Acorn Cottage

The Lord of the Manor has decided that his shoulder is healed well enough to begin working on Acorn Cottage. Maybe I should explain Acorn Cottage a bit...


When we moved to this house 12 years ago, there was a decrepit old shed on the property. It had a cracked concrete floor, lots of rotten boards, and spiders everywhere. All the windows were painted shut, one door was falling apart, and the roof leaked. We used it to house the gardening tools, camping gear, bicycles, and other assorted clobber. Eventually we remodeled the house and the shed looked really tatty. Suddenly it was way worse than before, so early in 2007, we decided to renovate it into a studio/guest house.

First we cut the shed roof off and suspended a wood floor over the cracked concrete. Then we cut new openings for windows and a door, built a new roof, and made two bump-outs to gain extra space without increasing the footprint. The photo above shows the kitchen bump-out. We put in all new vinyl windows, painted the outside, roofed it ourselves, and tiled the floor. Then the Lord of the Manor's shoulder started giving him trouble. Hmmm, I wonder why?


So over the three day weekend, we started working on the interior finish work. We got a fair amount of wallboard up in the kitchen area. And the Lord of the Manor made these window casings. Most finish carpenters take the little pieces and cut them to fit the window, but my finish carpenter just makes the whole unit and slips it into place.

And here it is in place. Isn't he brilliant? And now I've got to get busy with the paint. I'll keep you posted on the progress here Amongst The Oaks.