with the layout and think moving the bay window there will be fabulous. So that's changing regardless of the ceiling.

After some deliberation though, we decided to abandon the idea of having a flat ceiling and just go with the easier approach of letting the lining boards follow the verandah rafters on an angle.

Partly this is because I think it will look wrong to have one section of the verandah with a different shaped ceiling to the other. It is a relatively small area and I want the space to feel like it flows from one to the other, which it won't do if the ceiling isn't the same.

Most persuasive of all, after a closer look at the photos, Dave persuaded me that the other house that I really liked that I thought had a flat verandah ceiling - actually didn't! So now I'm happy that we will be able to get the right effect going with them on an angle. With the added bonus that it's less work. Yay!

sketchup model of divider shelving

I spent some time today playing around with SketchUp again. This time, doing a mock-up of the divider shelving between the kitchen and lounge in the old house (see plan here) to make sure that it works.



This is meant to be indicative only - I haven't thought in detail about the precise layout of shelving - but it illustrates how it might work.

The unit in this mock-up is measured at 2.6m by 0.5m, which I think should fit? I'm guessing because of the height and weight of this, we will want to have a support beam somewhere, going to the roof perhaps. We can figure that out later...

possible doors

Dad spotted these doors a while back being thrown away, so nabbed them thinking they'd come in handy.



They're really solid old doors. I'm not a fan of the yellow 70's glass, but that could be easily replaced.

They are apparently normal door width, which should mean that they could possibly be used for the doors from the kitchen to the verandah in the old house.

I haven't decided for certain yet, as I had originally been envisaging something less fancy and simpler (more like these).

But, the curvy bits could work well with the curve of the bay window now it is being moved, and they would lend a slightly more formal touch as befits being framed by the stairs that will lead up to them. So I am almost convinced... just need to think on it some more. :-)

You can see them in context of the house (albeit not quite in the accurate position) here, which gives you an idea of the scale the steps will be.

tweaking old house plans

Dad came up with the idea to move the bay window that was previously planned to go in the bedroom to the lounge, and build in a little window seat.

In order to see whether this would work, I needed to revisit the old house layout plans. The previous version was out-dated as we had moved the location of the kitchen doors so they lined up better between verandah posts.

The final architectural drawings for the old house are here. Using them, I played around with moving the window and overlaying furniture, and think I have come up with a layout that will work well:



We'll have to be careful how we position the window, to make sure it is nicely lined up between the verandah posts outside, while still leaving enough space for the divider wall. Also, we will need to plan carefully to get the window seat at a comfortable level without looking out of place relative to the existing front window. But in principle, they're different enough that I think it will work.

Another side-benefit to this is that it gives us more flexibility in the layout of the bedroom. By not putting in the bay window and just leaving it as solid wall (as it is currently), we would save ourselves a job as well as gain more space for furniture.

Next door's sheep come to visit

I am a big fan of sheep, so delighted that next door have a flock. I am even happier that they let them come to visit and graze... not only is it cool to have them around, it means that Dave doesn't have an even bigger mowing job!

Here's some footage Dave took of them wandering up the driveway:

work on the verandah

Dave and Dad made great progress while they were up there on the verandah foundation, pausing only when the ran into a hiccup with the ceiling height.

They got all the stumps in for the verandah on the long side of the house. This was a big job apparently as not only did they have to dig out the holes, it was a pain getting everything lined up perfectly. Even worse - the tractor got a flat tire, so after all the effort to get the augre, they had to do a lot of it by hand!

Here's the beginning...


They dug out each hole ...


Then filled with cement.



Repeat many times and you have a forest of stumps...



A quick tangent to dig out a flat area for the under-verandah tank...



Then it's time for some framing...




They even got the posts up (with temporary supports until Dad gets the roof frame up) and voila, the verandah starts to take shape.