The cooker arrives!

I've decided only to only update when something or a few something's happen. Otherwise, it will be a dull read and a lot of "tired from work...couldn't be bothered today!"

A couple of weeks ago, we had the two trees in the front garden chopped down. It was sad to see them go, but you may remember from a previous post that they were causing us issues. Perhaps when we are done, we will plant something else not so intrusive.

We have finished the insulation but are a bit slow with the plaster boarding as it does take a little while to flex and drill into a curved shape. 

The majority of our time has been spent making a floor frame and concrete base for our cooker which arrived this weekend.

It's bloody heavy and we spent a good few hours trying to get it across the rough terrain and into the house. 

But here she is :-)

This is not our final flooring by the way...

That's Andy's engine crane we used to move it around. It came in handy! That man has a tool for everything!

We bought a flue off eBay and had it

Powder coated black. Andy's next job (as well as to finish off the plasterboarding) is to get the flue through the roof and connected to the cooker.

After Christmas, we should be able to get a plasterer in and then get the kitchen fitted, as long as it has survived the winter in the lock up!

We are hoping whilst this is going on, West Berkshire council are looking at our plans and thinking how amazing it's going to look and grant us planning permission!!!

Plaster and plans

A lot of the left over isulation from the round bit has been recycled and added into the other part of the roof. Our water tank is going to be sitting up there and will be boxed in so we aren't going to bother plaster boarding it.

We had purchased 8 sheets of 9.5mm plaster board from Wicks last weekend and spent the week testing how to bend a couple of pieces. The first piece didn't go too well, mainly because it was cut to the wrong size. The second piece we left over night with various weights on to bend it after dampening it. That just crumbled to pieces the next day.

The third piece we managed to dampen and get up successfully, although an awful lot of screws were required to keep it in place. Never the less, this way seems to work!

We had a visit from a plasterer too as we waned to start getting an idea of how much it's going to cost to render the place and have started asking people to come and give us some quotes. 

He said we should leave the render on that is ok and just pull off the rubbish stuff (the rubbish stuff sounds hollow when you knock it). He said he would then make sure it all joins up and skim over the whole thing. He also suggested we plaster rather than render.

This is Andy's list of what's left to do in this part of the house:

Also, I would like to take this opportunity to unveil to you good folk the master plan (queue drum roll):

Ta da!

I personally love it! It's giving us the space we need whilst not being too greedy and not retracting the focus off the old house.

If any neighbours are reading this and have any questions or concerns I URGE you to pop by and come and speak to us. We want as little hold ups with the planning process as possible (although I imagine West Bekrs council will do a perfectly good job themselves of holding things up). 

The longer the planning delay, the longer the build will drag out and the longer you have to put up with the sight of our £700 ex gypsy caravan spoiling the scenery ;-)

In all seriousness come and have a chat and let us know your thoughts!

Insulating

Hello!

It's been well over a month since the last update. Various things like birthdays, camping trips, weddings and holidays have been going on which has caused work to come to a stop.

But, it proceeded again last weekend with the beginnings of insulating the conical ceiling.

Basically, you may remember that it looks like this:

Lots of rafters and awkward shapes.

We had bought 3 sheets of 75mm  Celotex on eBay and began the long and laborious task of measuring each individual triangle section, sawing it out and stuffing it in. 

Expandable glue foam helped fill the small gaps, but came at a price. Alas, poor Andy was on the receiving end of a rogue piece of foam, making a break for freedom, high in the rafters. It came to a rest on top his head expanding away happily, and stealthily. It was only when Andy noticed the stuff expanding into his ear was evasive action taken. Evasive action being Andy running to get some scissors and chop it out. 2 bald patches later, and we had completed our task.

We took a trip to Wicks today and got some plaster board that we are hoping (through trial and error) to curve around the roof. Andy is going to make a cardboard template first as it really is a fiddly shape!

It's good that after a lot of destruction, we are finally starting to put something back in again.

On the plans front - our architect sent us a second set of sketches and it was perfect!! As soon as we get a copy of them I will show you the plan! I'm happy because it gives us a second bedroom and a decent size bathroom whilst not taking up hideous amounts of space outside. It is single story, but that's because the main building is only height and a half and I think anything too big would be over powering and take focus off the old part.

When the plans are drawn, we want to submit to planning so hopefully by early next year we will get a decision and can start building. Yay!

Every time I'm feeling annoyed about living in the caravan, I step outside and take in the view

And then I don't feel annoyed any more 

:-)

Tree surgeons and architects

Sorry for the delay with an update! We went away for the bank holiday weekend so no work was done on the house.

