As I mentioned in that post, I needed to put a roof over my house's patio to keep melted (and refrozen) snow out of the substrata; else within just a few years the frost-heaving would destroy the patio's retaining wall.
[If you click on the photos, you can see a larger image.]
This photo can serve as a "before" image of the area I was working on last summer.
One of my sisters came over from Indiana (250 miles away) for a weekend to give me a hand getting started with the construction. This photo is from mid-afternoon on Saturday; we have the south wall of the enclosure built. I think we went to get some dinner at that point -- Chinese, yumm!
This is later, after we'd continued around the corner with the wall. If you look carefully, you can see the patio's paving -- it's old granite street-paving stones.
This photo shows the semi-finished (I plan to sheath and side the wall's structure) result from across the east yard, taken in the fall of 2009.
A photo taken at closer range, again from the east.
... and from the south.
Here is a better view of the patio paving.
We'd have made better progress than we did, if not for all the time wasted getting her van unstuck ... 
6 comments:
I love it! I love getting to see along-the-way pictures; this is great!
Did you have to re-grout (or re-point ?) the foundation walls?
Oh -- I'm confused about the walls you're going to "sheathe and side" -- isn't this going to remain an open porch? With walls or without, it seems like a wonderful place to sit and read, or write, or just be.
(And, no, i didn't realize you hadn't done any of this kind of work before. How do you learn to do stuff like this on your own?)
"Did you have to re-grout (or re-point ?) the foundation walls?"
No! I had to rip them out -- or, in the case of the one side which had collapsed, clean out the debris -- and replace them. Fortunately, the collapsed and/or buckled walls weren't the main load-bearing walls.
"Oh -- I'm confused about the walls you're going to "sheathe and side" -- isn't this going to remain an open porch? With walls or without, it seems like a wonderful place to sit and read, or write, or just be."
It's going to be semi-open ... those big four and five foot wide opening will still be open, but the areas between the opening and below them will be walled. I like the openness of it as it is right now
Now, I do like how it looks and feels right now -- and I didn't want to roof it in the first place, because with all the trees to the south and the body of the house to the west it got a nice amount of sun as it was. The thought occurs to me that I *could* wall-in just the fbase-to-roof portions between the openings. But, if I do it that way, I'll have to rip out the portions below the openings and redesign them as proper railings. It would look nice, and would keep more of the open look (which I like), but it would also allow more water to get in.
"(And, no, i didn't realize you hadn't done any of this kind of work before. How do you learn to do stuff like this on your own?)"
I'm just that good!
Partly by reading and thinking about what makes sense, partly by trial-and-error -- for instance, I'll never again even buy particleboard (unfortunately, I had that down as subflooring in 3/4 of the house, including the bathrooms, before I realized how worthless it is). Also, early on, I introduced myself (I'm not normally a person to introduce myself to strangers) to a fellow doing even more drastic work to a nearby house, and offered to swap help with him; so I learned a lot helping and talking to him.
I'm just that good!
*grin*
On the porch -- What about just walling up as far as what looks like the railing, and leaving it open above that? Would "closing" that lower 1/3 take care of enough of the water problem? It is lovely having it open. And it probably lets a little winter light in -- that's the great room, right?
Of course, I can imagine how cool it would look with your initial scheme, too, with siding to match the rest of the house.
Hey -- where is the kitchen? Is that the big window ( ? sliding door ?) at the end of the porch?
(I'm so glad your sister took pictures!)
"Hey -- where is the kitchen? Is that the big window ( ? sliding door ?) at the end of the porch?"
The kitchen is on the opposite side of the house from all the pictures shown in this post. The kitchen is on the other side of the triple windows shown in a picture in the other post.
If by big window or sliding door you're asking about one of three the "patio doors" (that's what they call these pseudo-french doors) which open onto the patio, noo. That door opens into the south half of the livingroom (the LR is the size of two rooms).
As for the enclosing of the patio, whatever I do about the parts that looks like railings below the openings, I have to enclose the full height of the "walls" between the large openings. It's partly for stability (which is ultra important), and partly because those sections are built of 2x6, and the "railings" are built of 2x4, so it would look really silly to leave the "full walls" open.
I think I'm going to have to draw myself a diagram to get sorted out -- 'cause there seem to be too many sides to your house! (I really just need to read through your remarks more carefully, I think.)
I love the kitchen window side, though, with its own porch, and the wonderful details up in that triangular part (the name of which I might have known once, but...), and I love that you have lots of windows.
I just can't get over that you did the sun room and all the rest.
The particular painted fretwork in that gable is from a demolished house a friend once owned (I think the columns on the porch are from the same house). If you look carefully, you'll see that it doesn't fit the space -- it's from a gable with a slightly less steep roof-pitch.
I also designed and installed the cedar shingles in the three gables (the gable in the back of the house isn't visible from anywhere, so I did it in plain siding) -- in fact almost everything visible inside and out, I did.
My favorit of the three gables is the one at the east bedroom -- and which one can no longer plainly see, die to the greatroom addition blocking the view.
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