Here are some before, during & after photos with the bigger sets below.

With the roof now cleared you can really start to get a sense of size of the space we will have available to us. The timbers that we removed we are offering for free to anyone who wants to collect them (see HERE) and the cattle feed rack on the left we’ve given to Jean Luc our farming neighbour so he’s got use out of that. We are also trying to rescue the trough (at the bottom of the picture) that has a water irrigation system still fitted but given the time it’s stood unused and the rust its infested with it looks like it’ll only good for junk, which is a shame. Also not sure what we’re going to do with the old tiles as yet but i’m hoping i can at least crush them down and use them as hardcore rather than taking them to the dump.

Below are the remaining photos from the work carried out by Dad and I, unfortunately the two photos which would have proved popular if we’d captured it we don’t have…

These were :

1. I slammed my head off the main roof beam
2. One of the beams rolled and slammed the side of my head…

How i wasn’t knocked spark out is beyond me, but more to the surprise of Dad i didn’t lose my rag.
There must be ZEN in them bits of wood ;)

And that’s it. That’s where we are at the moment, we’ve got the wall to remove of course but i need to figure out what to do with all those bricks we’ll remove. There isn’t such a thing as a skip hire company around here and taking it all to the municipal dump is going to take many many trips with a car and a trailer so I need to get my thinking cap on!

Do you have any ideas?

New wood burning stove
heat in this house has always been somewhat of an issue. With the old stone walls and rather large gaps in them and lack of a “proper” heat source we’ve always struggled to heat the house. We’ve used paraffin heaters to heat the rooms etc etc but these cost a lot to run and the only other source of heat possible is from an old cooker stove that is very inefficient and doesn’t throw out a lot of heat at all and all that changed today.. Welcome the Poele Godin to the house.

Now Poele Godin isn’t a name i’ve come across while searching for a wood burning stove and that’ll be because it’s a very French brand. This particular one is 40 years old and belonged to the parents of a friend of ours. A quick search on ebay.fr brings up a few available for sale in our area ranging from ¢300 to €500 and given the amazing change in heat this house has i’ll be bidding on one asap (eBay search : http://bit.ly/Poele )…

With the amount of heat kicking off this thing we thought we’d try out cooking bacon on it and since that was a success we even threw in some potatoes! Genius! For the first time in Autumn/Winter since we’ve owned the house i’m sitting here in a t-shirt and not a t-shirt, jumper and a body warmer If i can get one for €300/€500 then it’s really priceless.

Clearing the barn & more hedgehogs
Enough said about this, needless to say another 5 found, i’ve got a bloody hedgehog farm going on here!

Sorting the lawn
Today was full of goodies from Jacque and this time it was the ride on mower. Given the amount of sun and rain we get here the garden grows wild, and since Jacque has bought himself a ride on mower over the summer it was time to put it to good use. I’ll post a picture shortly of me smiling like a big kid riding it (it could be below by the time you read this) and trust me the smiles were involuntary but there is something that makes you feel great riding around on a mower feeling like a cross between a racing driver and a master gardner.. Anyway job done and i’ll be volunteering to do it a lot more i think :)

PS : The smoke isn’t from me crashing the mower in a hail of flames but still some of the hay from yesterday STILL bloody burning.

That’s it for today, as i said we took a short one and listened to Tottenham hotspurs beat Portsmouth 2-1 (great result) and watched the longest F1 qualifying in history and Jenson Button somehow blow a great opportunity to take the title.. Tomorrow we’ve got a day of lifting, lagging and roof removing if all goes well.

Task 1 – Repair the rear window.

Somewhere in a storm in the last few months we appear to have lost a pain of glass, so Dad has task #1 of fitting a new piece of glass to this rotten old window. Easier said than done as he had to be so careful not to either break another really thin 2mm thick piece or damage the window itself. Time & patience paid off and he got this done. Looking forward to the part of the renovation where we replace all the windows :)

Task 2 – Get the bloody car out of the barn!

This car is starting to be a right pain in the arse. The owners haven’t turned up, we don’t have the right paperwork to take ownership and we’ve got a guy waiting to take it but we can’t give it to him (at the moment) , plus it’s not been out of the barn in around 8 years we’re told, so starting it isn’t an option.
Now i don’t know a great deal about these Citroens but Jacque Chirac loved them and they have some great funky hydraulic suspension but after all this time it’s sunk and is actually below the level of the barn so getting it out proved to be a mission for NASA, a structural engineer and 2 English guys sheer stubboness..

