a scarecrow

Denford, like some other villages, has a scarecrow festival. Here is our builder scarecrow - he won't "medal" but is delighted to be participating.

Inside, today, Mike & Tandy from ACA-Apex are installing our "smart home" system. They have been very helpful & are much better value than many of the systems we looked at. We installed all the cables ourselves (see Nov. 18th 2011) and it seems that all of my labelling has worked well.

Keith has finished the flooring downstairs and it looks lovely. Now he is doing the skirting and door frames. We have, in a triumph of hope over expectation, booked Ace Removals again, to take all of our stuff out of storage on September 20th.

the light at the end of the tunnel

We now have proper flooring in 4 rooms, and here are pictures of the "guest room" (or bedroom 2 as we know it) carpet and the study with ash flooring.



Next step is to move ourselves out of our bedroom, so it can be finished & carpeted.
Keith is about to lay the rest of the downstairs flooring.
We still have to finish tiling in the utility room and the downstairs shower room needs to be finished.

We have been able to enjoy sitting on the deck & using our new barbecue. We now have lights installed there, so can sit out reading.

The post you can see is for the steel wire fencing that will surround the deck when it is finished (at the moment I have to be careful not to fall off!)

banister

Keith installed it yesterday - the rest of the staircase is still under wraps, but this looks lovely.
So does the whirlpool bath, all connected up, so I had my first bath in it yesterday - bliss!

We have now ordered the awning, and the decking work continues at the back, despite the downpours.
When our trees were planted, we were told to give them 2 buckets of water each, 3 times a week, whether or not it rained. This has led to passers by enquiring about my state of mind as I water the trees following torrential rain!

decking

as

Addingtons from Rushden, have been doing our decking. When we researched raised decking, we found it was advisable to get it professionally done to ensure it is structurally sound. The deck itself is done, here it is before the steps and balustrade are done.

I type this in a room with a real floor - the larger front bedroom will be my sewing room, so Keith has laid ash flooring from Kahrs, the same as he will lay throughout downstairs. I am unpicking and re-sewing the curtains from our old bedroom to go in here. They are a beautiful rich coloured patterned corduroy, and I am very glad that I can (I hope!) make them fit here.

We have had 2 fantastic days out at the Olympics - one at the Olympic Park where we saw women's basketball, and one at the beach volleyball. The travel was good, there were lots of stewards to show us where to go, and the commentators explained what was going on and how the games scored. The rest of the time, we listen to the radio.

general update

I am told it can be difficult to get a general idea of progress from the posts on the blog, so here is a round-up:
The main bathroom is just about finished, here are Ewan & Keith installing the shower screen:

All that remains is to connect up the bath, and tidy up the tiling.

As I write, Keith is painting the last room upstairs. That means we can consider flooring up here in the next few weeks. We have found a local firm Oundle Carpet Weavers who make their own carpet locally (although the one we have chosen is actually an Axminster, who they also make carpets for)

Downstairs, I am tiling the utility room. There is some tiling that needs doing in the downstairs shower room, but we are waiting until Keith has installed the door frame.
The main jobs remaining downstairs are to finish the study, and to put down the flooring.

Outside, the drive is complete, thanks to Rob for an excellent job:

Work on the decking at the back begins this week.

And off-topic, we have had 2 lovely days out. Art in Action were as well organised as ever, with parking on an old airfield, and fleets of coaches to ferry us. Thanks to the sunshine that bathed Folk by the Oak, and to Sarah & Bob for their hospitality & the excellent picnic, despite their being as busy as we are, renovating their new bungalow.

We have seen less of the swans this year as they are nesting further away, but Keith got this picture of the cygnets being taken around their patch:

And for the followers of Genghis: he has mostly been absent, but during the flooding (when from our brook to the River Nene was a complete sheet of water) he did appear, playing with the the other ducks!

a bathroom & the beginnings of a drive

Rob has been levelling the ground outside - not an easy job, but finally is ready to lay the paving blocks. He and Stuart have been dodging the rain to get the work done - but it is a lot easier than when he was here before (see 7th February)

The mosaic in the bathroom is finally finished - each piece put in individually. So the bath is installed (but not yet wired up for whirlpooling)


The rest of the bathroom will be done in the next few days and we move on to Bedroom 3 (the large front bedroom, destined to be my sewing room)

trees

The long gap in our blog is partly because we took a break and went to Crete for 10 days - thanks to Margaret & Terry for suggesting Paleohora, which was wonderful:

Most evenings we ate at one of the cafes with this view.

When we returned, we met up again with Rob, who was one of the groundworks team during the freezing weather in January. He has returned to level the ground for the drive, install soakaways, and to pave it. He has dug the border that enabled us to plant these lovely trees:



From the front: red robin, rowan, holly. Thanks to Majestic Trees for all their help (not to mention looking after them for 15 months!)


Thanks also to Stephen Molcher at Storefield Aggregates. They have delivered all the materials on time, at a good price, and Stephen's advice & patience have been invaluable.

Inside, I am doing the mosaic in the bathroom, and Keith is installing doors. More photos to follow.