You may remember me saying in the last post that we were due a visit from both the architect and the tree surgeons. Well, they both came!

Lets start with Duncan, the architect. We had another chat around what we wanted and told him we wanted to make the place symmetrical and have 2 bedrooms.

Duncan agreed.

We then said we wanted to pitch the roofs on the extensions and have a vaulted ceiling, so perhaps have the extensions made out of oak frame.

Duncan did not agree.

He said oak frame would be expensive and you would be covering most of it up. He also said that pitch roofs wasn't a good idea. Firstly, it's making more work in that we would need to start messing with the conical roof. Secondly, because the pitch would be so shallow, we wouldn't be able to have tiles so would have to have slate. But this isn't an issue as I quite like slate.

Duncan suggested we go with flat roofs.

Andy and I weren't expecting this as flat roofs are what are there now and quite frankly, they look like sheds. That's all I could imagine them looking like.

But Duncan sent us some examples:

Having seen these, we think it is actually a good idea. We like the over hang and the roof would be zinc, not felt, and the cladding could go vertical not horizontal like a shed.

Also, if we are cladding and/or render the outside, then we could build out of blocks.

It seems like a quicker, easier and cheaper options.

Duncan has already given us a first sketch but I don't want to share that with you as I want you to see all of them at the same time along with the final sketch ;-)

Now for the tree surgeons. It started off a bit wobbly as when they initially came to do the quote, the caravan and shed weren't there. This meant it would take them a bit longer to get around them and get branches down.

But, they did it!! And what a difference:

The lads left us the wood so we can chop it up smaller and let it dry out to use  in our wood burner Aga thing in a couple of years. We just need to find somewhere to store it. It's a lot of wood...

The tree to the left in the 2nd photo is

Playing havoc with our drains. The other tree's roots are coming up through the asphalt on the drive. It would be a shame to chop any of the trees down completely  as the chestnut trees line a lot of the lane, but these 2 are starting to become a pain...

There aren't any TPOs on them. But we are going to wait and see. 

Bean watch update: they've turned black and will start being harvested any day now! It will be odd having open space again!!

Caravan update: sky light was leaking. Now fixed! 

Leaks and levelling

Last weekend, the Briham residence (as we shall now be referred) had to contend with a leak. 

Andy was preparing the gaps in the floor for filling and then he noticed a pool of water where the mains comes into the house. 

This was naturally a bit of a bugger. Andy's good chum and plumber Ricardo Browne came to the rescue and replaced the leaking pipe. He mentioned whilst he was here that he had installed many Rayburns and Aga's, which was useful information as you'll find out further down.

Whilst he was sorting out leak, Andy took out a couple of the doors that are in the corridor going from the main bit to the bedroom.

A little thing like taking an unattractive door off can make such a huge difference I think.

We also had another chap come and assess the house for installation of a Rayburn. As mentioned before, our central heating and hot water is going to be powered by wood. It might well be a pain for Andy in the dead of winter at 6 in the morning to go and start a fire as I want a bath, but its the cheapest option in the long run. 

Electric will cost us a fortune and we can't get gas mains and have no where to put a propane tank and propane isn't cheap.

Anyway, the chap said he can fit the Rayburn and tanks and connect it all up as soon as we want it so that we can have hot water and a cooker available. Then he will just leave some pipes ready for when we finish the place and put radiators in.

He quoted us nearly 8 grand. That's a hell of a chunk of our budget. That's 2 quotes we've had now of around the same price so I think we are going to have to source a reconditioned Rayburn and tanks ourselves and Ricardo do the plumbing in. 

We also bashed some more render off the wall. We're not removing all of it as we are going to have it rendered exactly the same and some of it is sound. It's just a matter of removing the crumbling hollow stuff. 

It's a fun job to do on those days when we can't really be bothered to do something but feel we ought to do something.

This weekend, we put self levelling latex down on the floor. Whilst the quarry tiles are lovely, the floor was cracked and terribly uneven across the room. Pulling them up is easier said than done so we early on said we would have to level, insulate and then we're going to have floor boards as the finish.

We ran out 3/4s of the way through and Andy had to go and get some more, hence the obvious join. But again, it's not going to be the finished look.

We still haven't got the digger back from its service but that's understandable given its harvest time and the combine harvesters take priority over out little Kubota.

The Architect is now back off holiday and is coming round tomorrow for another chat and then we'll hopefully get some sketches soon! Yippee!

I am also very excited about the tree surgeons coming on Wednesday!

Caravan life is still ok, although our sky light is leaking, but its nothing that a saucepan on the floor can't sort out!

