Reader's Digest Version...

Jumped all the hurdles:
- rezoning the property /check
- fire inspection /check
- health inspection /check
- business licence /check
- Ontario Master Business Licence /check
- domain name, website purchase /check

Got the logo finalized, business cards designed, brochure for first year operations printed, "Did you forget anything? bathroom amenities cards printed, breakfast cards printed....

We have a driveway now - woofrickin'hoo.... it's solid, above the grass level.  There's two spaces together, then another separated by a good 8 to 10 feet of grass,  In this grass peninsula, we'll put a garden with a electric lamp pole - a $50 find at Hab4Humanity - eventually.

The lakeside patio is in now - as wide as the sunroom, out about 12 feet out - looks fantastic.  There's a smaller one on the driveside entry, with a paver path leading out to the parking.  NO MORE WET MORNING FEET!  There'll be another paver path leading from the lake patio towards the lake, turning right near the breakwall and heading toward the right corner of the property, where we'll build a small patio with a firepit in the middle.

Planting:  we've put in more gardens:  a circular one at the end of the rose of sharon new hedge, with grasses and low and high flowering plants.... a fruit garden along the west fence (rhubarb from last year, strawberries, blackberries, raspberries, grapes).... matching bella donas, hostas, russian sages on either side of the side door.... 2 large wisterias along the front rail fence.... a bigger garden around the entry post of the driveway.... a whole forestette of silver maple twigs and fir mini-brush babies... the only disappointment are the 6 dinosaur pines (will grow up to 70 feet in 15 years!) - extinct.  I called Vesey's and they refunded the pricey corpses.  Good company.

Lots of what I planted last year has come up/is coming up/looks like it'll be coming up.

Green bedroom is almost ready for occupation..... just a few adjustments, touch-ups, .... hooking up the minifridge. 

Bought the paint for the outside of the house.  Behr's exterior paint plus primer.  Stuff is thickthickthick.  I'll be scraping hard, doing some repair, then painting a side of the house at a time... and what did you do for your summer vacation, little Margo?

So much more, but at least I've reduced the no-posting-guilt-load by 25%........ also, not completely my laziness, the new Dell Vostro 3700 laptop (remember that evil brand and designation) completely fried itself after exactly three months.  The Dell service was great - after online around the world of irritating bad English/worse accents, Steve in Nashville became my shining knight from DellHell and arranged two visits to my workplace, 2 complete new motherboards and extraneous arcane and  other parts - but the Dell device itself was a black hole of sadness.  The new Dell Vostro 3750 just came in, minus the already-paid-for pricey MS Office Professional 2010, which still hasn't been worked out to my satisfaction yet, but at least I've got a laptop again.... so I'm catching up... adding some pictures a bit later will help.

Ciao

Fie-yah, Fie-yah..

Today the Fire Inspector came to look over the cottage.  Everything looked great to her... she advised in the placements of two alarms and two extinguishers and two signs. 
I've done exit plans, framed them and put them on the back of the bedroom doors.

After Kee get these things up, which I've already bought, I can email her and she'll give the OK on the business licence.... the final municipal hurdle.

Now, it's just a short quantum leap to receiving our first guests:  tiling mudroom and sunroom, building new side entry deck and lakeside patio, finishing blue bedroom, getting the new queen mattress, beginning and finishing blue bathroom, getting driveway and parking spots created, making the pathways to the house.....  aaaaaannd the list goes on.........

B&B 101

Here I am, stuffed to the gills on abfab food and B&B 101, thanks to Pam Rudolph of Carriage Lane B&B, Peterborough.  Not the only things I'm trying to digest though, I've also got a head full of B&B data that I've got to chew through and absorb.

I've had 3 breakfasts today - at brekkie time, late lunch and late supper, because Pam has thoughtfully screwed up meal schedules for her and her inappropriately funny, adorable husband Ben, to give me exposure to her tried and true breakfast recipes for the time I'm spending here, learning at her table.

Pam runs an extremely professionally delivered B&B academy, giving newbies like me a solid footing, practical advice and proven direction, based on her more than a decade experience in bed and breakfasting.  A career that, while maintaining a upper-tier B&B, has expanded beyond, as she put it, "bed & heads", to culinary classes, hosting events, concierging visiting educationals and other professionals and delivery courses in starting a bed and breakfast.

