Holed Up

Thursday 13th December 2012
6 below zero. That's 10 degrees warmer than our coldest morning last winter.



Friday 14th December 2012
A new weather front brings wind and rain.

You may presume from the title of this post that we have been severely affected by the winter weather. In the grip of  a very icy spell of weather, with temperatures as low as 6 below, life has just been ticking over on the smallholding front. I have been laid low with a heavy cold, whilst all around me the house has been shrinking!

The new downstairs bathroom
(old office). Not yet quite ready
for the new bathroom suite.

By that, I mean that the new kitchen furniture has been delivered before the old is ready to come out. Similarly a bath, shower enclosure, two lavs, two sinks, shower, taps etc were delivered on two pallets midweek, all awaiting the two new bathrooms to be ready to house them.


One day this will be a spacious country kitchen.
For now it is a bit of a building site,
filled with the new kitchen and the old kitchen.

So downstairs is now crammed with giant boxes, just to add to the dust and half finished floors, skirtings and ceilings. At least we have doors now. Jason has done a fantastic job constructing new doors out of the reclaimed pine boards. The extra effort has certainly been worth it, as the doors look like they could have been in place since the house was built, at least two hundred years ago.




Our bedroom! But no room for a bed.



The second bedroom,
complete with new floorboards
and new corner cupboard.

Upstairs shower room (to be)


























As if all this upheaval downstairs wasn't enough, Jason has also been busy laying new floorboards throughout upstairs - those fabulous 10inch wide reclaimed floorboards we got hold of from the salvage yard. This has meant moving all the furniture from room to room upstairs and has effectively confined us to the one room in the house which is relatively unaffected.

So we have spent the last few days holed up in the living room, cosy under the quilt in front of the fire.
Mind you, there's not been too many complaints from anyone, particularly Gerry who thinks this new arrangement is a cat's idea of purr-fection.

Meanwhile the dishwasher has packed up again - the third time is as many months, so we'll go without one now until we get the kitchen fitted after Christmas. The hoover has finally given up the ghost too and the pipe to the washing machine has sprung a leak!

But, on the whole, the building work has not been as bad as we had feared. We are now starting to be able to see elements of the finished product.

And for now we have a respite from building work until the New Year. We'll busy ourselves stripping wallpaper, painting ceilings and sanding floors before round 2 starts - Replacing the tile floors downstairs, completing the two new bathrooms and ripping out the old one, a new boiler and radiators, new windows, a couple of skylights ... so lots more fun to look forward to.