Andy bought some insulation so the plan for the weekend coming is to crack on with that for the roof.

Chimney and sewage

We actually did some work this weekend!

We've been talking about the top of the conical roof for a while and what we want to do. The old picture I posted a couple of posts back shows a cupola on top of the roof. We want to put another one back up with a weather vane on the top, as a homage to the original. Basically, something that looks like this:

But instead of the vent looking things, were going to have glass so it will let light into the roof from above. And, to add an addition twist, every other pane will be stained glass so we will have some nice reflections inside the conical roof too. 

We've heard there's a carpenter in the village, so Andy is going to seek him out and have a chat about our requirements. 

The stained glass will be made by moi and any of my friends who fancy a crack at a bit of stained glass making. Hint hint ;-)

We've been wanting to take the wood burner out for a while too so Andy said we'd do that which would involve opening up the top of the roof too.

This involved a ladder against the roof with me on the bottom for...er...weight...and Andy up the top pulling off bits of lead and wood.

After disturbing many giant moths, we finally got the burner flue out and opened up the top

The coal and wood burner came out pretty easily and now we have a nice space where it once was. 

We're not keeping the woodburner so have put it on gumtree for free

It'll do someone for a workshop or shed.

According to the iphone weather, it's not due to rain for at least a week. But, were going to out up a bit if wood across the top and some tarpaulin over it to give it a peak so if it rains, water will just run off. 

Unfortunately, Andy's tarpaulin is in his racing truck which is in storage. So until we can get it, we've made a botch job fix by duct taping bin bags together to make a giant bin bag tarpaulin look-a-like. 

Anyone who sees it will definitely think we're cowboys :-)

Edit: forgot to mention our waste pipe issues!

So, our bathroom has been smelling worse and worse so we decided to open the manhole and take a look on Saturday morning.

After some rodding, we removed the blockage which seemed to be roots. Obviously this is not good as this suggests there's a crack or something in the pipes. Now we need to dip into our diminishing budget to get a bloke out with a camera on a stick to tell us where the issue is. Then we need to decide if we dig up the garden and replace the pipe ourselves, or pay for one of those concrete "sock" things. 

Also, we have roots climbing into our 3rd chamber in the septic tank, which means the water isn't soaking away. Again, that's going to involve digging to replace the pipes and probably chopping that tree down. The thing is, the septic tank and tree in question aren't on our land. We knew there'd be issues along the way with the trees and roots, and there'll probably be a lot more to come. C'est la vie. Still love it here!

We're alive!

Well hello!

We have Internet! Huzzah! I can now resume updating the blog you'll all be pleased to know :-)

Where to start....

We had our survey done and have a nice set of measurements that mean bugger all to me but are obviously very interesting to an architect and planning officer. 

Unfortunately, our architect has now gone on holiday for 3 weeks so the wait for drawings continues.

With the lovely weather we've been having, we haven't really been doing much on the inside.

I wish I could say we've made significant progress on the outside...but we haven't! A bit of weeding and levelling really....

The tractor is in for a service and its only since we haven't had it we've realised how useful it's been. Digging up stumps by hand is back breaking!

We has planned to crack on with the main part, pending planning and insulate, re-plaster and install our eBay kitchen and hot water system. But, the more we've talked, the more we've decided to hang fire on installing the kitchen and hot water system as we want to see the architects ideas. He may come up with some genius plans that would mean the kitchen is somewhere else entirely and we would have wasted time, money and energy if we went steaming ahead. 

We aren't in a rush.

Even if we had plans ready to submit to planning today, they would take 3 months to approve and then winter is pretty much here and we'd be mental to try and build then! 

Realistically, we'd be looking to start demolition in the winter and start building in the spring and then hopefully be done around this time next year.

We thought we wanted to make the extensions out of brick, but we keep thinking about other methods. We are very indecisive, but we can afford to be right up until planning submission.

Caravan living is still ok. I've cooked some pretty good meals! Even with the rubbish oven. We have a shower connected and a box connected that gives us instant hot showers and we have out sky dish connected and working!

The epic thunderstorm we had the other day was a bit disconcerting...and rain on a caravan roof = no sleep!

But basically, we're good as we are and comfy as we are....which as you can see is dangerous because we're not doing much work!

Finally, here is a picture of what the place looked like when we came to view it in November:

  and now:

It's pretty scary to think that the house we bought 3 months ago is probably worth significantly less today....!

Skip and trees

I won't lie. With all this lovely weather, progress has been slow.

But we have a skip now!