Friday, I left Wheatley and drove along Hwy 3, with a colourful honour guard of changing motorcycles - it was Friday 13th, the traditional excuse for bikers of all bikes and backgrounds to gather at Port Dover - from hogs to scooters... although even if I was an 89 year old female virgin nun, I would not show gripping a scooter at Port Dover..... the laughing would be unbearable even if I still did have my hearing.

I stopped at Courtland, visited Saffire Blue, a small family business, a warehouse for toiletries - shampoos, conditioners, essential oils, etc.  I bought these three things, plus shower gel, facial cream and cleanser, and 8 oz plastic bottles and pump caps.  I'll be making my house blend of bath products, with a blend of lavender, clary sage and rosemary essential oils.  I've bought clear labels and will label the bottles accordingly and fill and refill them for guest use.  The skin care products, I've bought for myself.

Next, a north turn onto Hwy 59, where I stopped at a nameless town because I saw the magic words - "Liquidation".  Grabs my brakes everytime!  I ended up buying a new mini garden hoe, a small I'm-on-my-knees rake and a bottom-loading black and stainless steel water cooler.... and a skirt.  Unbelievably, in this hole-in-the-wall liquidation warehouse, was a teeny boutique of lovely cotton skirts, shirts and tees.  How serendipitious, eh?

Driving then up to merge with the rightfully detested Hwy 401, it took me three lifetimes of bad karma to get through Toronto... what a bumper-to-bumper hellhole that stretch is!  After spasming through that 1.5 hour stretch, Peterborough wasn't far, and Ms GPS had me at Carriage Lane B&B nicely.

Starting last night, after an aromatic Indonesian rice and beef supper, we outlined the course goals, my starting point, the level of preparedness I'm currently at and then viewed pictures of our home, the rooms and the property.

Early this morning we began, as they say, in earnest.  Pam is just a resource to be reckoned with.  I fired off questions and concerns and she's got all the answers.  Leading me back to her well-prepared curriculum when I veered us off track, I was in the enviable position of being her only client this weekend, her only focus.  We broke for a late lunch, worked again until 6 and then reconvened for a delicious breakfast/supper.

Pam and Ben are a wonderful couple, their professional lives multiple and varied, what with the bed and breakfast, her culinary career, his outside work (now retired) and their caring, selfless interest in fostering troubled children, setting aside the B&B at intervals when they see a child they can help.

We've done the majority of the curriculum by now and tomorrow will wind up the course with a few extra items and review.  Pam supplies a certificate, hard copy assist materials, a tax receipt and a lifeline for assistance.  With completion also comes a free year registration with BBCanada, the premier marketing/booking machine for Canadian bed and breakfasts.  That's worth $100, taking the course price down to $350.  Money well spent, I think.  I have more confidence in my strengths and knowledge after this time with Pam.

Maybe a bit of return trip shopping........ home again, home again, jiggity-jig......

Long time, no post...

.... because life is so freakin' busy!  .  I feel guilty about not posting all of April.  I'll get a ton of text down, then add pictures in later.  A few days before posting after a long drought (avoidance), the inner nag starts tapping my inner shoulder, then prodding my inner chest, then I get down to it.

But a few recent points of interest:

This has been the wettest spring/what spring?/cold, damp, miserable.... seems like the past few years we're a three season climate zone - prolonged, pissy winter/hot, all-too-short summer/really nice autumn.  The lake has been wild for weeks on end, with rain nonstop.  We've had another tree down, on the roadside lawn, just missing the house.  The driveway - if there was an intergalactic market for mud, we could supply the multiverse - is a gloopy catch 22 - if we had a driveway, we wouldn't have any mud/we can't get a driveway until the mud is gone. 

The zoning amendment went through!  Huzzah! and Hooray! and thanks to the zoning gods.  I went to the Council meeting on April 10th with the fabulous GGs for support (and 2 pitchers of sangria for extra fortification).  We were next to last on the bill and were passed immediately.  Now we can get our business licence - which I think I'll do tomorrow.  This was our biggest - not obstacle - but biggest piss-off, I guess, in the B&B journey.  Having B&B homes near us that didn't have to pay off the local government with an expensive zoning amendment was - expensively irrating.  But - it's done.

.... assembled our first tax return data that included B&B financials.  We've kept the majority of receipts, invoices, etc., especially the big tickets - boiler, insulation, zoning applications, and such.  What we've spent on this thing is eye-wideningly, head-shakingly there in black & white.  As there was no actual B&Bing going on in 2010, this is ground work for next year, our accountant Al tells us.  This summer we'll be officially open in a limited capacity, so next year's tax return will hopefully be a bigger, better bang for those bucks.

