Firstly: Thanks for hanging in there! I know thing have been more than a little quiet on the site and that’s simply because there’s not been a lot going on with the renovation, due to the weather in France. The good news however is we’ve not just sat back, we’ve been planning, organising & generally beavering away, and next week sees the restart of work as the result of all that planning!
So after the enforced winter’s break we finally have a break in the weather from high winds (more roof damage), very low temperatures (no frozen pipes this year is a WIN!) and a generally very tough European winter.
Hopefully the weather station has survived and we’ll download the data when we get there to share with you, but for now the outlook for the next few weeks is looking bright and it’s time to make the dash over to the house and roll up ”our” sleeves. I say ”our” rather lightly because really it’s my Dad! Yep it’s once again time to throw the big guns at it and he’s come up trumps again and will be doing most of the work we’ll be talking about (we need to keep him topped up with good food the odd beer & lots of English tea - then we stand a fighting chance of achieving some great things).
Here’s the plan!
- Put the finishing touches to the bathroom
- Repoint the interior walls in the kitchen area
- Remove the rear ”bedroom” ceiling
- Insulate & plasterboard a new ceiling
- Run electrics to the new bedroom
- Create a new floor for the the rear bedroom (lots of levelling to do here)
- Order new windows (more about this soon)
- Order new custom front stable style door (more about this soon)
- Fit new kitchen appliances
Now of course some of this is going to take more than the 3 weeks my Dad is on site but you’ll be pleased to know we aren’t flogging him to death; there’ll be builders in and then after that we have some tenants for 2 months, in Dawn’s parents, so works will continue with and around them, and both Dawn and I will be going to the house as well so it really is a full-on affair.
What does this all mean?
Simply put, by the summer the house will be in a totally liveable state. There’ll be no more rustic ”slumming it” in a house with holes in the walls, ill fitting door & windows and a rear ”bedroom” that’s currently really just a room in the barn we’ve thrown some beds in. From this point on it means we can concentrate on getting all the plans through and the major renovation started on the rest of the house knowing that we’ve always got a water-tight, warm, accommodating and really rather nice cottage for us and everyone else to go out to without worrying how cold it’ll be or if a window has fallen out. So keep your eyes peeled as there is going to be a flurry of posts, pictures and we’ll even grace you with Episode 7 (or is it 8?) of our podcast..
Thanks for hanging in there, it feels so good to be back..
