There are lots of unexpected things that come up when you live in a historic home…
So many generations have come before you…
What they added, subtracted, moved, shifted, destroyed or buried is a constant unknown!
Last week Kent and I decided that the flagstone pathway at the side door needed to be redone before winter.
The stones had sunk in some places leaving spots for water to pool.
We thought since we were going to that much effort we might as well widen it, put pea stones between the flagstones and add them around the boxwood hedges.
So…
We got to work!
The orange paint line shows our general plan for expansion… very high tech!
At this point we thought we should take a bit more dirt away and even things out. Kent put his shovel in and hit something…
He dug around a bit and decided the tractor was needed… (i.e.: Kent wanted to run the tractor )
Right in the centre of the pathway buried about six inches down he found this!
A wonderful Gristmill stone!
Why, how or when it came to be buried under the pathway I have no idea but finding it was like Christmas morning… we were giggling like schoolgirls. ( Well… I was, Kent was completely manly as usual :))
Now the question was what to do with it!
It seemed very fitting to design the new pathway around it making it the focal point.
We set it into place and started bringing the pea stone in around it.
Then we placed the flagstone from the old pathway back in.
There was a second large stone buried which we used for the end stone.
The pathway is much more level and having it a bit wider is much better for us. The story behind the gristmill stone pathway will be told many times I have no doubt! It leads me to wonder what else is buried around here!
Things are progressing with the various renovation projects inside the house as well. I have shared some pics of the kitchen on Instagram but am waiting to do a blog post until it is completely finished and my friend Erin comes to take photos. She will do a much better job than I ever could and with this amount of effort I really would like lovely photos for the website and blog!
Now for a little Tip of the day from me to you!.
We have had a terrible fly problem here. They are thick as thieves in every window where the sun shines. I read about Lavender being a natural fly repellent so we placed four plants in the windowsills as an experiment…
It really works!
The flys are about 80% less than they had been.
I am thrilled!!!
Please follow along on Instagram, It has become my go to place to share what we are up to on any given day.
Here is a shot I shared from the kitchen looking into the foyer.
The glads were from a roadside stand… 12 for $5.00
I added some wildflowers from the pasture to fill in.
Crazy beautiful!!
That same stand had these beautiful bouquets all done up in mason jars…
I couldn’t resist!!
Have a wonderful week!!
