Other Floors of La Fortuna

The upstairs -- I didn't take many pictures. I got the view on the Main Floor, and the bedrooms are pretty much just bedrooms.

The Stairs Up break into two parts around a sizable landing, and the three parts (stairs, landing, more stairs) each have their own separate floor-to-ceiling bookshelves on the inner wall.  The tall windows on the landing look west over a Mormon Church and its parking lot about half a block away. Emphasis on over -- the west side of the house is the steepest drop off, so the Church itself is 50 feet or so below the floor of the house.  (HomoDommi commented that they are destined to always own houses overlooking church parking lots).

The church parking lot.  Not really going to be visible once the trees have leafed.

At the top of the stairs there is a small (5 x 8) landing (lined again with bookshelves), and with a nice computer table built in across one end.  A very nice place for the Teenager to sit and play games or do homework -- quiet, aloof, but open to the house, so not too far away from everything.

The upstairs has three bedrooms, all ordinary square rooms with small closets and big windows on the view -- Girl-Child's on the southwest corner, Teenager's next to it, directly overlooking the loggia, and, behind them, what quickly became known as "The Fourth Bedroom" -- windows on two sides overlooking the north, the driveway, the relatively ordinary suburban-looking neighborhood.  This room will be a guest bedroom, and until there is something better, officially HomoDommi's "art" room.  There is also a bathroom.

My room these first couple days in the house, the 4th Bedroom has the only ordinary view in the house.

The basement / Ground Floor

The taller window (see below) overlooks the koi pond and rock garden.

The portion of hill upon which La Fortuna is built is so steep that the "basement" is completely above ground.  The floor is mostly taken up with "The Red Room" -- appropriated as a television/games/guest bedroom already, with a door opening directly outside to the front side of the chicken coop.

This is The Red Room, before we moved in any furniture.  In the original plans, those windows matched steps outside along the side of the house.  In the actual layout now, that's just a rock garden with the koi pond just outside of the taller window.  

The Red Room was the Texan's guest room those first nights in the house.
The door visible at the back is to the L-shaped room. I am standing in front of the door to the outside.

Another room -- hardly a room -- is an L-shaped area almost the full length of the house. The spine of the L is perhaps 5 feet wide, the foot of the L perhaps 6 x 8, all with a half-finished, uneven floor. The whole room is only half-finished -- the head space is quite cavernous, but the non-walkable part of the room is a giant ball of rough concrete.  I think of this as the cartilage between the hill and the house -- protecting each from the other -- the house won't slide down, and the hill won't be eroded away.  The room, such as it is, is currently hip deep in quick and cheap shelving housing working supplies for the chickens, the koi pond, the garden, paints, all nicely labelled.

The back of the L

The foot of the L.

The space isn't really very useable for anything but storage, but I have no doubt HomoDommi will improve that.

There is a second door to the outside on this floor, as well, in an unadorned, concrete-floored hall/mud room.  It opens discreetly to the egg nests at the back of the coop.

La Fortuna, Main Floor

The new house was built in 2000, by introverted people who clearly had a lot of books and knick-knacks.  I conclude this from the evidence:  introversion -- the house is mostly closed off to the neighborhood (a typical snout-house with a two car garage more accessible than the front door, and small windows facing the driveway) and bookish (built-in bookshelves in every room).

The driveway/garages are on the north side of the house -- the south side, facing the wonderful View, is mostly floor-to-ceiling windows.  The front door opens onto a large open room with a stained glass image of a tree and falling leaves; along one interior wall is a floor-to-ceiling, 10 foot wide bookcase.  This room instantly became known as The Tree Room, and it is, for the moment, HomoDommus's study/personal space. The Tree shades the view of the loggia, a large concrete patio inner courtyard with an awning of wisteria.

The Tree Room.  Estimated 10 feet x 10 feet (to the end of the wall).
The great room is beyond the opening.

The bookshelves, actually, are a little odd. They are deep and tall -- 12" at least both ways.  Great for tchotchkes and coffee table books; not so great for paperbacks.  HomoDommus was planning to either take them out and rebuild them, or add sub-shelving -- I'm not sure.  I think they add a lot to the room architecturally, and should be left as is, although I admit I don't know what they'll fill them with.

HomoDommus and The Texan look at the big shelves.

Immediately behind your right elbow as you walk into the house, facing back north, is the dining room.  This is a narrow room and feels more closed in than the Tree Room (which shares the same walls).  It has a little arched doorway into the kitchen, which in the plans was a pocket door (but looks and functions better as just an arch).

The Dining Room

If one walks straight ahead from the front door (walking west-southwest) through the wide archway, one enters the Great Room.  This is really three living spaces, separated by floor and massive bar-height counter.  One space is for casual dining -- under the tiffany lamp on the left (next to big windows looking out at the loggia).  One space is the kitchen (more tomorrow on the kitchen). And the last is the living room.  The windows here look out at the view -- the house is built on so steep a hillside that the yard is about 15 feet below these windows (many steps down from the loggia).

The Great Room.  Note the stairs up, on the right, lined with more of the tall, deep bookshelves.

The Master Suite runs the length of the house on the east side.  Mentally return to the Tree Room (or look back at the pictures above).  Behind the large bookcase is a short hallway to a bare little guest bathroom -- a posh white ceramic basin sink with a faucet and a single tap, all coming directly out of the wall, and a toilet.   (I forgot to photograph -- perhaps the Family will provide one.)  A long blank wall -- probably there was a chest or case there for holding towels and soap.

