Retriever Ridge

This week the exterior waterproofing and insulation was installed. The floors inside the crawl spaces were leveled. Drain tile and stone was installed. And the exterior was backfilled. Framing starts next week.

There are recycled antique brick pavers in various locations around the house, pool, and gardens. Some of the bricks have markings on the end rather than the face or long side. While others have no markings at all. The unmarked ones have a pair of "keys" along one side. They keys allow the pavers to lock together more securely. In some cases the brick pavers are used for paths and in others for borders/edging between some of the garden beds and the lawn. In other cases, the edging uses other materials.  Our plan is to use only bricks for the edging. We should have more than enough.  We'll keep the brick pavers for the walking paths to the pole barn and make the paths a little wider. The path from the house to the pool will use natural stone rather than bricks, eventually.

Last week excavation was done for the front and back additions. The front hole is a bit bigger than I thought it would be. Its larger size is to accommodate the footings for the front porch. This week the footings were poured. And then the foundation walls were installed. Now that the block is installed, the outline of the additions is more obvious. It's easier to distinguish the house vs porch on the front and the bedroom vs pool bath in the back.

The layout of the house is quite functional. The living space is all on one level and has most of what we need, without having space we won’t use. However, there are a couple of things we want to do to make it work better for us. First, there is no office/study. There is a very large space the previous owner used as his workshop. He was an avid woodworker and sculptor, etc. I'm not, so we'll be dividing the space into two areas. One for a study/office so that I can work from home and the other for a smaller workshop/storage area for projects and tools that can't or don't need to be in the pole barn. Second, we're going to modify the bedrooms. Bedroom #1 is too small. There will be a small addition on the front to allow for the expansion of this bedroom along with a walk-in closet. It will also be turned into a suite by re-positioning the door into the current owner's suite bathroom. That bathroom is fine and will just get a new vanity. Bedroom #2 will become the...

 A guy who used to work for me wanted to change careers and went back to university to become an architect. During the summers he came back and worked for me. We had some interesting lunchtime conversations about what he was learning. At one point I remember him talking about the focus on the view of the house as compared to the view from the house. In our case, it's all about the view from the house. The property doesn't need a grand architectural statement, in other words. The front of the house. Three-quarter view of the back from the perspective of dogtown. Three-quarter view of the back's other corner. The pole barn with enough firewood to last for a while.

The property is over 13 acres with a mixture of woodland, meadow/prairie, and mown areas. And a 900 foot long driveway. Meadow #1. Not much to say. The previous owner fancied himself an artist and had some sculpture placed around the property. The stone in the foreground was the base of one of the sculptures. We've moved it to a different location and will move the stones later. Meadow #2. The mound just behind the trees on the left is the new septic field. I seeded it with native prairie plants when the work completed. Meadow #3 is behind meadow #2 and is being prepared for a deer plot. It will provide alternate food sources and might keep them away from the purposeful landscaping. Dogtown is included in the area protected by invisible fence. This perspective is from the driveway toward the house. This view of dogtown is from the house looking back at the vantage point of the previous photo. View from the edge of dogtown looking the opposite direction toward the pool with the gard...

Because we bought the place in the winter, the landscaping is a never ending series of surprises, in a good way. Every week something different is in bloom. And the previous owners did a good job of planting edible landscape. Herbs (chives, sage, thyme, oregano, dill), green onion, rhubarb, strawberries, blueberries, red & black raspberries, blackberries (just starting to flower), apples, plums, and more. We've harvested and eaten quite a bit as it ripens, but have been too busy to get it all. I have several gallon bags of frozen berries and rhubarb saved for later...

The purchase process went quickly and happened during the winter. On our second visit to the house we had bold visitors. A couple of them came right up to the window and watched us with great interest. Several herds of deer walk through the property every day. And, based on the number of fawns I see, one or two does live here. That also means they eat here. The previous owners protected gardens with fences and various individual plants or small beds with wire cages. SWMBO removed some of the cages only to have the deer decimate the plants. For example, there is no longer a hosta leaf anywhere on the 13+ acre property. In addition, these tasty treats were victimized. When they are outside, the dogs do a good job of keeping the deer out of the gardens, but they can't be out 24x7. Rather than fighting the deer, we'll be replacing the damaged plants with ones the deer don’t find palatable. I've already done some research and have a good list to choose from. We'll limit the ...

We thought for a while about whether the new place should have a name or not. And if so what sort of name it should have. After eliminating choices for a variety of reasons, we finally settled on Retriever Ridge . First for the two boys that led us in this direction. The "cocoa puff" came into our family a little while after our previous dog passed. We rescued the "cream puff" last fall. I suppose he is our "pandemic pup" in a way, though he was already fully grown when we got him. Having the two of them meant a townhouse or rowhouse was not really suitable. We needed a yard where they could enjoy their best life. And second for the fact that there are a couple of ravines on the property. One along the northern edge and the other that runs south of the house, thus resulting in a "ridge" or plateau between them.

Over the past couple of years the kids have gone off to college. Therefore, most of the time it's just the two of us and the Guardians of the Garden in the house. So, we'd been thinking for a while about downsizing. We had a particular new development in mind and the timeline seemed to line up, but it turned out to not be the right fit for a number of reasons. As a result, we switched gears and started thinking about other options that might fit our wish list. We also modified our wish list a bit after re-evaluating all the factors. In the process of exploring the new idea, some interesting properties popped up and we looked at them to get a feel for things. They sold quickly which was OK, because we still had the longer timeline in mind. And we learned enough to confirm the new direction as a possibility when the time came. Then, out of the blue, we heard about a place that would soon be coming up for sale. We went and saw it a couple of times. And bought it before it even we...