Life At Villa Boswell

If you are looking for a fuss-free shrub that will provide lots of privacy, then check out pittosporum.  Since our backyard patio is completely exposed to our neighbor’s view, I wanted something that would grow tall enough to provide a sense of privacy.  Fortunately, there are lots of examples around our neighborhood showing the various ways pittosporum can be used in landscaping, so this post will give you lots of photos and some good advice for growing P.Eugenoides.

• How do you plant Pittosporum?
• Pittosporum as a privacy screen
• Spacing
• Trimming and care

What is Pittosporum?

Pittosporum are evergreen trees or shrubs that consist of a number of varieties, from low-growing shrubs to really tall trees.  They are hardy to zones 8-10.  This article discusses Pittosporum Eugenoides, which originates in New Zealand and is also known as Tarata or Lemonwood tree.  The NZ Plant Pics website gives a nice overview of the various types of pittosporum, along with some good pics.  At first, I thought it was called Lemonwood tree because its spring flowers smell like lemons, but after an initial pruning, I learned that the leaves and branches emit a wonderful lemony smell when cut. That’s a nice bonus when you are using them as a hedge.

Continue reading Pittosporum for Privacy Hedge

What an innocuous little title for such drama. This staircase has more twists and turns than Peyton Place! I’ve missed lots of work on the house since the drywall, but rather than going in sequence, I thought I’d let you know that we declare March 9 National House-Done-Day.  Yeppers, we passed our final inspection and got our electric tag.  Hopefully, we will have our electricity turned on this week.

Wayyy early Monday morning, at 1 a.m. to be exact, we finished the last requirement of the house necessary from the County’s perspective:  the master stair railing.  This blog is a little about that pain-in-the-neck staircase.

Continue reading Winding Staircase

I spoke with Chris tonight.  Both of us are feeling tired and overwhelmed by our work loads (he on the house and me on house/job stuff).  It’s been such a long haul, and it never seems quite done.  We broke ground in May of 2007 and spent 2 years prior to that in intense design/planning/structural.  I tried to cheer him up, and as I did so, I couldn’t help but do this little exercise, because by training I document stuff.

So, when someone sees the completed house, practically everything that you lay your eyes on will have been created, installed, modified or highly directed by Chris, Lora, Brian, me, or Clay. 

Let’s Start with Lora

Continue reading How Do You Build Your Own House?

While a lot of the exterior work was going on, we had a crew inside doing the drywall.  Boy, these guys are FAST!!! And really messy.  You’ve never seen anything so messy as drywall, and it’s not just the dust. But, as usual, let’s start with just before, where the remaining walls that were not ThermaSteel SIPs were covered with reflective foil.  Heat reflection and insulation, with 5/8" drywall everywhere–efficient and sound absorbent.

Living room.

Master Bedroom.

Ok, now let’s begin drywalling. 

Continue reading Drywall

This post will be sort of a long pictorial showing how we started the finish work on the lower walkway. The final touches are not done yet, but you’ll get the sense of the scope of what it means to create a raised walkway with fill and concrete, and how important it is to have knowledgeable concrete workers doing the job.

The Before

So, here we are in the before. In the very foreground is the rough cut soil that is thankfully decomposed granite.  Still, that all had to be finished.  There is a good 7′ of clearance between the bottom of the walkway and the underside of the plank going from the lane to the main deck.

Continue reading Lower Walkway