Our new greenhouse

My wonderful husband is back to work today after the hardest-working vacation we've had in a long while. Yesterday afternoon, we reattached the eavestroughs to our new greenhouse, and the major renovation work to its exterior shell is complete. Now we can work on the interior at a decent pace without worrying about thunderstorms or getting eaten by mosquitoes. It's a pretty impressive accomplishment when I think that it was just a dark little hobby shed on August 1st.

Here's the exterior BEFORE (August 3rd) and AFTER (August 15th), followed by interior shots.

I love all the light. My neighbour says I should just clean it up and put in a table and chair for a winter studio on sunny days, or a tea room. But I'm looking forward to all the seedlings I'll be able to start... they won't be growing so long and stringy any more, with their necks crooked toward the window.

Because greenhouses lose a lot of heat in winter from their north sides, Lee opted to make the south side the place where the light comes through, and we plan on dividing the interior with a wall that will absorb solar energy during the day and radiate warmth for our plants at night. We'll have storage on the other side of the insulated solar wall, and hopefully our greenhouse won't require much heating. There's a fan installed in the end wall to keep the temperature from getting too high on really sunny days, and we can always open the windows.

I guess you could say we had a very productive vacation this year... even if I didn't get to relax and read a book from start to finish. As Lee says, it was something completely different... a mind break if not a body break, and I'm looking forward to learning how to run a greenhouse starting next January when I plant my own peppers. Oooh, and I'll be able to start my own annuals, too... and maybe I will take to having my morning coffee out among the green growing things on sunny winter days...

Thank you, Lee, for an amazing vacation, and the incredible amount of research, time and energy you put into making this dream of ours come true. You're the best!