leopard shed

[Yvonne G]

I'm in partnership on all my turtles and tortoises with a fellow who lives in Pennsylvania. He used to work as a reptile keeper at the Philly zoo. He was in town for a visit this week-end and he helped me with some projects that I had going. Here's what my leopard shed looked like. The tongue-and-groove siding was badly warped and pulling away from the studs. The shed is probably 80 or 100 years old:

And here's what it looks like today. I just have to re-hang the door and paint it:

All that lumber in the foreground is the old siding, which is now destined for my wood stove!!

Yvonne

 

[Crazy1]

Yvonne, looks like you are getting quite a bit accomplished this spring Looking forward to the finished-painted pics too.

 

[tortoisenerd]

Yay! Quite the productive day.

 

[Candy]

Don't forget to primer first. It looks great Yvonne what a great friend for you to have. I also noticed your garden on the side looks pretty nice.

 

[Stazz]

Wow - looking good Yvonne Your torts are so lucky to have you. And what a lovely big space you have! I'm envious

 

[Yvonne G]

I'm just about finished with the shed. I still have to clean up the old lumber. With a fresh coat of paint you can hardly tell that I used old, junky, used plywood!!

Yvonne

(I'm too cheap to toss anything. I probably have more used lumber than a lumber yard has!)

 

[Candy]

You should paint a giant tortoise on the front of it Yvonne.

 

[Laura]

Paint leopard spots in it... camoflage....

 

[bettinge]

Your torts can really stick their noses in the air now, as they have beautifully refurbished home. Looks like Ty Pennington stopped by!

 

[Yvonne G]

I think that the story I've pieced together about the old house behind my house is kind of interesting:

Many years ago all of the property in my neighborhood belonged to an old guy named Blakely. He lived in an old one-room "house" and when he got too old to take care of himself, he built the house I live in now, for his daughter's family, so they could take care of him.

In the beginning, before the daughter's house was built, the man's home consisted of a one room building on cement piers and wooden timbers. And the 10'x10' shed you see in the pictures is just outside the one-room. This shed is now my leopard shed. Inside the leopard shed there is a drainboard and sink along one wall, but no plumbing. They probably had to haul water, as I don't see any place where there would have been a hand pump. There is a metal-rimmed hole high on the back wall where the stove vented out. So my leopard shed was the kitchen for the old man's one room "shack."

You can see where rooms were added onto the guy's one-room home over the years. First a "real" kitchen, then a bedroom, then he extended the living room and added a bathroom.

Its a real shame that I don't have the money to get this old house back up to speed. The wooden timbers that run under the house are rotting and the house is starting to lean. It won't be long before it will be unsafe to go into. Right now I just use it as an over-grown storage shed (and the cats find refuge in there from bad weather.) But when I first bought the property, my mother and her grandson lived in the house I now live in, and my daughter and her husband lived in Blakeley's old house.

I'm always looking for treasure when I dig, but so far haven't found his old dump site...just a rusty spike or broken bottle occasionally.

Yvonne

 

[nickpanzee]

Wow! That's pretty cool! I like things like that too.

 

[shelber10]

Nice job looks very nice

 

[bettinge]

Yvonne, You must have had a tort at some point in time named "Blakely"???

 

[Yvonne G]

Lol! No, I really don't name my tortoises. If they came to me with a name, then they kept that name, but the only new tortoises that I actually named are the two Aldabran tortoises (The Bigger One [Bo] and The Smaller One [So]!

Yvonne

(And Laura here on the forum gets credit for their nick-names)

 

[Stazz]

Yvonne, it would be quite exciting to fiind an old treasure buried somewhere!!!