ROCKING CHAIR

Can you help me out with a dilemma...

do I paint this rocking chair in a dark grey or leave it as it is?

WHAT A DIFFERENCE

It always surprises me when I come across a photo of the house as we originally saw it...

above is the garden beside the conservatory as it looks now and below is a photo taken on the day we moved into the house.

Quite a few changes have been made since that day!

The original porch (built in the 70's) has been demolished and a new one rebuilt with the door positioned in the middle and windows at the side. 

The trellis has been taken down. Luckily, the honeysuckle growing up it survived its move and is happy in its new position. 

Patio and steps up to the conservatory have been replaced with York stone.  

The horrible crumbly brick path that went around the conservatory, has been turfed with grass. 

The conservatory has had a complete re-vamp (you can read about it here). 

All windows have been replaced and updated. 

One of the main improvements to the look of the garden, is the very tired, worn concrete paths have had gravel added.  It helps soften the area plus neatens everything up.

FREAKY WEATHER

Spring is on its way - to be precise it's Thursday 20th March 2014 just 20 days 8 hours remaining til its here. We've been noticing a glimpse of it already; sunny days, flowers blooming, birds tweeting, and a gentle breeze. 

Today started off as one of these beautiful early spring mornings, 

then ..........

all of a sudden from nowhere comes a mass of hail stones......huge loud hail stones that make you stop what you're doing and look out of the window.  

The photo above is taken from the main bedroom that over looks the conservatory roof. 

The above photo is a detailed 'close up' of the large lumps of ice that now cover it and the garden.

Then as quickly as it arrived, it all stopped, the sun comes out and shines again!!!  

Isn't mother nature a versatile and wonderful thing?

CONSERVATORY - BEFORE AND AFTER

Conservatory details  - new glass replaced, wood repaired, new stone floor added and inside & outside repainted.

                                      (after)                                                   (before)

     (after)                                                                                                      (before)

      (after)                                                                                                      (before)

       (after)                                                                                                                              (before)

     (after)                                                                                                         (before)

Conservatory updates

The conservatory has had a new lease of life. It is almost completed apart from the odd little details here and there, like wall lights, door and window furniture, chairs, sofa cover etc etc. The best bit is that we're using it again and that it is now a lovely relaxing room with lots of natural light.

The outside and inside paint is the colour Hardwick White from Farrow & Ball - exterior eggshell and estate eggshell finishes.

We can't find a large enough plant pot for the olive tree, so have had to hide the original plastic terracotta one with two grain sacks......I quite like it though.

This is what it looks like from outside....... not bad for something that I was convinced needed knocking down and building again!!!  

CONSERVATORY

We're working on renovating and updating our conservatory.  Here are some inspirational photos of how we'd like it to look.....

(above) Photos thanks to Alitex

(below) These were taken at Chelsea Flower show.... even a greenhouse can be a source of inspiration.  Love the paint colour.

(below) The shade of paint used on this greenhouse works well with the dark grey of the wall beside it.  Just had a flash of inspiration.....maybe we should over-dye the sofa cover that will be used in our conservatory in a similar grey? 

(above) I like this one by Hampton Conservatories not necessarily for it's shape but again for it's colour.  It has a matt finish.  The box hedge works well too. 

We must update our existing window sills and add wooden ones, then paint them the same colour as the window frames and walls.