Ah yes, the renovation...

The time has come to get on with the troublesome downstairs toilet, with its too high waste pipe, manky smashed window, unbuilt cupboard and uneven floor...

One layer of screed drying slowly


Another layer goes on




You know how we love a bit of shuttering...
I've previously mentioned our nightmare with the immovable film (and some lumps) of tile cement smeared over every tile in the bathroom, and how renovation works have therefore been sorely affected... Well, we're nearly there with the bathroom now. After absolute weeks of working away with scourers and products, sweating like bears, we experienced the miracle that is vinegar for the final clean. We still need to attach the tile skirting, and make an under basin cupboard, but the PIR lighting is all installed and working like magic.

Masking up to cut in with paint

The floor is still quite marked here...

Inside of the dormer is finally looking less building site-y

Floor tiles still badly marked...

Wall tiles more or less clean!

Floor tiles clean at last- they're supposed to look cloudy 


Who'd have thought... a miraculous vinegar called Stimula, that costs just 35 centimes

'The display cube', containing my treasured piece of Isle of Wight glassware. The idea is that the bathroom accessories echo these colours, but I'm not having much luck so far, as they're fairly pastelly, and bright jewel colours appear to be in vogue when it comes to towels.

Antique chateau sink, courtesy of Em and Pete, happily fitted.

And the rest of cottage #1? It's not good I'm afraid...

Voila! La cuisine! (It's functional...)

The laughable 'dressing room'. As you can see, we have put our clothes in it!

Master bedroom- that's right, nothing's happened here yet!

The guest bedroom- bet you're glad you haven't been invited?

Now this is a little taster of a very cunning kitchen plan... Keep following my blog to see what develops!


So, as you can see, we're back in the renovation game, and we feel motivated and optimistic. Having an income of absolute zero is still frightening, but we have a detailed and strict budget, and there's still some left. Living costs are fairly minimal, especially now that we're growing our own vegetables and have so many fruit trees. And we're doing all of the renovation work ourselves. It feels like slow progress sometimes, but this IS a five to ten year plan, after all... and we've only had seven months out here in total so far. We feel absolutely blessed that we can spend our time doing this; life is good. And good wine is very cheap! That sometimes helps...

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