Big a$$ garage and the runway

I figure we should talk about the backyard while it's still summer and it makes sense to show you pictures of flowers.  No one's gonna want to see a backyard redo when it's 65 degrees out, you know?  You just won't be in the zone.

First i have to tell you about one of the main reasons we chose this particular house-it had the space to build a giant detached garage for S's antique truck that he's rebuilding.  Said giant garage is also the reason the house hasn't come along as quickly as it should, since many months were put into the preparing of the garage and the driveway. 

This is literally the first day we got the house.  I'd like to call your attention to the magnitude of weeds, black vent hiding behind the bush, and the tiered driveway with the garage under the house.  Sadly the green garage door still exists, but not for too much longer.

The yard.  I hardly knew ye. 

The tiered steep driveway leading to the under the house garage.  See ya, wouldn't wanna be ya!  This all got filled in with dirt to where the flat piece is.

Only picture i could find to illustrate this, lol.  We will be connecting this "walkway to nowhere" with stairs coming from the basement.

At least S knows his limitations-although he dug the footings, wheel-barrowed dirt back and forth a million times to fill in the steep driveway, shingled the roof of the garage, did the capping and the soffeting, ran the electricity, something about "conduit", etc, he hired professionals to do the masonry and pour the concrete.

 Boys and their toys.  Yep, that's him digging the new driveway.

What i have termed "the runway."  it's long but it looks darn good!  We were the talk of our neighborhood with this addition, strangers driving by would literally slow down and tell us what a great job we did and how the concrete looks so nice (instead of asphalt).  I like it because it gives us more side yard, and we are the only house that doesn't have the driveway next to the house, which i think is a rather clean look.

The outside of the sunroom had a facelift, too.  Can you see where that black vent was?  Look at those stairs, lordy lou.  They are stairs on stairs, if you can tell.  Concrete and then aluminum and iron, for some strange reason.

We painted the black sides tan to match the stucco, and the railings white.  I think they flow much better and don't look like they were just plopped on.  It also wasn't very long before i couldn't stand looking at the giant cinderblock garage til we stucco it.  Can't wait to show you how i prettied that up.  I hope you'll think so, too!  Here's a sneaky peak!

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