.... this weekend, travelling to Peterborough to study B&B academy - at Carriage Lane B&B.  The curriculum includes professional hosting, culinary, housekeeping, promoting, finances... the compleat angle.  I'm going solo, Kee's working and actually, doesn't think a high percentage of the schedule relates to what he'll be doing - there's no tiling, wiring, plumbing or cement work on the timetable.  I'm really looking forward to this - having successful experts show me how they perfected a wheel I just can barely recognize as wheel-shaped.

This has, as I've said, been a completely crap spring.  But now the lake is actually turning blue - instead of muddy grey-brown.  The sun is out a bit more - I hung laundry on the line on Sunday.  It reminds me what we fell in love with and why we bought this place - in the first place.

All those hundreds of bulbs I planted in the fall - I'm getting results:  hyacinth (hyacinthi?) of all colours and sizes, blue bells, white phlox and tulips in cream, burgundy  and blues and lots of white, sky and dark blue muscari.  What I thought - and looked in the pictures - were white paperwhites and something else - are actually yellow.  I don't like any yellow flowers.  Ninety-five percent of the stuff I planted was white or blue, with purples making up the remainder.  Lots more are upcoming.  I'll have to check my maps to see what was planted where... finding out what it is I'm looking at or what isn't where it should be coming up at.

D gave me a five foot tulip tree for Mother's Day, it's absolutely beautiful and very, very sturdy.  He planted it in the roadside yard and it looks great.  On Sunday I enlarged the roadside corner garden, planting two white lilacs, four rhododendrons, and some other white and purple flowers.  I added some hollyhock and morning glory seeds up close to the fences.  That garden will be all white and purple.

I'm going to kill a rabbit.  A mangy grey rabbit has been eating my flower shoots - the crocus have been comletely nibbled to a half inch of the ground.  This thing is so stunned I got within two feet of it.  I've tried human hair, cat litter and mothballs.  I think next I'll try a bb gun... or someone with a rabbit-killing firearm of some sort.  I've never killed, even hurt an animal, but this is beyond personal - it's financial.

Went to another auction with my sister on Saturday.  Bought a useless fan [crap], a four piece setting of handpainted dishes [pale green with white dot flowers - dinner and salad plates, fruit and soup bowls and a platter], three really nice fadey, white framed watercolours of birds and two really lovely, deep-hued watercolours of water birds, an art deco wooden magazine rack and a trim little art deco table, both of which I'll clean up, restain and use in the blue bedroom.  I'm getting very picky and less frenetic with my bid card.... things are getting filled up.

Bought a fan for the sunroom - bit of an e-purchase drama there.... I searched through the net, found this lovely wall mount "Old Havana" fan:  heavy black ornate base with a black and bronzish fan unit.  Very period, very 30s looking.  One site had it priced several hundred cheaper than others.... and after checking very carefully, I bought that one.  And by very carefully, I mean - as much as I compared that one site against the more expensive sites, I could find no difference in the fan, while at the same time being extremely not-careful at all. What was delivered, what I bought - was the base - only the base.  The fan unit holder.  Not the fan.  No fan.

Me and Mr Liu had an extremely close e-relationship for the next few days, ending with me spending three hundred plus more to acquire the remainder of the picture of the lovely Old Havana fan that I thought I had already bought. Whatthe?  Well, it's up, it's gorgeous and I'm learning to move on from these type of things..... as these type of things do pop up.

I am a mad breadmaker right now.  I recently bought a bread magazine and one of the recipes was the dutch oven no-knead method.  So far I've made about 10 loaves - it's amazing!  The bread looks like every beautiful artisanal loaf you ever did see.  Tonight, before I did the final 1 hour proof, I smeared four cloves of roasted garlic over the top, some Mediterranean herbs and some pepper, then folded the top and bottom, left and right sides over.  Let it rise for another hour, then baked.  It tastes fantastic. 

This dutch oven method broke big about five/six years ago and has fan sites galore.  All you need is flour, salt, yeast, warm water, a heavy cast iron dutch and time.  The results are beautiful, professional-looking and delicious.

The Notice Goes Up....

