Junky

The problem with being nearly done the main cottage renovations is that we've run out of rooms in the cottage where we can store our junk! Piece by piece and day by day the junk has been migrating out of the main cottage and in to Peaky, our bunky junky.

Building supplies. Furniture. Outdoor items like water toys and fishing poles. It's all there.

We once held grand plans of stowing numerous guests in this little cabin. Now, we're lucky if we can wedge ourselves in sideways to locate a can of paint.

Oh, hey! I think I found it!

Peaky prettification

While I was busy feeling useless during the bathroom demolition, I picked up a shovel and tidied up the garden beds around peaky.

Before:
(Hey... I forgot there used to be garden lights at the cottage. This photo is from our first visit last fall with the real-estate agent. It explains the black plastic spikes that I've been digging up. I wonder what good those lamps are to them now without the spikes to hold them in the ground?)

And after:
Step 1, clean up the bed. All that remains is a cute clump of frog's belly sedum.

And with a relocated hosta:

I'd like to put a small shrub (potentilla maybe? or a spirea?) at the corner of the bed near the door, and some climbing something - maybe a rose - at the back corner on a trellis.

I've also dug up the bed to the right of the door and gotten bitten by angry little yellow ants who didn't like me overturning their nest. Stupid ants.

That other bed also has a transplanted hosta.

I'm trying to fill the gardens with ultra-low maintenance "won't die if you neglect to water me for weeks" plants. Flowering shrubs. Hardy, clump-forming perennials (I'm done with the invasive plants - yarrow, ajuga,  I'm looking at you! - and the rampant self-seeders - geranium? columbine? I'm looking at YOU now!)

I also want to pick up some vinca to replace most of the under-the-cedars garden that's on the slope down to the water's edge, because nothing's growing well in that spot due to lack of sunlight.

Inch by inch, the cottage gets better.

Grand plans for the future (i.e. Not this year, no way no how!) include some raised beds behind the bunky for a bit of a vegetable garden. With some chicken wire to keep the creatures at bay.

Some more photos of Slanty

We made a few more additions to Slanty before our guests arrived.

Starting with some slightly more appealing bedding (ya, the duvet cover and pillow cases are cast-offs from the house, but even unwanted bedding from home is still nicer than the carp that was at the cottage. My linen closet at home has never been happier!)

And we added a cute little light from the Mart of Wal that is NEW and as such is much less likely to start a fire than the scary one that used to be in that spot.

I also ditched the red curtains on this side of the bunky in favor of some white ones.  I'm a flimsy-curtain kinda gal. I hope you don't need a pitch-black room to sleep in, because you're S-O-L at the cottage if you do. Put a pillow over your head or something.

Someday soon I'd like to paint all of that paneling white, I think. Clean it up. Brighten it up.

I'm also planning to scavenge some ceiling tiles from the bathroom demo (more on that later) to fill in the gaps at the edge of this room.

Here's a view from a different angle. I'll probably need to get rid of that cuckoo clock, too. Cuckoo as in "crazy", not cuckoo as in "little bird leaps out and scares the pants off you every hour". I'm not THAT mean to my guests. (am I?)

And here's the super narrow back bedroom in that cabin. I thought I would replace the red curtains in here too, but when I put the duvet in with the yellow walls and the red in the curtains, it suddenly all ties together! Kismet! The cover is actually navy blue, red, and yellow. The flash just overexposed it a little.

Until we get out here with some paint and flooring, Slanty is pretty well done for the time being.

Slanty!

With impending cottage guests, we needed to scramble to find extra room for bodies. The warm, living kind. The other kind I could just toss out back into the poison ivy patch.

ahaha.

Yes.

One of the bunkies needed to get tidied up, and quick. We picked Slanty. I really should get signs made to label these guys. Slanty: slanted roof. Peaky: peaked roof.

It's the most presentable to start with and it doesn't smell like an old shoe on a hot day (like Peaky does).

They've both been pressed into service as crap repositories for the last few months while we renovated the main cottage. We took the old chesterfield (sofa, couch) out of Slanty and wedged it into Peaky. The coffee table has moved temporarily into the main cottage since we didn't have one. It's only temporary as Dad has promised to make me a coffee table/trunk/blanket box for my birthday. ☺ ♥

Then I cleaned, cleaned, cleaned, cleaned. Look at all the shop cloths I went through wiping things down!

We set up the extra queen-sized bed that came out of the bunk room and generally spruced the place up.

We found a few treasures, comme toujours.

There's this splendiferous clock. (what is it with this cottage and the whacktacular clocks?!) It's got a moose. And some fish. And a net. And something... black... and something... brown? It also needs a battery because it's only correct twice a day.

Then, there's the always exciting "what's under the bed!?"
Answer: empty pop bottles, paper towels, paper plates, plastic cups, plastic cutlery, bottle caps, gum wrappers and... not one, not two, but THREE dirty socks! Ick.

But it's cleaned now to the point that it's habitable

There's a twin bed in the closet in-law suite back bedroom. There's the queen bed in the living-room front bedroom.

And there's a wee dresser, microwave, and a water cooler.

It's still got warts. There are tiles missing from one edge of the ceiling. There are still two kinds of carpet in there. I'm not sure how air-tight the windows are, but they'll do. I hope it's comfy enough for them!

High, low, medium, slow, jolly old peppers

This post has nothing to do with peppers. I simply couldn't decide whether the bunkies were a high point or a low point at the cottage, and it got the old skipping song stuck in my head.

There are two bunkies on the property. One bunky = high point. Two bunkies = very high point. However, much like the rest of the place, the bunkies are scary = low point.

I've been calling the bunkies by names according to their roof pitches in order to distinguish them from one another. Thus, we have "Peaky" and "Slanty".

Peaky features a living area (couch, dresser, end table, turquoise fridge..... turquoise fridge!?! Oh, yes. You read that right. I'm willing to bet it's not Energy Star compliant, what do you think? And when you see how bad the fridge is in the main cottage, you have to wonder how bad this one could be that it would be relegated to the bunky.), a toilet, and a sauna. Sauna!? But of course! I don't know about you but the first thing I want to do on a hot summer day at the cottage is hop into a sauna.

I'm beginning to suspect the former owners were mad.

So the bathroom in peaky is, well, here. See for yourself: Yes, it's a bonifide, running water toilet. The problem is: the cottage isn't on septic... so.... where does it go when you flush?! No-one's sure. We're hoping there's at least some sort of pit dug underneath the bunky, but even if there is it's a massive environmental hazard. The sheeter must go.

And then, there's the sauna: Doesn't it just make you want to strip down to your skin and spend hours basking in the steamy (mouldy) heat? Mmmmm. There's a barrel stove in there with a rusted out chimney pipe (which leads to a condemned chimney stack on the roof) that has to be removed along with, well, everything. The one good point is there has been plumbing roughed into the bunkie, so we could retain the shower if we wanted, or at a minimum install a small sink for guests when/if we get around to it. *shudder*. That room gives me nightmares.

Moving right along, we have Slanty, which features the world's smallest bedroom (the "in-law" suite, we're calling it) and a not-completely-horrid living room area with a couch and table. This bunky boasts two different kinds of carpet, in a 12x12 building. I think they've been acquiring carpet at the curb, perhaps?

Of the two bunkies, I think slanty looks the worst on the outside but is in the best repair on the inside. I'm not sure anyone is going to want to stay in these buildings yet, though the kids are very excited about the prospect of having their very own cottages. The princess is already planning her garden. Cute.

(Oh, and if you haven't already figured it out. Click on any of the photos to see it enlarged)