Screened Porch

Since I'm constantly refering to my screened in porch, I thought it might be a good idea to tell the story of how it came to be. As I mentioned in an earlier post, my back porch used to be nothing more than a set of three concrete steps sitting outside the back door. It was hot, and sunny, and not a very pleasant place to be, so I spent most of my time in the front yard. Our front porch is big, beautiful, and shaded by a huge oak tree. I loved sitting out there in the cool of the evening, with a diet Coke and a book. The only problem was the guilt I felt when my indoor cats stood at the door and cried to be with me. I had mentioned to Dave that I'd like to have a deck built out back, but since I had a perfectly good front porch, we put the thought on the back burner. Then, a few years later, several rent houses filled with loud, rude, very obnoxious people. They all must have decided to hate eachother, because they constantly yelled, and each tried to turn their music louder than the other. It became so unpleasant to be outside, that I holed myself up in the house most of the time, and became depressed. We began to think more seriously about building a nice back porch. The idea became a reality in 2007, when we hired a contractor to build an addition to the back of our house. Our water heater, washer and dryer were taking up much needed space in the kitchen, so we decided to build a utility room for them, with a back door opening onto a large deck, which I'd decided to screen in.
I haven't regretted it for a moment. The addition moved the back of the house closer to the pecan tree, so I still have my shade. I can sit out on my back porch, and read or knit. We've added a pet door so the cats can go out there and enjoy the fresh air while they relax and bird watch. A wonderful, unexpected perk is that Dave can now sleep in on Saturdays, because the porch roof keeps the sun from glaring into our bedroom windows in the mornings. Our utility room holds our washer and dryier, and they've built a nice closet for our water heater and brooms. We also added a closet for Dave, so now we both have our own closets. I just couldn't be more happy.