Bueno, today I picked up an envelope at the post office, from the Municipality of Chatham Kent, containing:  a yellow notice to be posted at the roadside of our property; a receipt for the cost of actions taken; and an official Municipality letter about our intentions - a zoning change to allow operation of a 3 room bed and breakfast. 

This means our neighbours will receive their letter of our intentions also.  I've laid a bit of groundwork:  visits with muffins, breakfast breads, scones and a short spiel..... maybe you've heard we'd like to open a small bed and breakfast, just 3 rooms, seasonally, for birders and their ilk, just a neighbourly visit to say, don't worry, there'll be no changes, no additions will be made to the house........

So, hopefully, no one will turn up at the Council meeting early in April, showering on our parade.   

I'm making slipcovers for the leather parson's chairs in the sunroom dining area - more accurately - I'm making an abysmal mess of making slipcovers. 

First attempt:  finished to the point of hemming - tried it on the chair - toooo tight.  Reread pattern directions:  wrong chair - not a parson's chair, but the thinner back chair.  Shit/damn, rip, repeat.

Second attempt:  correct chair type, worked up to the point of sewing in the side panels on the upper chair front - cannot read the directions.  Something rounded is to be sewn to be something so squarish that I know I'm just not getting this.

Third attempt:  call sister Ting, who's a professional.  She'll save me.

God, but I'd like to just dump this one on somebody, but I can sew, have always sewn, just finished the curtains for one of the bedrooms..... and can use that money for something else - that I can't do.  So Ting'll get me back on the right track and I'll finish them. 

Make curtains for the green bedroom... turned out great.  A very 40s look, billowing, sheerish, just need the roller shade now.

Finished the first panel of the blue bedroom curtains, but I don't like the two pattern effect like I do in the green bedroom.  So these will be redone again, with just the single fabric - a crisp, Laurenesque striped cotton.

Still have the sinus infection - I think it can claim naturalized citizen status by now.  Yesterday I read an article about a cancer survivor in a charity fashion show... she had thought that she had sinusitis, but it turned out to be stage 4 sinus cancer.  Very rare in women, usually suffered by men who smoke or work in a paint manufactory.  She was diagnosed in time, underwent half a year of chemo and other treatments, and is now cancer-free.  I am susceptibility incarnate - and am now convinced I have stage 4 sinus cancer.... she listed all her symptoms....

I have them all.  I always do. 

I'll be making an appointment, initially because my optometrist said, when examining my eyes a couple of week ago, that I should have my cholesterol checked as there was an indication of it during my examination.  Since patients can only ask on two concerns, I'll do the cholesterol with a sinus chaser.

Seems like this week I'm minoring in hypochondria, majoring in screwed up seamstressery, with an extra credit in suck-up zoning paranoia.

And tomorrow, vino & birthday lunch with 3 bio-sisters, vino & designer pizzas with 3 soul-sisters.  Sunday - I sew.



Good night, Renee....

Goodbye to my dear sister-in-law Renee. 

This picture was taken about the beginning on last August, 2010 - just, just six months ago.  Her and my brother-in-law had just brought up their new beautiful boat, we motored around Point Pelee from Leamington and moored in front of the cottage, jetski-taxi'd in and enjoyed an impromptu bbq before returning.  What a beautiful day, now not to be repeated, now a warm, precious memory.

She was so interested in our renovations... and noticing the limited closet spaces, she later sent me up special flat hangers that maximize hanging space.

That weekend, she sometimes complained about a persistently sore hip and so went to her doctor on her return to Pittsburgh a couple of days later... who referred her to a osteopath... who, after tests.... sent her to an oncologist.  Renee had an aggressive cancer.

She died Thursday morning at 4:30.  Cancers had tsunamied her body, leaving her vunerable to the pneumonia that claimed her life. 

Just six months to remove this vital, funny, sophisticated, generous, gutsy, loving woman.  Her grace under pain and the knowledge of her shortened future was a model that I know I couldn't achieve. 

Renee was a great wife, a fantastic mother, a fun sister-in-law, the favourite aunt.  She loved great red wines, pates, real cheeses, authentic travel adventures.  Renee was a voracious reader, she had a flat-out, truthful bawdy sense of humour, she absorbed life experiences like a sponge.  Her generosity was legend, her recall of everybody's interests and lives was just one of her special characteristics.

The triteness of "life isn't fair" just doesn't do anything to describe the devastation in our family.  Thanks, Renee & goodbye.... but you'll never be gone.