An hour later, with some pushing, pulling, choice words and creative ramp building it sees the sun for the first time in just under a decade and now the barn clearing can really start.

The barn is full of hay as you’d expect but its not been used as a hay loft for as long as the car has been in hiding and there is a LOT of it.. With the help of the local farmers tractor we cleared most of it away ready for burning.

Take it from me any romance you had about growing up on a farm in Smallville moving hay like Clark Kent well forget it… It’s horrible, itchy, gets everywhere..

Task 3 – Rehome the wild life!

During the move we found a next of hedgehogs hibernating. Now being a city dweller i’m sure i was a little over sympathetic about their plight and rather just turf them out or burn them with the rest of the hay i found the Nature Channel watcher in me and we rehoused them. Seriously we rehoused them! I’m not going to be taking that part of the barn down till next year so we moved some hay, had a new bed then physically moved the rather cute rodents to the new area and buried them again. Not so much as a thank you or an uncurling ( see below ) but it felt really good and a dose of positive karma all round.

And that’s my good karma deed for the day well except feeding the local wild kitten

So a good start to the week, tomorrow is a very busy day of pipe lagging, tile removal, mowing of lawn (my first time with a ride on mower) &  fitting a new wood burning stove, so forgive me while i sit back here put my feet up and have a Leffe beer.

Lots more tomorrow…..

This was just the break Dawn needed and with the added excitement of having explored the area and found far far more on our doorstep than we’d previously thought it’s really given Dawn a 2nd wind and a small reminder why we want to live in Montpillard.

Here is just a small sample of pictures of everyone working away. Unfortunately there were no “before” pictures taken only during and after so you can’t see how much progress they made, but lots of progress they did make and taming the jungle that was the garden was a priority while Dawn & Eric (her Dad) started to dismantle the cow shed.

Dawn & Eric - Hay removed from the cow shed.

Jules about to get strimming!

Looks like Eric's had enough of someone!

All this has to go.

Hmmm what's in here?

Non! Nothing of interest.

Clearing the cow shed (Eric's quite the beef cake).

Digging out the cave stairs.

Almost cleared.

Somehow Dawn is still clean....

They’ll be more pictures soon, but I just wanted to take a moment to say thank you to every for their help. We really couldn’t have done this without you. From my Dad and his ability to plaster, plumb and eternal patience, to Eric, Maureen, Julie & Judith and all their hard work in chopping, strimming, painting, lifting and lumping. Weeks like this when our friends and family are REALLY helping us out. I know it’s an old saying but many hands do make light work, however even it’s ifs just one set of extra hands they all make things progress so much more smoothly..

With that in mind if you fancy a trip to our house for the summer then you’re all most welcome (family, bloggers, readers etc etc), but come armed with old clothes and a pair of gloves as you’ll be needing them :)

This was a hard exercise to go through so when we started to look ahead to see how would two adults a few kids and a dog live in the house things became easier, we became more practical about where we wanted bedrooms, bathrooms.  From here we went down a planning route which ultimately has clashed with what is deemed as “French Enough” and not in keeping with the area.

There seems to be a fine line between wanting to move design forward as we see it and using lots of natural light to a somewhat invisible tipping point where this is not “French Enough” and is rejected out of hand.

We’ve posted the below render before, and while taking advice from the CAUE we’ve been told the house looks too “Alpine” and specifically the changing of the pitch of the roof of the side house is not acceptable.  So while this wasn’t a major shock to have scorn poured on the initial plans what did strike me was a lack of understanding as to why we would want to do things and the outbuilding is a great example.

The outbuilding as is, is not useable for anything except storing maybe cattle feed.  The roof is too low, the walls are falling down and it has zero foundations.  Taking the chance to increase the height and change the pitch to match the house seemed logical.  Changing the pitch meant that we could actually use the new roof space as a storage/dressing area in the master bedroom, while creating a utility & entrance room downstairs, which ultimately meant we could move the kitchen door so you didn’t walk directly in from the muddy drive into the kitchen.

This just isn’t going to happen.. The pitch of the roof isn’t allowed to be changed however we may be able to heighten it.  The reason we were told for the reject was “This was un-French, and when we come to sell the French wouldn’t get it”.. REALLY? Wouldn’t get the extra space and practicality it offers, but OK deep breath and think about fighing the battles that actually need fighting.

