a hand basin!

Keith has used iroko wood to make the stand for our hand basin:



Oh, the luxury of being able to use it instead of a bucket! It will have doors eventually, but at the moment I don't mind.

more thanks

Often on this blog, I thank people who have been involved in the build, in many different ways.
This post is for other thanks:

First of all to Medea Misch, who organised Charing Cross Medical School's 40 year reunion. We met up with a lot of Keith's old colleagues and it was good to catch up with them all.

Then on Sunday we went off to see the Underdowns, who have been supportive of & interested in our build from the beginning. They too have moved, to "Sussex by the sea". Their kitchen is in a worse state than ours (currently the oven is in the garage!) but the weather was kind and Nigel barbecued, so we sat in their lovely garden and caught up with all the news.

On Monday, Joe allowed us to look after him while his mum went to work. We all had a good time together and look forward to seeing him next week as well.

Thanks also to Jane, from Nene Valley Homemade, who selected me to trial her new handcream. I have been doing a mosaic in the bathroom tiles, so it has had a very hard trial, and has kept my hands nice & soft. Her products are sold at Daily Bread Co-operative in Northampton.

A final, dubious, thanks to the swallows who chose our garage loft to build their nest in.

a sunset, a heron & news of Genghis

Keith took these lovely sunset pictures:




The next day, I borrowed his camera and just managed to get a picture of the heron as he lunged for a fish.


Those of you following Genghis' adventures will be glad to know that today he heroically defended his ducklings against another drake (who should have known better!).

Inside, we have begun work on the main bathroom, tiling the floor & preparing the walls.

another room!

The walls of bedroom 2 (as it's known on the plans) are now scraped, filled, sanded, treated & painted. It will be the main guest bedroom, but for the moment I have moved my sewing machine in, and Keith has set up shelving.



I won't be making curtains yet, just some bunting for the village celebrations and some repairs that need doing, but it is nice to sit at it again.

Next job is the main bathroom, which Keith prepped today and I have to begin tiling tomorrow.

This picture shows Genghis & his mate, but you can't see their ducklings nestled between them.

a living room

The task of smoothing down, filling, scraping, treating and painting the living room is now finished. We celebrated by moving our table & chairs down. No more carrying trays upstairs! Keith has also done part of the hall - and - a mammoth task - the stairwell.
The lights are in place and we can begin to get a sense of how it will work.



We took some time off this weekend to go to Raunds Music Festival. It's a small, community based festival in a market town a few miles away. It's our kind of festival - you can walk to the car & be home within a quarter hour of it finishing. There is beer (including a special brewed "Raunds Revelry") and tea & home-made cake as well. It attracts all ages & kinds of people. A big thanks to the volunteer organisers who make it happen.

The waters are going down. we can see the footbridge & path now, and the birds are returning to find their way around again.

not-so-fine weather for ducklings

This afternoon a mother duck came into the garden with her ducklings. They appeared quite happy, running about & cheeping, although she seemed to be keeping a close eye on the high, fast-flowing brook.
After about an hour, they left. We found out later that they were unable to cope, and she took them into our neighbour's garden. She tried to find a safe place for them, but the ducklings kept jumping into the water, whilst she tried to shoo them out! She attempted to put some safely in the log store, but they got stuck, and our neighbours had to rescue them. She finally managed to lead them off, but had to return for a missing one. By late afternoon, it did seem that they were back safely at the War Memorial.

All of this water has disconcerted both the heron and egret who have difficulty wading through the fast flow to catch fish. As I wrote yesterday, this is more typical of February than May. Tiny ducklings would not normally need to cope with this weather.