Our Own Personal Twilight Zoning....

... had to submit a sketch of where the parking spots would be, if we go all bed and breakfast on the cottage.

So, with my new Dell laptop and my new Dell everything plus wireless printer, I scanned this from our purchase documents, added in the yellow to-be parking spaces, blued-out the cottage shape, redlined the existing driveway, for submission.

I hope it's obvious to the zoning committee that there's sooo much room for just 3 parking spaces, there'll be no impact upon neighbouring homes......

It'll take until April 11th to find out.  Twenty days before that, close neighbours will get notice of our intention, a notice will be posted, and then we wait again.

I'm hoping no one will object.... to think that anyone would want to kybosh someone's else's dreams, negate all the hard work towards their goal, is very nervous-making... gonna be a long couple months.

Combien!

Never NEVAH have I seen such snow here in southern Ontario.

"Combien!" That's how the auctioneer started off his spiel today - a liquidation action in Leamington.  I went hoping for a oriental carpet for the living room.... and found one... plus one.

I bid - just once & won - an 8 x 12 "palace" sized oriental, brand new, lovely rust burgundy, creams, grey greens.  Brand new, high quality machine made, from Turkey.  Covers a good deal of the living room, but not too much, the beautiful wood still shows all around.

And the bonus was a small 3 x 5 handmade tribal carpet from Iran.  It's old, not sure how old, I'll be looking for the pattern on the internet.  It was almost as much as the 3 times bigger one.  It looks great in the middle of the kitchen, the glowing dark colours against the cream and putty of the stone-looking tiles.

On another thread.... I practiced more muffin types today - dark chocolate chip, lemon blueberry and pecan maple.  Chip & lemon/blueberry fantastic, pecan maple.... not offensive.... bland actually....  maybe sliced with maple butter would be the cure.

Found a fantastic new recipe for buttermilk pancakes - extremely fluffy and tasty.

D took some muffins back to Toronto (2 weeks left on his course) and I took a couple of each across the road to a neighbour who just broke both his legs in a snowmobiling accident - hit a snow-hidden cement thingee at a fair clip.

Sinus still on world-wide invasion kick.  I'm still on placebo antibiotics apparently. 

Today was "Family Day" national holiday.... back to school manana..... ciao

Sinus Blitherings..

Fifteen years ago, I thought I was skillfully hooding my shot around a tree, cleverly saving a stroke... turns out I was idiotically overestimating my ability, deadnuts hitting the tree, rebounding directly to my face, knocking me out, cracking my right sinus and making future yearly appointments with sinus infections for the rest of my life.  And that brings me to the last 3 weeks of my life.  I am so sick of this movie.

One the more interesting, less disgusting side... went to an auction with my sister yesterday and came home with several treasures.  Of course, all these treasures cost $40 - either singly or collectively - doesn't mattter... it's a standing joke that everything I buy for the cottage is $40.  Kee is very - I guess, resigned - to the fact that likely nothing costs $40 and it's best not to go to those dark places.

I got three paintings:  a largelarge, slightly kitschish merchant sailboat scene, a small, horizontal aspect garden watercolour and a large, squarish, good-amateur, white heron/marsh reeds oil.  Also:  a broken Boston fern table that I'll strip, Kee will fix and I'll restain.  Also:  a very old, dark wood, box cabinet - about 2.5' long, 1' high, with 2 doors.  The glass on the left door has a crack, but the cabinet is just entrancing.  It will go in the living room, over the desk-to-be-built, beside the library-shelves-too-be-built.  Also:  a fire extinguisher - how prosaic, eh? 

The ship scene had this going for it:  the colours:  it was a great match for the wall of the green bedroom and I like the dated look of it.... it could be thought to have been here for decades. 

The watercolour is actually a numbered print.  It's like a clip of an English garden, and the greens, pastel flowers and green matte complement the small bedroom perfectly.

The white heron comes with a signed certificate of authenticity, by artist James McGuigan.  There's a lot of talent in it, although I must say it's of the talented amateur level.  The real appeal is the subject matter, a large white heron, on the wing, with the reeds of a marsh behind. 

These three pictures really suit the cottage.  I lucked out.

A stitch back in time...