Where things start to become sticky is when plans start to suggest the internal layout of the space.  Now the CAUE may well just be being over helpful but coming from a small 1 bedroom flat in London all my life I want to create open spaces for family and friends to gather.  For this reason I found it amazing that the CAUE architect arbitrarily chopped 12ft off the lounge, move the front door and created a hall way that had no natural light.  Why would you do this? The house is dark right now and the idea of windows is to open this up not to darken it down..  Is to have space & natural light “un-French”?

While we are talking about light, gone are the skylights in the new bathroom and with the internal changes gone are the dormers windows altogether and this is where I think that looking at plans without explanation can be cold, harsh and ultimately wrong.

The below image shows a quick bastardization of the work done by the contact at the CAUE so please forgive the roughness.  The top one is his “suggested” design and our compromise is the bottom and here is my explanation as to why this should be more than OK.

Ground floor Windows
The on to the right of the front door the window isn’t actually an addition it’s actually restoration of one that was there.  Sometime ago it seems to have been blocked up and we’ve since been using it as a HiFi cupboard (see image) but unless you talked to us about this you’d just assume we were adding a window.  That said it does need another window in there, the light in the kitchen is poor and this would really help.

Bathroom Windows
Seems simple enough, for light and ventilation.

Dormer Windows
Both our neighbours have these so it is indeed in keeping with the area.  The dormers would be in two new bedrooms allowing light and views.  The dormer on the far left is actually in the 1st bedroom where we could move our children too when they are old enough to not sleep in our room so they ahve their own room but are close enough to us for anything. Again without knowing this logic I don’t get why it would just be OK to move the bedrooms to opposite ends of the house.

Ground Floor Right Door
This needs to go! The suggestion of making this into a window to me is bizarre.  The window would be at ground level and maybe it’s the Londoner in me but this is just not secure.  Take into consideration this is where you park the car and you’ll get no use or light out of it.  Closing the door and adding a window that is away from the car port and at a decent level to allow in light seems a natural way to go.

Lean to / External stairs
So this is where I can see some difference of opinion and will be the easiest area to compromise on.  The external stairs were put back on the suggested plans with the explanation of  ”this would help with heavy furniture”.. Unfortunately nothing here as lost in translation and this seems to be pure opinion as to function.

The stairs are a later addition to the house.  They are made with poured concrete and is definitely not an original feature, they are also coming away from the house and the ivy, moss and water that pour down the gap are damaging that corner of the house, so it has to go.  Also for me again I see this as a security risk having a set of stairs leading directly to what we wanted to change into a glass widows to allow more light into the top floor.  Luckily for me no permission is needed to remove the stairs and these WILL be going.

Now the compromise
The suggested rebuild of the lean-to and pitch change of the roof is not in keeping and makes the look “alpine” in design is the opinion of the man at the CAUE, now he used to work in planning so should know what will and will not go through.  So OK I’m not overly precious about this, it would have been ideal to create more space but if this is a sticking point given the other spaces we are creating then I can accept this. Unfortunately it could be easier to remove it completely than to make use of it.  Currently it’s in a state and is falling down in-fact we’ve done a few posts on removing the roof and taking down the wall.  Again it’s under the size I need to have permission to remove so if it does become a hassle then it’s going, however we feel personally it is really a part of the house we do want to keep it.. The jury is out on this at present.

Conclusion
This is anything but concluded! Design is such a personal issue and it’s hard to strike a balance between allowing design to move forward and yet keep the integrity of the area so there isn’t something that stands out like a sore thumb.  So while for instance i’ll agree that the roof pitch change may be too much, I’ll not agree that putting in windows to allow more natural light in (thus reducing the need for lighting and reducing it’s energy bill) is a step to far, there has to be a balance struck between 21st century living, technologies and environmental concerns with that of keeping an old stone building just as old cold stone building.

I guess what I’m getting at is before we pruchased it, it was sitting there rotting like it was doing. While we don’t expect to be able to be outrageous with it, it has surely got to be better restored, lived in and come compromise has to be reached to the benefit of everyone.

So it’s now time to go back with some suggested revisions so they’ll be more news on this shortly we hope.  In the mean time below is the evolution of the plans, from where we were, to what we’d hoped for to where are are now today… WOW how plans change ;)

If you remember our first set of blog posts from Feb 13th about the storm damage (here, here & gallery here) from this point it’s been like pushing water up a hill to get the whole insurance process sorted. And there are some lessons we’d like to share with you.