Girl-Child remembered that when they toured the house a couple weeks ago, the sink had been an artistic one of blue and green turtles. They must have been attached to it; the room is painted dark blue to match -- at least they replaced the artistic sink with a simple, but sophisticated white basin.

If you turn south (right) from the bookcase in the Tree Room, away from the guest bathroom, you will enter the Master Suite.  Here again, large windows overlook the loggia, on two angles. FemmeDommi's Library is south of the bedroom, with a door directly onto the patio.  HomoDommus will be taking out half the bookcase in that room, so there will be room for a chaise under the south window.

The Master Bedroom with Library beyond.

On the north side of the Master Bedroom is an extended bathroom (shower stall separate from soaking tub, toilet behind the door, his and hers sinks).  And beyond that, a huge walk-in closet with miles of shelving and coat rails, and one small window facing north.   This is the same window on the left of the photo of the house from the street behind it.  There is no fan in the closet (and I didn't see one in the bathroom) -- my guess is that Boise is so dry, they don't need to worry about moisture and mildew.

Master Bath, and closet beyond.

The tub may or may not be a whirlpool.  The Teenager volunteered to take two baths a week without complaint, if they could be in the tub. His offer was accepted with more alacrity than he expected.

Time miss-spent - but - Chickens!

I squandered my time this evening (caught up with two nights of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report) and so will put off the next step of the house-move description until tomorrow.

To tide you over, here are some photos of the chickens. The whole horizontal part of the yard (as compared to the near-vertical part) is securely fenced in, so the chickens get free range -- which they take full advantage of.  It was quite pleasant to find them in the shrubbery, usually travelling in a flock.

Girl-child contemplating how to grab Betsy the Chicken for long enough to take a photo.

Soufflé and Peaches (aka Shadow) checking to see if Betsy survives the approach of the humans.

There is a fourth chicken, Angel, the largest of the bunch, but she is also the shyest. This is the closest I got to her.

Angel, less confident in her safety than the other chickens.

There had been a fifth chicken, apparently red, "Colonel Buck-Buck", but she died two days before Closing. Although sad to lose her, we were mostly relieved she died before the hand-off, rather than just after -- we would have assumed we'd done something damaging to the poor fowl.

Aside from eating her eggs, that is.  We had four eggs in the 3 days I was at the house.

La Fortuna

I flew out to Boise to help HomoDommus and FemmeDommus move (finally!) from their three-plus year rental to a realio-trulio owned own home.  And such a marvelous home it is!

Four bedrooms, three livable stories. A gorgeous patio with a thick awning of wisteria, overlooking a view south and east across the city of Boise and some distant (low) mountains beyond.  A densely planted garden of flowers and fruit trees and bushes, and a vegetable garden.  A babbling (man-made) stream that flows down to a pond with 6 koi in it.  Four chickens and daily fresh eggs.

Curiously, it is a recently built house (curious, because that tends not to be "our style").  The former owners built it to their specifications -- she (or maybe he) is an avid gardener, and she is a writer (of Young Adult novels, I believe leaning towards paranormal and romance, since that is what all Young Adult novels do these days).  The house is full of built-in bookshelves.

The house is built on top of a finger of a foothill, with snow-covered mountains (snow-covered, at least, in early March) at its back.  There is a small yard (as I said, densely planted), and a very, very, steep drop off to the edge of the property.  They are just four houses down the street from an impressive mansion built by Mr. Simplot (of Simplot Potatoes).  He gave the house to the state of Idaho, on condition that the huge flag be flown above it daily -- it has been in use as the Governor's Mansion for several years. (Click here to read the wikipedia.org article about it.)

You can see the Simplot Mansion (under the flag - no kidding about the size of that flag) in the photos below.  All the land between the camera and the flag is part of the mansion -- it is a city landmark; a dog park; and the biggest, steepest sliding hill in Boise.

The Boiseans new house is the last one down the hill to the left of the flag.

(Remember to click on the photos to see them larger.)

HomoDommus driving one of the moving vans to the new house.

La Fortuna, as I call it, is the green house on the far left.  The Simplot Mansion is beyond the flagpole.

For those who have been tracking the house purchase, the windows,
from left to right are: Ground floor: closet of Master Suite; guest bathroom;
dining room; and the multi-paned window next to the garage is in the kitchen.
Upstairs: two windows of "The Fourth Bedroom" as it's called, and the family bathroom window.

From the back, the house looks quite like any other 21st Century house -- a two car garage, a shy entrance tucked in a corner.  When FemmeDommus and I arrived on Friday morning (awaiting the delivery of the new refrigerator) a thick mist obscured the view beyond the house.  But the mist burned off and we had two full days of sun and warmth -- perfect moving weather.

The view from the wisteria-overgrown patio.

The same view that evening, from in front of the patio.

The first day, the new refrigerator was installed, and we moved the kitchen things, and a few chairs and rugs, and beds, so we all could sleep in the house that first night of occupation.  There was also quite a bit of last-minute desperation packing, but we ended with pizza eaten in a picnic on the floor in front of the gas fire.

I'll talk about the interior of the house, and the special features, tomorrow.