Have you ever heard of McKay's Corners?  If you (a) live around Chatham, Ontario; (b) sew; (c) aren't afraid of towering, mouldering, chittering bales of ancient fabric, then you might know about McKay's Corners.... an enormous pole barn bursting with material, out on a country road off Highway 401.  Thirty years ago, I shoveled through the stacks for flannel for receiving blankets and velvet for an elegant bring-home-baby-from-hospital blanket.  Twenty-five years ago, I unearthed spandex or my daughter's skating and dance outfits.  Pillowcases, sheer and rich materials for draperies... once even a woollen blend for an unfortunate pair or man's woolen pants, which I just couldn't make Kee wear.  Prices are great, measurements are generous and you just wash the material in hot water water a couple of times to get rid the dead mummy smell.

This time I went in search of vintage cotton prints, to make drapes for the two big bedrooms, slipcovers for the leather parson's chairs in the sunroom and maybe some aprons.

I've found some great old stuff, it washed up a treat, I've got the patterns.  Now the hard part - explaining to my sister who own a fabric store why I got this outsider fabric in my possession....

Groundhog's Day....

.... is my birthday.  And it's been a nice one - schools were closed due to the big storm, so I got to stay warm & snuggly inside.  I've baked bread - buttermilk honey white bread... cleaned the house... rearranged parts of the house... and explored the lovely Sony ereader Kee gave me.  My wonderful sisters took me out to lunch on Saturday.  San gave me a beautiful art candle and fresh flowers, Sue a hip battery-operated pepper grinder - tilt it to grind, and MB a lovely quilt she made herself, plus a ceramic bird feeder.  On Sunday, I went shopping with the GGs in the States and got all sorts of things for the cottage - in the B&B vein of shopping... some cotton quilts for beds, some cute duck-footed egg cups, a small rack for brochures of local spots - wineries, parks, etc.

It's been expensive around here lately.... I went to Chatham last week to - what I thought was to - present our business application, pay the $100 fee and become voila Omstead's On Erie Bed & Breakfast.  Not so fast.  Turns out, this area isn't zoned for such.  The zoning includes only single detached homes and group homes... so, theoretically, I could open a halfway house for pedophiles, sex addicts, anger mismanagement antisocials - but no room at the inn for a couple of birders, oeniphiles or butterfly enthusiasts. 

Puzzling, because just the other side of the harbour, there operated a ranch-style house B&B for many years... I guess, unofficially.

So, "no" I was told, followed by "I'm afraid you'll need a zoning amendment" and "that'll cost you around $1200",  !!!!!  this was followed by a business card of the company that does this.  Off I reeled, across Chatham to this place, to be told, "yes, we can apply for you", "you've a very good chance of the amendment being granted", and topped off with "no, it's not $1200, I'm sorry to tell you - it's $2015"  !!!! and $&*!

And the previous day, I finally broke down and bought a new laptop.  So, last week was a $4000+ week, with very little spend-ecstasy to show for it.

The neighbours will be getting a notice of our intentions..... opposition, while it likely wouldn't be fatal to our plan, would be disappointing.  We intend on going around fairly soon to our immediate neighbours and explaining our intentions:  small operation, no parking/vehicle disturbance on the street, no alterations to the size of the cottage, the quiet clientele our B&B would appeal to, our desire to have an interest/supplementary income as we melt into our early retirement years.  Hopefully, there are no objections to a very reasonable small business operation around here.

I hear the groundhog did not see her/his shadow today.... great!, an early spring is what I need.

details... details.......

So..... met with an accountant today... yup.  Thankfully, a friend, a local guy.... who was very encouraging about the details of the first nutz&boltz of becoming a bed and breakfast small business.  It was a very encouraging meeting - casual, clarifying, positive. 

A lot to think about, gather up, organize.... paperwork on purchases we've made with the B&B in mind, future purchase guidelines, record keeping methods....

Another lane added to my learning curve superhighway.

Did I mention....

.... that we are moving towards opening a bed and breakfast?

As we toured the cottage the first time, I turned to Kee and breathed, wide-eyed, this could be our bed and breakfast.  The two large bedrooms at the end of one wing of the L shaped cottage could be easily - well, theoretically - be made into suites by:  (a) closing off the hall door to the big bathroom and opening it to the bedroom through a doorway made in the closet and (b) making the small junk room on the opposite side of the hallway into a bathroom that opened up to the other large bedroom through it's closet. 

We could have the far corner of the house, with it's bedroom and three piece bath.   Plus, if pressed, the small bedroom would be perfect for a single guest who could share the small bathroom with just us.  The totally windowed sunroom would be great for morning breakfasts, the enormous yard - just wonderful for people who liked to sun a bit, read a bit, relax on a small beach.

