Shade, Sanity, & Sourdough

We took a quick detour from our original plan of getting the porch done this week to tackle something that has been making life in the kitchen almost unbearable. The back of the house faces east, which means from the moment the sun comes up until nearly 4 pm, the kitchen sits in full sunlight. From May through October, it stays over 80 degrees in there before I even turn on the oven. For a regular kitchen, that’s miserable. For a microbakery kitchen, it’s a disaster.

So instead of pushing forward with finishing the porch, we made a very practical (and honestly life-saving) decision to install a large awning over the pool deck. It shades the kitchen windows and creates a wall of cool, soft light that finally makes it possible to bake again without melting. The difference was almost immediate. The kitchen feels calm and workable now, and I can already tell my sourdough starter is happier, too.

What we didn’t expect was how nice it would be to sit out there. The awning is big enough to make a perfectly shaded spot by the pool, and since we don’t have a porch right now, it has quickly become my favorite place to read or unwind after work. There’s something really peaceful about sitting outside with my Kindle and a glass of Cali Red while knowing the kitchen behind me is cool, comfortable, and ready for another bake day.

We’ll get back to the porch soon, but for now, this feels like progress in all the best ways.

Huge shout-out to JPW Patio Designs for the incredible job on our awning. The guys were kind, knowledgeable, got the job done quickly, AND cleaned up the entire area when they finished.