Unless I spot a new/interesting bird - that might get me to the computer.
Here goes:
- Wednesday, 25 February: I got a second coat of paint on the wall that will be behind the stove - that's enough already!
- Thursday, 26 February: Glyn and Nick installed the hearth; the centre [that projects forwards] is a bit too big (deep), but we can live with that. The intention was to have hearth under the fully-open door, so that the ash that falls off won't end up on the floor [we don't plan on getting the room carpeted, but may need to if it's too cold]. The mortar needed to go off, so we didn't have the appointment to get the stove installed until a week later... Which gave us time to order in a load of logs; yes, I know it seems crazy buying wood when we are surrounded by trees, but we had nothing cut (and, more importantly, dried) and no time to get out the chain saw. Both Nick & Glyn assure me that I can paint around the flue [but wait till Monday, so as not to disturb the hearth until the mortar is set], as that is now dry. I'm not convinced, but they insist, so I think I'm going to trust them. To avoid getting in their way, I cleaned some of the windows in the sitting room; what an immense improvement. Chris, the satellite engineer, came to have a look at our aerial; the TV reception is bad, and we only have a free-standing boosted unit that gets in the way wherever I move it to. He said the reception is poor, and may be worse in the summer [when the leaves on the trees provide further interference], but the satellite dish that's already on the chimney is receiving a clear signal. After a bit of dithering, I made an 'executive' decision, and book him to connect up another cable [needed so we can watch/record a second programme on the new PVR], and install the Freesat PVR/decoder he's going to supply as our existing PVR/decoder will no longer work.
- Friday, 27 February: I carried on cleaning the floor - first I had to move all the furniture out of the way, apart from the TV/telephone stands (which were on already-cleaned floor), and the bigger sofa which I couldn't get out of the room on my own, so I put that on a pair of "wheelie things" [wooden platforms with a castor at each corner], and herded it around the room to be out of the way of dirty-water splashes [and there was a LOT of dirty water]. And, naturally, I had to stain-stop a line on the ceiling [didn't want to risk spillage on my soon-to-be-newly-cleaned floor] Finally finished after a twelve-hour day; the thought of having to start again in the morning helped provide the adrenaline for when I'd had enough. In case that wasn't daft enough, on my lunch "break", I moved all the plants and chippings/excess mortar from off the gravel by the front door, put some rubble in the rut at the end of the drive, and topped up the "ditch" with bark chippings [hoping to cushion the impact of the tyres on the bricks/paving slab fragments until they bed in]. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we have less of a trench to drive over. I took a quick walk in the woodland, to let my lunch 'go down' before all the bending over from floor scrubbing, and startled a bird with a very long beak, the colour of a hen pheasant. I've googled it, and am 99% sure it was a woodcock; the fact that it didn't move until I landed virtually on top of it [jumping back over the stream, heading straight for a thicket of brambles], makes me pretty confident. I'm sure it wasn't a snipe, as I think it would have been a bit too big (?)... But lovely to see a creature I'd never seen before.
- Saturday, 28 February: My nightmare: we spent the whole day shopping - but we now have curtains* (and poles), a small sideboard for the kitchen, and a blanket box to replace the pouffe as a coffee table [with the central section of hearth protruding, the pouffe felt too big for the space]. What we didn't manage to buy were the fridge and washing machine... Curry's free "next day" delivery has a delay of at least a week on the fridge, and the dispatch estimate on the washing machine was 2 to 4 weeks. Oh, well, we can't say we didn't try!
* a variety of curtains - Sunday, 1 March: We went back to Curry's, and bought their cheapest fridge - thus saving us about £500, so a big thank you to Curry's for not doing their next day delivery!
- Tuesday, 3 March: I spent the day "assembling" some form of kitchen [moving various dressers/sideboards around to give us storage and a work area], moving the furniture back into the sitting room, painting two mist coats on the "square" of plaster around the flue, and helping pull satellite cable through the cavity wall so we could have proper TV reception. All worth it, as it's starting to feel like a home... Chris very kindly set up the decoder/PVR, and even set up the WiFi for me; very thankful for a decent, generous workman, so beetled straight off to CheckATrade to right a glowing review.
- Wednesday, 4 March: I finished the kitchen, and stored all the foodstuffs in the pantry and dresser, and the crockery/glassware and some of the saucepans in the two sideboards. The rest of the saucepans are temporarily stored in the old metal filing cabinet [I figure that if it will take a drawer full of paper, it can cope with a couple of saucepans/trivets per drawer]. I was quietly pottering away when I heard a really loud noise. Not sure if one of the neighbours was doing something interesting I had a look, and there was a man with a chainsaw in the garden! Yay - Colin was back, and taking the conifer trunks off as low as he could before grinding out the roots. He'd needed to wait for a new 3' chainsaw, as the stumps were so big, and a new grinding wheel for his digger. He worked late into the evening, but finished all of the remaining conifer work. Adam showed up, and pointed out what other tree work they'd done; the only things outstanding were three oak limbs, and the crown of an oak that needed tidying. I had a great day - Colin brought his daughter, Maxine, and little dog, Alfie, - so I got to chat to lots of people, finished what I was doing in the kitchen, and got two proper coats of emulsion around the flue (so that it was ready for the fireplace to be installed). Matt delivered three bags of logs, which was great until I realised that the bags were slightly blocking the path that the stove would need to use the next day. So David & I ended our day by moving logs to the back of the house from 11.30pm - only took an hour, but we were absolutely ready for the stove and female relatives to arrive the next day.
