Monday Memories

We bought a house.

It had two porches; one in front

And one in back

We decided two porches are not enough.

Mr. Marvelous, being Marvelous, turned the area under the back porch

into another porch.

He screened in both the upper and the lower back porches.

I like my back porches.

I get a lot of use out of my upstairs porch.

It is my summer kitchen.

 It is my space to sit in my rocker

Sometimes it is where I do the routine household paperwork

 like menu planning and budgeting

Sometimes it is where I work on crafts

No matter what the activity, I always love the view.

A year or two ago Mr. Marvelous talked about putting plastic up over the porch.  His reasoning was to create a warm space in the winter.  We could grow plants on the porch if it were covered.  We could grow things ALL YEAR!

My response was always and adamantly

NO.

I was absolutely NOT willing to give up the view.  Not see the deer?  Or the turkeys?  Or watch the hawks soaring over the trees?  I don't think so!

In the fall of this past year, I started thinking about my rosemary plants.  I keep losing them to cold weather.  I thought about my parsley.  I thought about being able to grow lettuce through the winter.  There is a window in my kitchen that looks out onto the back porch.  Wouldn't it be nice if Mr. Marvelous could do just a little build out and turn that into a kind of bay window with shelves, cover it with plastic and make it a miniature greenhouse?  Doesn't that sound like a perfect idea to you?  Me too.  So I suggested it to Mr. Marvelous.  The response was laughter.  Not exactly what I was looking for.

He explained that it was not practical either work-wise or financially.  I kept thinking about it.  I could not let go of the idea.  Finally I gave in.  

"Well if you can not build that window, perhaps we should cover the porch with plastic this year?"

To say he was shocked would be an understatement.  

I assured him that I was serious and before I could change my mind he got busy.  In one afternoon, he and Junior managed to cover both the upstairs and the downstairs.  It was a little different, but I adjusted.  

 (Well of course Jack helped!)

He added two hinged plastic coated windows that could swing open on extra-warm days to vent it.  We didn't figure we would need those much before early spring.  We were wrong.

 It has been a bit gloomy and cold the past few weeks.  There has been a lot of rain and clouds and not much sunshine.   Yet even on the cloudy, gloomy days, the temperature on that back porch stays at least a good 10 degrees warmer than outside, and usually a full 20 degrees warmer.

When the sun shines, here is what happens.  

This was the outside temperature one sunny morning last week:

That's cold by Alabama standards

This was the temperature at the same time on my lovely back porch:

Mr. Marvelous received a text telling him just how marvelous he is.

I will happily surrender a bit of a view

in exchange for a warm place to sit in January!