Better Late Than Never

The title of this post is apt for two reasons.

When Paul and I extended this house it was mostly to accommodate me. I got a studio and wardrobe space, we both got a main bedroom that wasn’t effectively a corridor to the garage, and Paul got one half of the laundry to be his dark room. The Garage Project has been all about Paul having space for his interests and possible future career. The new garage is for his cars, collections and tools and the old one will become a photography studio. Considering that he left IT back when the renovations were happening, it’s taken five or more years for us to adapt to his lifestyle change.

The other reason it is apt is because, well, it’s May. Paul had thought we’d have it all done in February. I was more pessimistic, predicting March. We were both wrong. Some of the delays were due to being stuffed around (the first concreter), some to things outside anyone’s control (weather, building permission), and some to us not anticipating problems (the roof height).

But we finally have a garage:

And it doesn’t block the view (if you don’t count the neighbour’s roofs as ‘view’). I felt totally vindicated when this happened:

Whoever said a view is for visitors because you see it so often you stop appreciating it was wrong. I appreciate my view every time I look out of my studio window. I love watching the light change, the weather and the birds.

Now Paul just has to get the garage door installed, put flooring in the mezzanine and a stair/ladder, get the wiring and lighting done, have the drainage finished, move everything out of the old garage (and a few towers of boxes in the house) in, clean the old garage floor and windows, paint the floor, install blinds and cupboards, perhaps install a sink, and move all the photography stuff in.

Oh well. Good thing we’re not in a hurry.