The French Renovation

After a brief family-fuelled sojourn in Little Britain, we have arrived back at our tumbledown farmstead on a wintry hill in the Correze. Despite very strong winds in our absence, cottage #1 is still standing, and the roof is where we left it! The reported heavy rainfall has, however, left its mark. On every floor. It appears that water seeped/gushed down the chimney and also down the gap between the chimney and roof. The chimney has a little roof on it, so the rain must have been delivered horizontally. Chimney roof obscured by falling snow and grey snow skies The water that came down the chimney has damaged the extractor fan above the range. Its lights come on, but the fan is broken. The black sticky grime of the chimney guts coloured the water dark orange, and that has splashed its primitive design over the range and the surrounding surfaces. This should not have been able to happen; Kevin installed a board inside the chimney to prevent bird-propelled objects disappearing...

You think that's a rather boring photo, don't you? It's giving you a glimpse behind the hidden panel in the guest bedroom wardrobe, and it now contains pipes that connect to RADIATORS! That's quite thrilling, as far as I'm concerned! No, calm down, don't get too excited on my behalf... We don't actually have hot water to put in the radiators yet, as the wood burner isn't 'plumbed in'. We need to make a hole through the metre-thick wall for a flue/chimney. We'll do that soon.  We're still putting up insulation and plasterboard walls in the main bedroom. The tricky bit of plasterboarding around the window is now elegantly achieved. We just need to do another layer of filler, then we'll paint. The lower section of the wall is just a metal frame in this photo, but we have actually completed it now! We're on the look-out for a big black chandelier (not too chunky!) to fill that high space, so let me know if you see one on sa...

We're still here! Although we've been distracted by guests, dog-sitting, harvesting and strained backs, the renovation continues in earnest. Most of our energies are being focused in the master bedroom, but the apparent slow speed of progress seems to make us even slower due to the accompanying low morale. And we're also doing this with a very limited budget, so accidentally breaking a panel of plasterboard can be more upsetting than you might imagine. Heavy lifting and leaning out at height is what takes its toll on the lower back, and Kevin and I have both suffered in this respect recently. (Okay. It's possible that our regular golf interludes on the field are at least partially to blame.) Daddy, Mummy and Baby Steps The stake This pokey-out stake needs to remain where it awkwardly is, as it appears to be playing an important role in keeping the wall stable; it's exerting a lot of possibly important pressure on the upright beam. Kevin'll work out...