April 20 2007 —More barn shots  

Here we are looking west through the barn on the ground floor. This is where the big event will take place in August!

Once we move in, the area nearest the foreground will be used for storage and the area nearest the front will be used for gardening equipment and maybe a gym area. We will have to see how much junk we have to store.

Here we are behind the barn looking down at it from the bank behind. You can see in the upper floor framing, the doors for the bathroom and the door to the second floor. There will be a deck in front of these two doors and either a ramp or stairs to the bank out of the photo to the left. The bathroom (actually a half-bath) is there for us when we are working in the barn and will double as a porta-potty for anyone working on the property once we move in.
Opposite where the barn stairs (or ramp) will end, my old garden corral holds roses and (out of site) olive trees ready for planting once the fence is finished.

Here is a close-up of the roses growing in tubs. The one in the foreground is a chinensis mutabalis, a truly obliging rose which will grow under almost any conditions. The others are Sally Holmes and Phyllis Bide starts from my roses here in Oakland. I intend to move most of the roses up to TBV, but those two I will leave here in Oakland for the new owner.

Between the roses and the big bay tree you see in the middle-ground, construction on the house will soon begin.

Looking back down the bank to the back of the barn, we see Jim, hard at work making a sales call.

This picture is taken in front of the old garden corral, again looking at the 2nd floor doors.

You can see the side of the incredably massive slab—50 yards in the slab alone—and this does not count the concrete in the piers and grade-beams.

One last shot before we left for lunch, looking back down the driveway at the barn. They are still waiting to pour the slab on the guest cottage, which has been stalled by the rain. Hopefully it will go in on Monday.