Time for Reflection

We bought the home in 1982. Its been through several incarnations over that time. This one will be the last in our ownership. With a little over 30 years passing by, I thought it was a good time to reflect over the changes that our home and life have experienced. Our home was a State Bank Californian Bungalow house and when we bought it, it had very few changes. We were fortunate to have bought a very original and sound home. We consider ourselves to be the second owners as the people we bought from were there less than two years and did nothing on the house. The house was built by Mr and Mrs Clarricoates in 1929.

Let's start with the kitchen. Originally it was a very small area, no bigger than the bathroom on the other side of the wall. There was a brick chimney which the gas oven stood in. The brick chimney most probably housed  a wood fired stove beforehand. The bricks today pave the outdoor living area. We cleaned everyone of those bricks before laying them.
We decided to open up the area for family living with an A shaped room to add light and height. Sue could cook while still being part of the family. It's very much a coming together with the hub of the day's living.
Being both a cooking and living area, it has created an interest to our two boys, Andrew and Mitchell in cooking where occasionally they take on their own culinary adventures.

We will move into the past with other rooms over the next few posts as we draw closer to the end of our last and final changing of the house, no "home" for a new young family to make a home for themselves.

The area you see here is the original sink and where it ends to the left is where the original bathroom started.
We lived in the house during renovation. Sue's kitchen became the lounge room where a micro wave and an electric fry pan were her total cooking facilities. I still had the sink to wash up.

Looking to the left of what was become the kitchen was the door leading to the two boys bedrooms and the new bathroom.

Looking to the right is the doorway to the proposed study.
Note the claw foot bathtub. We gave it to one of the builders to take away for himself. We didn't think much of it at the time but they go for a very good price these days. We didn't really care because the builders were very good to us during the build.

Several months later, Sue started to enjoy the kitchen that she designed. It's stood the test of many family meals now but she's already designing what could be her next one. Time will tell.