Clendenin House Then, During and Now

My wonderful Irish House from the beginning, through the moving in process, and now. 

The Kitchen

It has been a total joy having a large kitchen with plenty of storage and counter space. I went from a narrow galley kitchen with about 24 inches of useable counter space to this. 

When I first moved in there was an the old fashioned stove which was a bit of an eye sore (and unfortunately no longer hooked up), a little electric stove that was lower than the counter, and heavy plaid curtains. But now it all looks great and it very functional. 

The beginning

         

The Middle

        

The evolution of my vintage (non-working) stove

And Now

              

I also have a full utility room which is quite the luxury. There's a full size chest freezer, a washer and dryer (not in the kitchen itself, which is very common here) coat racks and space for tools.

    

The Second Lounge -- now the Library

This room has had one of the biggest changes. When I moved in there was an old sofa and chair (which are both now in the main lounge) a wood burning stove and a desk/secretary

   

   

This room might have been a dining room at one time but now is more of a walkthrough to the main lounge and the stairs. Interestingly it has more electrical plugs than any other room. One of the most challenging things about an older house here is the lack of electrical plugs. This room has six but the main lounge has ONE! And there are MANY things plugged into it. 

During

This room was the major staging area for all my books and pictures as I was unpacking. The mess got on my nerves after a while. Getting the book cases level was quite the job. The floor is far from level. I used the car jack to lift the bookcases until the bubble on the level was centered and then piled up some cheap cork backed coasters I bought under one end of the book cases.

And Now

There's now a cozy reading nook and table and chairs

The Main Lounge (Living Room for us Americans)

This room's also been through quite a few changes. It started off with a large leather sofa (I really don't care for leather furniture). I moved in the large easy chair and sofa from the second lounge, made the chaise end piece into a reading nook in the second lounge and moved the rest of the leather sofa into storage in my middle outbuilding. 

It was quite the project getting the chaise into the second lounge and the upholstered sofa out of there. The door out of the second lounge is about two inches narrower that the main lounge door. I ended up having to take the door off the hinges (and still need to put it back up) and there's a few chips in the woodwork paint that I need to touch up. But it was worth it. The main lounge has a warm, homey feel to it with the chair and sofa. 

I have a fire most every evening when it's cool enough and right now, it really helps keep the room comfortable as winter settles in. 

     

       

The Master Bedroom

This is a great size room. The two beautiful wardrobes came with the house. There was a huge king size bed with a very bulky headboard and footboard. Even with that, it was a spacious room but I stored the big bed and put in my double bed from LA and then added two accent chairs as well as Mom and Dad's chest of drawers that they bought right after they got married in 1949. 

And then when I added my art and other touches, it truly feels like mine.

The Bathroom

There's one full bath and a half bath downstairs just off the kitchen. The main bathroom is nothing special but it's fine. The bathtub is blue, which definitely dates when it was last redone. There was just a pedestal sink with no storage at all. I added a hanging medicine cabinet and learned what masonry walls are! No nail will go into the wall, they just bend. I had to have my landlord come over and drill holes in the wall and put in plastic anchors to screw the cabinet in. 

Hanging pictures is quite the challenge too. I have a few walls that I can put a small nail into but most of the time I have to use these hangers that will go into the dense walls. 

It's a thing in Ireland and England that there are no electrical outlets in bathrooms, and the switch for the lights is outside the room. There is a Power Shower but it has to be supplied power by a pull cord across the room. The Power Shower is great though because it heats the water as it goes through, so I never run out of hot water in the shower not matter how cold it is outside and even in the warmer months when the oil heating isn't needed. 

First Guest Room

This L shaped room has gone through quite a few changes. I talked in an earlier blog post about completely redoing the whole wall of built in wardrobes. I also replaced the very dated hardware on all the doors. There were two different sizes of handles and neither were standard sizes any longer. I found these amazing contemporary handles that adjust to any screw placement size and they worked perfectly. It really updated the look of the doors. 

Adding in a large bookcase and lifting the bed above the wide base boards allowed it to be tucked into the built in back piece behind the bed. There were heavy curtains on the window at the back of the house, so with nothing back there but the garden and pasture, I took down the curtains completely. 

I put a little half sheer curtain in the window facing the farmyard because the barn right across is used quite a bit and could result in an awkward 'oh! hello there' moment.

        

The Second Guestroom 

I really wanted to have a second guestroom so I'd have room for several people visiting at once. It hasn't been used yet, but I'm sure it will be. The room is at the front of the house with two windows and gets great light.  There is beautiful wood ceiling but a fluorescent light! I'm planning on changing out the light fixture. 

That's my house. I just love it. The only thing that's been hard to adjust to is oil heating. Rather than forced air that is controlled by a thermostat, it's radiators that are controlled by a timer, I have to set when I want the downstairs and upstairs systems to come off and on. I have to adjust the timing by what the temperatures are like outside. Don't want to freeze to death but also don't want it to be too warm in the house and blow through a lot of oil. I've had to have oil delivered three times so far and the first time was €800 and then a bit over €400 the next two times. I have to go out to the oil tank in the farmyard and use a dip stick to see how much oil is left and figure out when I need to order more. 

But the weather is generally quite moderate here. Everything is done in Celsius, which I'm still getting used to, but it mainly ranges from -2 to around 28 which is about 28 to 78 Fahrenheit.

It is a bit challenging right now when the temperature drops below freezing. My water comes from a well that is quite a ways away from the house and the water pipe is just above ground going through some of the farm buildings. There is insulation on the pipe but when it gets too cold at night, the pipe freezes and I have no water. It's happened twice so far, meaning I have no water until later in the day, like 2-4p. I have to watch the weather forecast during cold weather and if it looks like it might drop to freezing overnight, I have to leave the water dripping -- which sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. 

Fortunately my landlord is having a new well dug that will be much closer to the house with the water pipe buried. This will hopefully mean the pipe will never freeze again, which is great. The well has now been dug but it still has to be tested and then connected to the house. Hopefully all will be done before Christmas.