- Thursday, 5 March: Stove day! I had a really early start [I couldn't get back to sleep when David got up at 5.30am, so decided to get on with it], and carried on putting away/tidying whilst waiting for Nick to arrive with the woodburner. Less than a minute after Nick, Craig, and Roland pull out of the drive (having installed the stove), and seconds after I've got the vacuum cleaner out to tidy up after them, mum's car pulled off the road. I'd nearly helped them unload when Karen arrived, so I was running around like a mad thing. I eventually managed to move all the furniture back into place before we had a tour of the house. It's not ready for guests, but that didn't deter them. Mum had brought Click with her, so we were only missing Miche to have a full house of my distaff relatives! Karen and I had a walk through the woods, but it was getting too dark to see... We were a bit puzzled to find pony poop? We had startled a tiny black pony [Shetland?] on the back lawn before we signed for the place, but haven't seen any in the garden since then. Saw my first butterfly of the year, and a couple of bumble bees.
- Friday, 6 March: The washing machine [that we ordered off eBay, Curry's being unwilling to commit to a date (and it was cheaper)] was delivered, and the ladies all helped pick litter in the woods. Karen & mum started clearing around one of the oak trees, while I was messing around with Click's camera and showing her photos on the computer, and dealing with the handyman David had booked to give us a quote. The plaster is already blown around the flue, so I'm no longer as impressed with Nick as I was 24 hours earlier...
- Saturday, 7 March: We spent the morning working in the woods whilst David took the car off for its MOT test, before my 'herd of cats' departed for home. They'd really been hoping to see the fox again, and the bunnies, but they didn't oblige... Until after they'd all gone; I've seen fox and/or rabbits most days since then. Suddenly the house felt very empty. Phew! It was lovely to see them, but I'm hoping that we're a bit [lot!] tidier before we have other guests staying over, as it's quite stressful being unable to find things in a hurry.
- Sunday, 8 March: We plumbed in the washing machine, and celebrated not having to try and get the house in order for visitors by having a bonfire; we were doing really well, and had nearly burnt all the garden waste and I was lifting up the base of the fire to aerate it, when I felt both my sacro-illiac joints "go". It took me ages to 'limp' back to the house [is it limping when both legs won't work?], and I ended up in bed with the electric blanket Karen had lent me on 3 [its maximum], three duvets, two hot water bottles, a long nightie & knee-length hiking socks... Oh, and the heating on. I was just about warm enough. I think my body had had enough, and ws letting me know in no uncertain terms. So it's been enforced rest [more or less] ever since.
- Saturday, 14 March: Karen & David came to help put up the curtain poles in the sitting room. David ended up screwing down various floorboards, and he and Karen cut out a lot of barbed wire from the woodland. My David re-fitted the track in our bedroom, and Karen and I put up four pairs of curtains we'd found in various charity shops. It is so lovely to have curtains [rather than sheets of cardboard]. And one day, we may even buy some that match? But the main thing is they keep the cold out/warmth in, and make the room feel very cosy.
"Curtains": before 
Curtains: after - Assorted dates: Various bits of: cleaning, putting away, and enforced rest/recovering from bilateral S-I strain from doing too much. I finally got around to updating my Flickr account, and sorting out my photos, so now I am feeling a bit less stressed by the backlog of online life to be got through. I was badly distracted by the bunnies frolicking and dust-bathing, so it's almost a relief that the weather has gone horrible again. I also spent longer than seems reasonable gluing my thumb nail back together: it has split (along the length) about a third of the way down, and I'm worried about it catching. I finally found that the tip of a false nail glued over the end protects it without the discomfort of wearing the whole fake nail. My lovely husband took me for a trip out, after a couple of weeks of not leaving the house... To the tip; he's such a great guy! ;D
- Bird feeders: The one Karen gave us, and the couple we've bought since, have been attracting a variety of birds including: greater spotted woodpecker, blue tit, great tit, coal tit, robin, dunnock, pheasant, chaffinch, nuthatch, and a collared dove. There may be others I've forgotten... We've also seen a green woodpecker on the lawn, and a tree-creeper in the woodland, as well as partridges, pheasants, and the woodcock, so I'm in a back-to-the-country heaven!
- The Ride: I was looking to see if the neighbours had permission to park their caravan [I was under the (mistaken) impression that Planning Permission was needed for a static caravan], and found a planning application that sent me into a tail spin - the attached plan didn't show our narrow little strip of land! That had me panicking, and leaving a voicemail for the planning advisor at the council. I subsequently found an amended drawing that the lady from the council had uploaded which does show our patch of land, so that felt like a result, especially when she said she had advised the neighbours that this was the correct plan. We felt we ought to clear access to the ride, and speak with the neighbours, so were working our way along the Roman road on Sunday when they appeared - probably drawn by the sound of the strimmer. They confirmed that they know the land is ours, but said they'd had people walking along it, so we're tempted not to clear the far end and hope that their dogs and our brambles help keep walkers and cyclists on the many footpaths around here... Anyway, there's some confusion over whether the tree preservation order on the [either side] neighbours' land extends to our strip, so we're going to leave it alone for now; it's not as though there isn't plenty of other clearing that needs doing!
I was having a Catch 22 for a while - I need the blog to see what's new on my photos, but I need the photos to remind me what we did each day... Lucky I took notes. It really is better to post contemporaneously, but for a while before we moved in I was feeling a bit like the camel - everything was a straw, but I was feeling as though I had enough to break my back. It wasn't that bad, but the absence of rushing from crisis to crisis is most welcome, and I feel I'm just starting to uncoil.
And being in a house that is staying above 14°C [unheated] is wonderful; I measured the temperature at The Old Laundry, and the sitting room was 10°C, rising to ~15°C with the heating on high. Here, we also have the woodburning stove, so I don't need to put the heating on very much at all.
I'm hoping for some more lovely spring weather (it was great walking down to the ride yesterday; so easy), so I can go an do some light bramble-chopping as therapy - fingers crossed!
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