Firstly I can’t stress enough that you need to get yourself a SKYPE ACCOUNT!
One of the main issues we ran into was that all the insurance numbers are local rate numbers in France. These CANNOT be dialed from outside France so straight away you are hitting a barrier to even start your claim process.
This is where having friends on the ground helps however a SKYPE OUT account where you can call landline numbers from your computer (or iPhone in our case), and the FREE numbers remain FREE (see small chart below or full list here)

• France Premium Rate – 0891 – £ 0.194
• France Premium Rate – 0892 – £ 0.250
• France Premium Rate – 0893 – £ 0.250
• France – Shared Cost – £ 0.130
• France-Toll Free – £ 0.00

So first tip is SKYPE, get yourself an account now it’s not just for computer to computer calls.

The 2nd issue is the length in time it takes quote to come back. I’m not going to harp on about this as this seems a regualr issue of mine with the total lack of percieved desire to get new work from French builders.

Anyway that processed took just under 2 months to get right & we got our first quote back around 4 weeks after we asked the two builders to attend site. The 2nd quote came in around 8 weeks, by this time we’d submitted the original quote to the insurance due to these delays.

The two quotes varied in costs by the tune of  €2,500 and in what each builder felt needed doing. I’ll be publishing the quotes shortly for you to compare, but the long and the short of it, the insurance company took the €8,500 quote and proceeded to work off this. Then after discussions back an forth with their “experts” they settled for €6800 which lucky for us covers the 2nd quote that finally arrived from our preferred builder.

With the payment agreed we’ll be getting the first payment of €6,300 into our bank any time now, and the final €500 on completion of work. So that’s part one completed, now lets see how long it actually takes the builder to do the work.

What we’ve learned

• If like us you’re not actually in France and are trying to do this remote then good contacts are a must. For us a great bank manager is a life saver, create and keep your contacts.

• Skype was a fantastic service. Using Skype our bill for all the calling we did came out at €4 that is far far less than we were paying before.

• A good reliable builder is a MUST.  Using our preferred builder we’ve actually managed to blend some of the work with starting repairs on the house, but you really have to sit on these guys to motivate them.

• There appears to be a remote project management business opportunity in France. If we could have paid someone locally to handle this for us we would have done. Between going back and forth to deal with this our travel costs have been around £600, so for a €500 fee i would have gladly paid out to have someone on the ground local so this.

Now we already know that a lot of the old mortar here has aged very badly and part of the renovation is to re-mortar and point everything to strengthen the house and give it a nicer finish but little did I know just how bad some places were. The above video shows just how easy the stones come apart from each other as the lime mortar is now just powder.

Don’t worry these stunning stones aren’t going to waste, we be rebuilding the outbuilding using new materials & bonding however the stones are going to be placed on the outside of the new structure so it keeps the original look.

Update 1 : Gallery now online HERE
Update 2 : Video update below

The current “kitchen” is no more than a breeze block wall that is holding up a cheap sink and the portable gas cooker. Given that we know we are going to totally refurb this area as part of the major renovation it did not make any sense to start putting in a final kitchen so the decision was made to buy some B&Q cabinets & doors, a natural gas hob from eBay and a solid work top from Brico Depot to try and give us somewhat of an inexpensive but functioning kitchen.

Items Purchased & Suppliers
Kitchen carcases & doors (B&Q) – £345
Natural Gas Hob (EBay) – £90
Sink (Brico Depot) – €88 (£85)
Taps & Waste (Brico Depot) – €40 (£39)
Solid wood work top (Brico Depot)- €99 ( £95 )
Wood Sealant (Wickes) – £10
Total Spend – £664
_____________________________________________

Preparation & Sanding

So this is what we started with ( click for larger image ), I have no idea how long it’s been here but it’s time for a refresh and there were a few things we needed to tackle first and this was going to be somewhat of a messy job.

You see every service that is available has been plastered and then stippled to give somewhat of the same effect as Artex ( without the asbestos ) but it’s a right nightmare so the first job was to remove this and the quickest way to so this was with a belt sander but that was only going to result in one thing and that was massive amounts of dust, and that’s just what we got.

Wearing eye protection and a respirator the place soon filled up with dust.  At the start it was comical how much there was but it soon dawned on Dad and I this this was a small wall no higher than 4ft x 6ft and we had far far bigger walls to come. This was going to be messy but it had to be done.

Once the sanding was done it was finally times to start removing what was there,

Removal not as easy as it appears.

