Unintended consequences....... Oh, my. OJ messed up, but I'm not really understanding all the issues. Guess I'll keep rereading the post and maybe more of it will sink in. OK. The plan is to build a 9by14 GH on the south side of my home with a window that will open to the house to help with temp control in winter months only. Because a fireplace burns in the house pretty much all winter, the house is VERY dry. I did not anticipate the additional humidity would create serious problems. Do you think the window opening or the house siding could lead to the type of damage OJ talks about? I would love to keep the GH warm enough for tomato plants to survive the winter, but may add extra insulation around the tomato to limit the space that gets the higher temps. I brought a container in from the garden with a grape tomato in it. It sits in front of what will be the window into the GH. The tomato started blooming first of Feb. My experiment this year is to take cutting, with blooms, from that plant to root. Just trying to see if the blooming cuttings result in an earlier production of fruit. If so, I'll plan on keeping choice tomato plants going all winter. I LOVE homegrown tomatoes! Paul Robson is my most favorite of all time.

There is only one way that I can think that could possibly (but not definitely) work, and it would take the house into a distinctly modernist direction and involves one aspect you may definitely not like. Right now extending entry level roof in any direction creates a conflict in the staggered roofs and facades. You would have to completely remove the entry level roof. The roof over the living room portion of the house would extend past the front of the house, and extend off to it's right and continue on at the same pitch to cover the entry level area. It would connect to that façade of the house right under the windows with the shutters at about the level of the shingle/clapboard line right below the window sills and stop at the current eave line of the former entry level roof. It would also extend to the far left corner of the house. Since it would drop completely over the living room window, you would basically have hole in the roof or "skylight" in the porch roof in that area and the shape would be continued by suggestion by two rafters that aligned with the two mullions between the LR window. It would give you a few feet of porch over to the left extent of the LR window, a patio area of sorts in front of the window and a stylistic continuation of "porch" to the left side of the window. I've only seen this type of things work with rustic modernism where the entire house was some kind of grey cedar siding with a grey roof, or an all white kind of modernist house, both very monochromatic.

Hi Jenny, I'm from Georgia too (Villa Rica)...west of Atlanta. Your house is lovely, congratulations on being a one year homeowner! What town/city are you in? The mock up pictures are great, esp. shows what landscaping can do for a home. I love the lamp posts and plan on doing this when we move to our retirement home. The only thing I see wrong with your porch is the posts are really too small. I would budget money in the future to get those replaced. Our builder tried to do this same thing to us and we just happened to be at the house and said he could use the smaller ones on the back porch. We wanted bigger posts for the front porch....a huge difference! I don't know anything about spirea bushes. All I have to say about bushes/hedges, you don't want anything you have to trim all the time (speaking from experience here....and you can tell from the overgrown hedges in my picture below, LOL.) I would wait until next spring and plant azaleas between the bushes. The azaleas will grow and mix into the bushes. You can mix pinks and whites but I planted some of the red azaleas and they aren't near as pretty as the pinks. Also, when you buy azaleas, get the ones with the longer slimmer leaves. They always have a lot more blooms. As for the railing, I like it both ways, but I prefer railings because it's where I put my tea glass and my coffee cup when I'm swinging, LOL. About five years ago, I felt the same way you do...something was missing, so I got landscaping bricks at Home Depot, curved them and made a perennial bed on the right side of my steps. Next spring you could plant a perennial garden and they come back every year. I just love it! Put down landscaping fabric before you plant the flowers and you'll have less weeding. About those hostas in the sun, they would bake here in Georgia with our heat and humidity, LOL. We do have a lot of hostas at the side of the house and one huge one to the left of the steps. I do love the hanging baskets and the idea of one added lamp post, the one closer to your steps, is a fantastic idea! After 14 years here, things are still missing from my front porch, LOL! I need planters also on both sides of my front door. I'm finally getting three rocking chairs for the front porch this week. Good luck! Dee Here is a link that might be useful: My Home

Kat, I think you have the right idea, but before I can say which way to go, can you get a shot of the territory? After seeing all those roofs collapse this winter from their snow loads, I understand the issues involved with flat roofs. When you say the deck is flat with the front door, you mean there is no height difference? Do you have gutters running along that roofline? And how much of a "pitch" does your roof have? Is the roof a simple design which is like two end gables and a flat roof on each side? And, do you want to do something that covers the entire length of the deck along the front of your house, or would a simple covered entry space be adequate? Also, how old is your current roof? Is it in need of work anyway? I'll try to find a picture of MoccasinLanding. It was basically a shallow roofline, but they had built a gable across the front which created a narrow cement pad stoop, held up with 4 wrought iron posts. (each end and then in between), so the front door was centered on the peak of the shallow gable. Altogether, the stoop and the gable were about 15 feet wide I suppose. What I'm thinking is maybe a smaller gable right over the doorway which can be enclosed against all weather and a small bench out there, and then not attached to the house, but mounted on the deck, a covered freestanding pergola or arbor running from the driveway/carport/garage/walkway/whatever, that can have an angled top to encourage rain or snow to fall off the side away from your house (or deck too if it is a narrow one) yet from the street will look like a flat surfaced pergola/walkway up to the front door. You could top this pergola with acrylic or Lexan panels, or even heavy duty canvas/Sunbrella fabric, which would allow light to penetrate, and not cut off the light from the house windows. If you want to move your front door, I think there is a project that our (absent) buddy Loretta did to HER tiny front porch to make it a really sweet AWAY room just inside the door. Your use would be different, but it would be sort of the same construction of a gable etc.