We'd market to:  The Birders, The Butterflyer's, The Black History Buffs (Buxton Settlement isn't far away), The Boozers (oeniphiles), The Bikers (pedal & motor), The Boomers (weekend trippers), The Boaters.  The spring, summer and fall on the north shores of Lake Erie are beautiful and activities are endless.

And we'd call it................... Omstead's On Erie.

Doing this, opening this wouldn't be immediate, but it would be on a shared front burner with remodelling.  As we move towards retirement, a supplemental, interest income seems like a great idea.  We know several important levelling things:  we won't get rich doing this; it's not a substitute for a planned retirement income; it wouldn't be steady.

So, as we move through all the renovations the cottage needs anyways, we keep in mind the things a B&B would need - capacity for hot water, bathroom requirements, bedroom set-ups, outside environments, safety features, local governmental requirements...... too, too many minutae to list, but we do have a list that gets added to, crossed off and altered.

I love to cook and feed people, in a social mixing grade, out of 10, we're whatever your average and normal level is - I think we could both welcome guests and maintain a friendly distance.  And when we're done with this cottage - in the future - it would be several things to several buyers:  a home, a great cottage, a bed and breakfast.... what it'll be to us.

So as Kee builds and rebuilds, I outfit, antique and e-buy.... that's the goal:  a calming, friendly, relaxing stay at a beachfront Arts & Crafts, Tudor-Revival, 1930s cottage, on almost an acre of property along Lake Erie, near provincial parks, conservations area, migratory bird  and monarch butterfly routes, boutique estate wineries, historic sites and Lake Erie.

Great, another lane added to the learning curve................ website.

Mortise - a square hole made to receive a tenon and so to form a joint....

I've received the beautiful mortise door locks from The House of Antique Hardware.  These are Arts & Crafts reproductions, genuine repros in every way, from their design, their weight, to their size - the only modern thing about them is the way I purchased them - on the internet - and their price - about $170 CDN each, when all's said and done.  And worth every penny, they are gorgeous!

These first two (I may get two more) will go on the green and blue bedroom doors.... if and when we open as a B&B, I think it's a given that people would want to lock their doors - and so they shall.  Two skeleton keys came with each door, hopefully we can have more made, as I'm sure one'll go missing at any given time.

This week Kee's also put a lock on the hall door of the blue bathroom - this bath is accessible from the hallway and the blue bedroom.  When the blue suite is being rented, the hall door can be locked to provide a complete ensuite, private bath... when it's not, that bath is another bathroom for us, with the small three piece bathroom in our wing of the cottage.

I'll eventually get the same locks for our bedroom and the small bedroom, maybe even the long hall closet.  If we decide to explore the options of whole or partial rental of the cottage, we should be able to lock whatever, wherever we want.

A learning curve I shouldn't hafta be leaning on....

The things I'm learning.... a lot of it are things I really don't want to have to learn about.  But I've got to, 'cause Kee has no interest in them - just finishing them off when they arrive by CanPar or Purolator or whatever....

Sidebar:  I've gotten to know the various delivery people so well, from delivering to the school and the cottage, that I've had one, John, in for a tour when he brought me my shower unit for the green bath. He's come up the school walk so often with internet goodies that he usually stays to see what's behind Box No 13.....

Back to the learning curve... struggling between a tankless water heater and a modern, efficient traditional tank replacement. 

The instantaneous tankless has no standby heat expense, a major plus - no heating the water 24/7 no matter how much or little we're using it - but there is the short cold water blurge that would have to be solved by a small 4 gallon gas heater attached to it... so basically we would have bought a new boiler, a new tankless water heater and a new small gas water heater.  The Bosch units we're looking at are some of the larger units, to supply 3 baths, the dishwasher and the washer (although I do wash in cold 95% of the time).  Right now, the estimate is around $3200/3500.

Our other option is replacing the oldoldold rustyrustyrusty electric heater with a modern, well insulated gas tank, hooking it up to the new furnace.  So, the boiler fires the tank, shutting down heating the house very briefly as it does this.  Not enough to noticeably chill the house in winter, less than 10 minutes, but there won't usually be a large hot water demand here in winter anyways.  But in the late spring, summer and early fall, if things go well, there may be occasions when lots of hot water will be needed.  The quote for this was around $2500 - another serious plus.

