by Will Kester

Created on: April 05, 2007   Last Updated: April 25, 2007

Expanding a house by adding on can be very expensive, and a real pain as you live in the mess. It increases your taxes, your insurance, and your house payments, often. I love to have room to entertain, but instead of adding onto the house, I expanded it out into the yard, cheaper and with some innovations, it works well for me.

I use my back yard for a living room in warm months, and feed as many as a hundred people, frequently. It's not that large a back yard, but it works well, with games for the guests to play, and plenty of shade. Shade is important, when it's hot. I usually invite them to arrive before it cools off, so they can see and enjoy the garden, the flowers, and the sparkling water of the water fall. They are welcome to hit the hot tub, which in the summer I call a cool pool, since I keep it at about ninety-eight degrees in summer; but they usually don't go in. They take off their shoes and put their feet in it, sipping sangria and visiting around the edge, or play darts, horse shoes, croquet or putt-putt golf on the lawn, or the favorite game at my house in summer - shuffle board.

I built the shuffleboard myself, for three hundred dollars. It looks like and old-West saloon bar when the top is closed, and it becomes a buffet serving bar for tons of food, served in huge portions, cooked in the covered area nearby. When all have eaten and the buffet bar is cleared, we open the lid, which flips straight down, out of the way. Inside is an eighteen-foot shuffleboard. Kids and adults enjoy it, and can play together, since most of them are really bad players. The kids learn to knock their opponents off the board, quickly. They squeal and high-five their partners, when the four-point, dangling-off-the-edge puck gets knocked off.

As the evening cools, and the guests appetites are satiated with food and drink, the mood becomes quieter. We sit near the falls, listening to the sounds of night, and talking by candlelight. Ultimately, several people will say something like, "You have such a great place for your friends." Proudly I respond, "Yes, I agree, but with great friends, you need a special place to put them all." They go home to their large, expensive homes, watch television in air-conditioned comfort, and wait until I call and invite them to come play again.

I clean up the mess the next morning, cut some fresh roses, lie in my hammock, or soak in the cool pool, and enjoy the solitude.

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