the archway

All of our rooms sort of seem like your on a train, no hallways and narrow doors going through. Each of our eight rooms are all about 13 to 14 wide, the length in which folks could get vigas across for the roofs.  The door from the kitchen to the living room was falling apart after we were chipping plaster and discovered that there was a mud smoke hole in the wall.  The adobe was all brittle and black, so this gave us a good reason to just knock it down.  It wasn't a load bearing wall and is single adobe (8-10 inches thick).  I made the corbels myself with my saws all, I wanted them to look like whale tails.  We got some big posts which were knocked down from a twister north of us.  The lintel is western cedar from my grandfathers old work bench.   It was probably milled at the Westside Lumber Company in Tuolumne, CA where he used to work.  After he died my Father asked me what I wanted from Grandpa's old shed, I told him the wood from his bench... he just sighed and said, "figures".  It was quite difficult to take it apart and I drove it back to New mexico tied to the car.  When I sanded it I was amazed that it looked like the Sierra Nevada foothills where I grew up and where it was from.  My husband really wanted a moorish window next the archway, so I built it for him.  It really looks nice with a candle in it.