Meanwhile work is still progressing inside. Most recently Brian has finished insulating the roof of the extension, which was a much tougher job than anticipated. The new nail gun worked well for fixing the battens (to maintain a ventilation gap) and the wood treatment went okay, but getting the insulation boards in was a nightmare. The rafters go in and out all over the place so you just can't cut them to fit easily. Anyway, it is done now so we can now heat up the extension (with the bath in it) which is lovely. Freya and I shared a long bath yesterday evening. |
We had a few nice days this week, which gave Brian a chance to get up on the roof and do the other chimney. We've already had a few compliments on the new look, plus they now have "hats" on so the rain doesn't come down them.
0 Comments
With the long spell of good weather we've been having, we decided to get on and move the old muck heap whilst it was nicely dried out. This was piled up in front of what will be the horse shelter, right in the way of where I want to put the surface down for their yard area. Unfortunately it wasn't a simple muck heap but was full of plastic, bones and other debris that we had to remove as we dug it out. Still we did it over a period of three days and its great to see it gone. As you can see Brian has already started to take down the wall to make a second entrance to the shelter. The concrete wall will also go and the concreted area behind it will be included in the yard area.
Brian has finished removing the ceiling and clearing out the roof space on what will become the utility room. This has confirmed three things that we already suspected from when we first looked around the property:
We spent today doing a bit of gardening... we've done some major shopping over the last couple of days, including a petrol brushcutter which Brian put to good use on the "garden" today. We can now see the edges and it is a decent size. At the end of the day Brian had a quick look under the concrete render at some of the stonework, including uncovering what we had hoped to find - a proper stone fireplace under the silver painted rendered one. Before and after pictures below.
We've decided to stay at the youth hostel for a couple of weeks as the "garden" is too uneven and stony to put the tent up in. We have a cunning plan to resolve this, as we have a very well rotted and inconveniently located muck heap to get rid of, but that will obviously take time. At the moment we are clearing out the rooms, an unpleasant and smelly job. We've had some less than pleasant discoveries, including the skeleton of a bird behind one mantelpiece, and one good discovery which was a decent (although filthy) fireplace in the bedroom behind the horrible wooden one. We now need to sort the waste into wood, rubble, metal and other before we order up a big skip. We concentrated on the sitting room first as this was the most pleasant room (it was the "good" room and I suspect cigarette's were not allowed and it wasn't used much) and is well away from the rest of the house. Now the sitting room is all cleared out we are planning to put the bed up in there and move into the one room with the tent as additional living space. Living room before and after the clearout: |
This Is..
Laura Nash and Brian Brett's blog about our move to Ireland. Archives
December 2020
Categories
All
|