House pictures! Yeah!

Isn’t she a beaut?

So, as you can see, curb appeal is… low. The thorny bushes at the front of the yard are leaning into the sidewalk, making passing by the house treacherous at worst, annoying at best. There is no lawn on the front yard (a plus for me not having to mow), rather the yard is filled with a number of planters, which were made from the cobblestones of the old porch. The porch was crumbling down and, according to the previous owner, the city made her tear it down and rebuild it. After having found the pictures of the porch, I would agree with the city; the front porch was libel to give way and the porch roof would have folded in!

There are some large dead or misplaced trees in the yard as well, which we plan to make short work of, including the catalpa at the right of the above picture.

You can see how close to the foundation this lilac bush started out, and it was never cut down (to hide the house? Why would you hide such a cute house!?)

You can also see some bungalow details here, tapered trim for the doors and windows, 9 lite windows, and eave brackets. There is also a different exposure of siding on the first story from the second story. It was common at the turn of the century (though particularly on foursquare houses) to have different siding materials, styles, or colors between the floors. When we resided our own house, we choose a slightly lighter shade for the second story. We’ll have to discuss some colors, check out some books on bungalows, and also see what we can come up with in terms of second hand exterior paint, to see if that can work here.

This view of the backyard says ‘you need a chipper’. A half dozen more trees can come down to turn the shaded backyard into a more cheery area, possibly starting with the bane of my yard work these past years, a crab apple tree. These little landmines invariably get squished and tracked into the house while mowing in the late summer. The fence, posts having been rotted at the base and currently being held up by wishes and magic, should come down shortly also, once we locate the property markers for later re-installation.

We shan’t discuss the garage on the left any further yet; too much to process. It does contain a sweet CONVERTIBLE CAR (Suzuki Vitara) that the seller is still trying to locate the title for so it can be sold or scrapped. But more importantly, he told us that it contains the original column details for the front porch! I completely expect to get these installed over the course of the summer.

Though there are no pictures of the process or the finished product (yet, since it is still in progress), we managed to cut through a good amount of tree and shrub today to expose some of the front of the house. After heading back home, I noticed that this also gives our own house a lot more eastern exposure; we should get a bunch more sunshine in the morning!