Well 2010 comes to a close and now 2011 is upon us we are faced with a new set of challenges. 2011 for us was going to be a holding year, with planning permission granted and a new baby on the way we’d decided to stop the renovation, save the money to get more done in one go and enjoy

Or in English : The building permit is GRANTED! FANTASTIC! It’s been a long hard road and we’ve made many mistakes but today we had some fantastic news and now we can really start to get together full quotes, project plans and time scales to turn our current 1 bedroom flat into a rather large open plan 3 bedroom family

WOW! As we had hoped we’ve had a flurry of activity at the house & things have really moved forward. It’s hard to know where to start so i figured i’d give you a little overview while i write up the larger posts. So here’s what’s new : Bathroom now finished & painted, there’s even a toilet roll holder to

Well that was a bit of a shocking phone call! There was no paperwork, no inspection, no photographs just a chat on the phone with some figures from our builder with a cost to repair and then a “Yes Mrs Caller that’s completed, the money will be in your account on Monday”… WHAT WHAT

Almost a week in and things are starting to shape up very nicely indeed

Have you ever done a job that you’ve always known needs doing & once you’ve started it you wonder why you’d left it so long? Well the removal of the ceiling in the old bedrooms was definitely one of them jobs

In the grand scheme of things with the damage and loss of life these large storms in France have caused we’ve got to think of ourselves as very lucky. This time we got away with only minor property damage but again it’s the roofs on the barn & grange that have suffered&#

With the groundwork already done by Dawn & her Dad (Eric) (in this post : HERE) it was now time to get the tiles removed, the roof opened up and wooden beams taken down so we can really start to see the potential in the space we then have and that was a job for me and my Dad! Here

With Christmas coming it’s time to spend a few days getting the house ready for the winter and the work we have planned for the coming months. Today was about setting the week up so it’s the start of all the dirty jobs (oh joy)

To make way for the new floor we are planning to put in requires the creation of one large open space in what we call “The Barn” . This is the space to the right of the living quarters which currently incorporates our bedroom to the far left of the building. In order to start this we need to empty