Project List

For the next few posts we will be playing catch up on work to date as we have now been here since the end of April. The overall renovation plan is 18-24 months but there are some priorities.

• Damp proofing done before we moved in - and the main reason for the lack of carpets & skirting boards downstairs
• Insulating & decorating sitting room

• New kitchen
• Repointing & releading leaking chimney

The three remaining above have to be done before the weather gets colder. The house is single skin and so we can't use cavity wall insulation (and so lose out on the government grants). We also want to bump up the radiators and install a multi-fuel burner as the central heating runs on oil.  There is mains gas at the end of the lane and we asked British Gas for a quote to bring it to us. £18000. I don't think so.

I'm desperate for a proper kitchen, it's getting boring changing the freezer blocks in the ice box. But I do give thanks to Andrew's sister everyday as she bought him this halogen oven for his birthday.

The brilliant halogen oven

Now we were sceptics at first but it is brilliant, releasing us from the monotony of microwave cooking and allowing us to grill and roast.  We also discovered that we can make cakes in the breadmaker and rustled up this apple & ginger cake.

It might look boring but it tasted good

We could press on with the kitchen but the sitting room leads off from it and we will be producing a lot of dust and rubble which I don't really want on a newly decorated room.

In addition there's some decorating of bedrooms as mentioned before and a huge amount of designing and sourcing.

Next year the projects will include transforming the lobby to the orangery, which will become the main dining area, and dealing with the outside buildings. We are lucky to have a secure garage, log store and a huge workshop (which is invaluable at the moment for storage). But it is really too big and cuts the garden in half. It is also ugly and none of the roof materials match.  If you look out of one window of the master bedroom you get this:

The prolific walnut tree

And out the other one you get this:

Ugly, mismatched roofs

The grey felt is the orangery roof, the green is the garage, the bit linking is the log store and the big one is the workshop. It's not pretty. We're hoping to pitch the orangery roof and put roof lights/velux in and somehow link it through to the garage.


Until next time.


Sharon