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Name: Katie Duffy (@contemporary_inthecountry)
Age: 32
Occupation: Primary school teacher
Location: Co Mayo
What type of house is it? A self build home. The project began in 2017.
How many bedrooms and bathrooms? Four bedrooms, four bathrooms.
When did you move in? February 2020
Who lives there? Myself and my fiancé Henry.
What made you choose this home design over others?
We wanted to design a home with modern and traditional elements that worked well with the site and the country landscape around us. Our house is nestled amongst mature trees and it sits on a hill overlooking pasture fields.
What’s your favourite part of your home and why?
That would probably be our living room, which has a vaulted ceiling and a glass mezzanine. You can see for miles through the triangular shaped window on the mezzanine. It’s a real treat to sit and look out at the ever-changing view and landscape depending on the seasons. We have a pair of upcycled 1960s armchairs up there and nothing sitting and relaxing with a coffee on a Saturday or Sunday morning. The vaulted ceiling has a great impact when you walk into the living area.
The living area of the house has large glass areas and the sunlight just beams in, so one challenged we encountered during the summer was figuring out how to keep our home cool.
I typically get up around 7am after I’ve hit the snooze button on more than one occasion. I like to set the alarm a little earlier than I need, to ease myself into getting up! From then I have an hour to leave the house for work. I go straight for the shower in our ensuite bathroom and then I make my way to my dressing room where I’ll get dressed and pop on some makeup. Once I’m all set, I head to the kitchen for breakfast. Henry is generally on breakfast duties and I cook dinner. It works well for us as I get home earlier from work than Henry.
I arrive home from work around 4.30pm and like to fit in some form of exercise before dinner, usually a gym session or a walk. Dinner is prepared around 6pm and we sit down to eat the at the dining table around 7pm when Henry arrives home. Weekdays can be quite busy, so we really enjoy catching up over dinner. After washing up, we move to the living area where we watch some Netflix or browse through social media while having our last cuppa of the day. Around 9.45pm I usually check on our indoor plants (dotted all around the house) and give the leaves a little spritz before bed. They love a little TLC! We tend to have lights out by 10.30pm on weekdays.
Overall I’m very happy with our design, but if we were designing again, I would give more consideration to our utility room. Having lived in the house for a while, I’d really appreciate a boot room which would help keep all the everyday items such as coats, shoes, bags, hats and so on organised. It’d be lovely to be able close the door and hide the mess!
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Canada, gun ownership but with much less mass shootings.
Much like the rest of the world.
Something is broken in the USA.
@Barry Somers: Very true. Iceland is the same it is one of the countries with the least amount of gun crime, if not the least amount, but with the most amount of gun ownership per capita. There is definitely something seriously amiss in the American system
Guns aren’t the problem in the US. Vetting & enforcement is.
@León O’Keeffe: and the population of Iceland is??? It has relatively no crime, no particular need to own a gun either..
@León O’Keeffe: “but with the most amount of gun ownership per capita. T!
Iceland ranks 15th in the world for gun ownership per person, still quite high but not 1st place. USA is in 1st place.
Finland is another European country with a high rate of gun ownership, it’s in 10th place.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_guns_per_capita_by_country
The US response to all conflicts is to respond with firepower. It brags about its military force, there is a constant attitude of ‘we’re better than you because we have better military hardware’. They glorify military service. The answer to all conflict or opinion is clouded by the possibility of use of firepower by government. There is a pervasive attitude that all can be solved by the gun and that life is cheap. These attitudes are not the same in Canada or Iceland or Switzerland where there is large gun ownership.
I blame video games.
@MAX POWER: I blame people
@Skybloo: I blame the weatherman
@Tweety McTweeter: I blame it on the rain
@Anne: blame it on the boogie
@Elma Phudd: don’t put your blame on me
@Elma Phudd: blame it on the sunshine !
He just never knew when he had gun too far!!!!
He’s not a careful gun owner
How old anyone get licenses for 100 guns ?
@Terry Cahill: could ..
Stupid owner collection 100 gun not protection lock vault and if someone break in would steal all gun then sell to crime gang to somebody kill that blame him for not have protection vault
@Brian Flavin: wow
@Brian Flavin: wow. Someone didn’t have their porridge this morning….
@Alan Wiley: Brian has hearing difficulties. I’ll let him explain if he wants to but that is up to him! He’s well known and liked on this forum! Feel free too disagree with him too if you want!
@Al Madzer: Brian has hearing difficulties. I’ll let him explain if he wants to but that is up to him! He’s well known and liked on this forum! Feel free too disagree with him too if you want!
@GerryCummins: ok thanks
@Al Madzer: or someone pissed in it
@Brian Flavin: still imagine a bank robber with a long gun.
@GerryCummins: lol sorry I don’t know you
Is the man okay the guns seem to be fine there’s only 100
Wonder how they seen the guns would they not needed a warrant to enter , unless he invited them in.
@Life is short enjoy it: it says in the article that they saw them around the house as soon as they entered which they did with his permission.
have your say