It’s now time to start removing that is there starting with the awful tiles that are used as a splash back.  A claw hammer and a chisel makes easy work of this. Next it’s time to remove the sink so with the water off, the waste secure we removed the link and that’s when the corner of the wall fell out. I couldn’t believe it you should have heard the language. It appears that the sinks final position in the wall was level with the join in the wall and removing the sink dislodged this and away it came.  I don’t have any pictures of this due to the sense of humour failure I was suffering at the time, but my quick thinking father realised that the breeze wall could be trimmed with the rip saw and that’s what we proceeded to do. More dust, cursing and breath holing while the whole structure wobbled we levelled the wall and proceeded to remove the sink, ready for fitting.

As you can imagine to get to this stage there were a lot more pictures as this was an eventful job that should have been so simple. I’ve uploaded a few images to the gallery below while I write part 2 of the build and fitting where we try to get something like a useful kitchen.

A quick recap :
While we are finalising the plans for the house we are working on a “Petit Renovation” first. The house in it’s current layout had somewhat of a  “livable” area consisting of Kitchen / Lounge, Shower room and 2 bedrooms both approx 11ft x 10ft each, however given the actual state of disrepair to all of them we really needed to fix up these area’s so we can comfortably stay in the house for holidays etc etc, and that by itself is no small task. Welcome to our “Petite Renovation”

The plan for the week is quite ambitious and we have a LOT to get through. This is actually Renovation Week 1 of 2 with the next week we are out here being Easter however this is the week where we must try and get things done to the bathroom as the wife can’t be without a toilet or at the very least a toilet door. Me and my father can just resort to being Neanderthals when needed :)

Plan for the week:

Bathroom
Remove and replace the bathroom. Everything in it from the WC to the 1/2 Bath / Shower need to be replaced. There is the option to level the floor and retile as well as remove and replace the awful foam square polystyrene ceiling and insulate.

Kitchen
Fit a kitchen of use! The “kitchen” as it is right now is a sink and a mobile gas cooker. A small kitchen has been purchased along with a new sink, natural gas hob and work top. This will enable us to have a functioning kitchen so we actually stop eating items cooked in one small saucepan and one small frying pan.

Plaster
The walls in the house are either covered in yellow stipple pain / artex or wood cladding. You by now have already seen the images of the walls we bought back to their original stone, and the plan is to finish this off where we can and then plasterboard, seal and paint the rest to create a clean space.

Fireplace
Rescuing the fireplace is one of the items that is on the top of my list that really shouldn’t be. This house has stood for over 300 years and the fireplace is very big, functional and the large stones used to create it have been painted over in yellow stipple paint and it angers me every time. While this is not urgent (as the fireplace works) this is on my hit list.

Rewire
I could write about the electrics in the house all day. Needless to say that they are badly done and very unreliable. While we re-plaster we’ll be relaying cables & adding data cabling as well. Given the ease of the French system of “Spurring” and the small size of the “Petite Mason” this actually sounds harder than it should be.

Plumbing
See above -  but just replace electricity with water! Everything is either bursting, pained or ready to rot. I’m looking forward to this as it gives us the chance to replace it when we fit the new bathroom and sink. Also some isolation values would in the past have been great as at present the water is either on or off to everywhere.

So you can see there is a LOT planned for 1 week, however we do have another week here in 3 weeks time but this is the week of long days, dirty work and no doubt a bit of swearing. Oh and of course I’d better let you know my budget: €2000 sounds fair :)

Drop in all week for running updates and photo’s ( there will  be LOTS )

The weekend rush to the house produced some news both good and bad but none of it terrible which was a big plus.

The house and the grange have both suffered damage from the storm. For the most part it’s lost tiles and flashings.  The shutters did their job and all windows and doors survived.

Unfortunately the outhouse attached to the North end of the house took a bit of a battering.  We had to remove the roof from it sometime back as it had collapsed but how it’s really starting to lean out. This will need to be dismantles brick by brick and rebuilt.  The very unfortunate side effect of this moving is that one of the beams that was attached to the wall of the house has collapsed and this has moved the wall to the house with a rather large crack appearing in the North wall.

Now normally the house cracking would be a devastating blow and this is of course not the best news but the house is standing and has been for 300 years so we’ll just need to deal with it.

The good news is that we are fully insured and have started the process of claiming and getting someone to assess the damage.  This could of course end up being a blessing in disguise as I wanted to put a door in that end of the house over time and while they are repairing this i’ll see if they can do it now.

Below are some very quick pictures from my iPhone that shows you what I’m on about.

This is a great time to ask you for your continued help with the site and the renovation of the house by clicking the Google ads that you see top right and below as this generates a small amount of revenue and right now it’s going into buying tiles :)