Rock on, Pierre!

What with family and friends coming to stay for a sunny summer escape recently, very little has been renovated here on our delipidated French farm on top of a hill. But work on the terrace continues! What sort of idiot decides to create a terrace spanning seventy square metres? Us. We're the idiots. As we have zero income and very little left in our savings account, we are salvaging the stone from our eight acres. And the ruin. I had originally harboured hopes of renovating the ruin into a sort of high-level walled terrace with an observatory of sorts, as the views of the stars here are simply incredible. There won't be much ruin left by the time I've harvested all of its stones. Basically, if the stone has a flat side, it's mine. Even if it doesn't initially have a flat side, I've learnt how to make one using a hammer and chisel. I've been able to create an almost level surface using stones of very different depths, either by digging a hole to fit tall stones, or by building up using hard-core and cement for our flatter friends.

Placing stones is surprisingly therapeutic, but there is a part of this job that is quite frustrating. In order to find the right stones to fit comfortably together, I have to lay them out first, but then I have to move them to dig and lift appropriately, and then I have to place each stone so that it is level, and adapt and fiddle as necessary. Sometimes the stones don't seem to go back as planned; so frantic last minute rearranging is necessary in a race to beat the drying out of the batch of cement mix. Once they're bedded in with cement, I wait for that to dry, then apply my magical mystery mix of lime. If you're still reading this, then you're clearly a fan of filler and mortar and that type of thing, so I'm going to share my special recipe with you. Don't spread it around! 😂

DEBBIE'S MAGICAL MYSTERY LIME MIX

3 parts sand

1 part lime

0.5 part cement

1 capful PVA

Water

I mix the dry ingredients thoroughly in a bucket first, then add the PVA and then the water until the perfect consistency is achieved. In hot weather, a wetter mix is required, as it'll dry out too quickly otherwise. My 'part' measure is an old Vanish tub. I use an old Comfort container for my water, and even after many uses, the water still has a fresh laundry fragrance!

Cementing in. Note my array of important tools: spirit level, metal beam for levelling between more distant sections, little trowel, hammer, kneeling pad

As Kevin lays the official patio slabs in a 6 x 6 square, I work beside him on my stones, sharing the cement from the barrow. Who says romance is dead?

First section limed, and next section cemented in.

Second section limed. But look at those clouds! An unprecedented monsoon-type storm arrived...

My still-wet lime mix was hammered with rain and destroyed! Arghh!

The monsoon-style storm took our pergola over the house, taking out the phone and internet line on its way. We watched this happen in horror, and ran out to remove the canopy in order to prevent the pergola ending up in Paris. I have never been so thoroughly soaked to the skin. We've managed to bend the frame back to roughly the right shape, but the canopy is ripped. Kevin repaired the phone line once the storm had passed.

While holidaying with us, Ben, our marvellous son-in-law, gathered rocks from the ruin for me. He spent ages carefully placing rocks strategically and aesthetically. He's an architect. Thank you, Ben!

I'm just going to take you away from the terrace for a moment to show you something bizarre. I could hear a dreadful noise up the hill a bit. I could see a ship. 200 km from the sea. I zoomed in with my camera to find that it wasn't a ship after all, but an agricultural machine in a very cunning ship disguise. I have no idea what job it does but I can tell you that it's the noisiest thing around here! 

And so, back to the terrace; here you can see that I am continuing on my journey across the 70 square metres. Several of these stones were lain in place by Ben.

Some of the stones are ENORMOUS, and require a good bit of digging in. Here's one I did today.

That's all for now, folks! There's a 38 degrees Celsius day waiting for me out there on the terrace! Actually, I should have added 'sweat' to the recipe for my special mix, as there's surely a lot of it in there!