With the 2nd option, we heat the water from our already installed boiler - so we're not double boilering (for heat, for hot water).
With the 2nd option, although there's no provincial or federal rebates for a boiler, it's cheaper than installing the tankless+gas tank set-up and then getting the prov/fed rebate.

I'm leaning towards the traditional tank, insulated, efficient, slaved to the efficient boiler.

I hope I've crested this curve, at least this particular curve.

Now let's talk mortise door locks.......  a bit later.

We Have A "Mudroom"

and I'm going to use that term... always.  I love the sound of it, the implications of muddy boots, hanging sweaters, the detritus of coming-ins and going-outs.  Mudroom.

At move-in, the mudroom was a large square, one step down from the rest of the house, after entering, on your left you stepped up to the kitchen.  It was stuffed with the orphans of the previous owners.... a washing machine, a portable dishwasher..... one wall was almost completely occupied by a cement double sink.  This sink was invaluable for cleaning months and months of brushes, rollers and tray.

The mudroom's on the driveway side of the house, the door is the one we all use.  The only other door is the lake-facing one.  So I want the mudroom super presentable.. this will be the major entry. 

The major work here was the installation of a complete new electrical panel.  D did the complete overhaul of the system, a total rewire of the house, removing the old service panel and expanding the electrical capabilities.  A complete transplant to the power heart of the house. 

 

I decided we needed to semi-divide the mr into 2 sections, with a 3/4 high wall just behind the entry door.  The entry side will be one-third, the "business section", behind the partition, will be two-thirds, because it will have the washer/dryer, freezer, a lazy susan left over from the kijiji cupboard purchase, a small coat closet repurposed from the tall wooden cupboard in the far corner.

To create the 3/4 high, 3/4 across the room wall, we used a 4' high shelving unit from our old basement.  The solid back was faced towards the entry side of the mr, the open shelves toward the business end of the mr.  These shelves would supply open storage for small appliances and all my jams.  Then Kee added on two more shelves, making it about 2.5' from the ceiling.... just enough and a bit for the ceiling light/fan.... which would be necessary because laundry would be going on in this smaller room.

 

The mudroom was shut off from the kitchen by a solid door.  We removed that, repurposing it to a new bedroom door down the hall.  We replaced thedoor opening with the beautiful oak french door we refinished and rehandled. Now lightfrom the kitchen and mudroom flow.

We fronted the partition with beadboard.  Kee had the brilliant idea of tucking in 6 small open shelves, at the beginning of the partition, just behind the side door.  Perfect for shoes - actually, the only place we have for shoes.

We gave away the old beer fridge to my son's friend and bought a small black and stainless Danby all-fridge refrigerator and a 41" Danby chest freezer.  The fridge goes in the front third, along the kitchen wall, behind the Hab4Hum oak french door, the freezer's in the back 2/3rd.

Storage, storage....... and more storage.....

I saw a cupboard/pantry unit on sale in Canadian Tire.  We picked it up... it wasn't as sturdy as Kee would have liked, but thought he could strengthen it. 

We mounted it on the long wall of the mr, about 1' from the ceiling, 2.5' from the floor.  This let it be mounted flat on the wall, taking out the heating rad completely.  This is holding so much - all my baking stuff, herbs, mixes, some china.  Kee has now sided the lower space and shelved it - more storage, more, more.... 

I've got it painted and now it holds the giant roaster, a myriad of muffin tins, pizza trays, heavy duty cast iron frying pans and my precious French crepe pans.

The arts & crafts looking fan/light was a Hab4Hum deal also.  We painted the blades the ceiling cream.  The fan circulates the laundry heat well.  After adding the suspended pantry, Kee had to recut the blades so I could open the left door - works perfectly.  Now the jams formerly on the black plastic shelves are on the reverse of the divider wall, with all the smaller electric appliances and giant pots.

The former wooden, shelved closet is now a small coat closet, but I think enough to hold Kee & mine coats that need hanging up.  It's painted a light grey acrylic that I originally bought for use on the bottom of the clawfoot tub, but had more than enough, so why waste.....

The booze is still underneath, maybe one day I'll get around to painting it.

So.... the walls and ceiling are fixed and painted; the washer/dryer is installed; we've got a coat closet finally; the lazy susan has loads of bakeware in good order; freezer and dedicated fridge are bought,