So we can finally move all our crap and have our front garden looking less like a scrap yard...

Andy has started trying to level the area where the shed used to be as this will also be parking eventually. We are debating over if it should be gravel or paving. Andy wants paving as he thinks gravel will be a pain with the leaves but I want gravel because I think it looks better and it looks pretty and you can hear people walking on it. Safety first!

We had another tree surgeon come round. He explained why our quotes were so high. Basically, it's more than a 1 man job as the trees are over a road, someone needs to keep and eye on traffic and help lower the branches.

He did say that the chestnut trees are diseased and they will be dead within the next 10 years which is sad to hear.

That does however explain why the conkers and leaves are falling down. It's very noisy when they hit the caravan!

We're still going to get them chopped back but depending how long we are there and if they will effect out extension will depend on when we decide to get them chopped down.

In other news, my good pal Lottie and Ben tied the knot last weekend :-)

Still no broadband. Apparently Plusnet need to send an engineer to the exchange to "make more room" for us?? Sounds like a cop out to me....

Life in a caravan

Good day!

It's been a while. We still haven't got Internet so I am making use of 3G!

We have been in the caravan for a couple of weeks now and the novelty hasn't worn off yet. 

Andy has made us a little walkway with a cover. We've put a shed up that my dad gave us which has become our clothes storage and washing area:

The shed is nearly as big at the house!

The toilet in the house is working so we are just using the caravan bathroom for showers. We bought this box which you plug into the 12v caravan battery and the gas bottle and it instantly squirts out hot water through a shower head. It works a treat! Although you have to go outside to turn it on and off. A minor inconvenience for the moment.

We haven't done any work on the house, but have been doing some work outside. We've tidied up the drive way so we can park our (my) cars on it.

Andy has also started trying to dig up the stumps for the two trees he chopped down so we can clear that area.

We've also been getting some quotes for a topographical survey and have managed to secure a good one. The architect has advised getting one would make the whole planning thing easier as they will be accurate. So, we need to get that done before we can see any drawings from him.

We've also been getting more tree surgery quotes. Really keen on getting the trees chopped back as it is so dark at the front. You sort of drive into a tunnel of trees when you reach our house. It's quite creepy, and a great shame to miss out on the light. We don't know what difference it will make as there are several other trees in close proximity, but we shall see!

We did a car boot to get rid of a lot of our stuff that we thought was too good to chuck but that we didn't want to keep and that went surprisingly well! We got rid of the majority and what was left was packed off to the charity shop.

An update on the field out the back: the beans are growing well! Andy had such joy on his face watching the tractor spraying the field the other week.

We're moved!

Lack of any updates due to moving!

I can safely say we are officially in! The caravan anyway...

I'll edit and update before the end of this week!

A week for quotes

I don't understand why broadband is so readily unavailable in the country. 

When we went to America, they had wifi and phone signal in the vastest of places.  That country is 10 times bigger than the UK!

Best we can get apparently is 1-2.5mbps. Which isn't very good! And I can't get a Vodafone signal unless I stand outside in a specific spot. 

Middle class problems, eh?

On the plus side, we breathed a sigh of relief when we discovered the position of the Sky satellite is out over he field as opposed to being blocked by the trees to the front.

Silver linings and all that!

This weekend will mostly be spent packing up our rented place and moving out.

Andy is working hard to get us hot water in the caravan. We're probably going to run electric straight from the house fuse box rather than the caravan one as we will need a lot to be plugged in

The wood was treated earlier this week and we've had 2 quotes for cutting back the trees which were an awful lot more than we thought but I think we're gonna have to bite the bullet and just pay it. The trees are pretty big and are over hanging the roof so they need to be cut back. The good thing is if we get them cut back, it will take a couple to a few years to grow back so we won't have to keep spending this money every year. 

We also had some people from Aga come round and assess our suitability for a wood burning flue. I may have mentioned this in a previous post, but we have decided to have all our central heating and hot water run off a wood fuelled stove cooker thing like this:

We probably won't have an Aga, but nevertheless we took advantage of their free suitability assessment.

They said the house was perfect to have a wood fuelled cooker system, we just needed to cut the trees back to allow for the flue clearance. But they quoted us 4-6k. We of course laughed in their face and threw them out, but before that, the chap advised we could source the flue and parts ourselves and fit it ourselves for about 500 quid. That seemed a fair price! We have been searching for an affordable cooker for a while but they don't come cheap, even second hand.

Our research has also shown that the government are providing grants this year for new wood fuelled or biomass systems but they have to be new. It's an environmentally friendly system because wood releases the same amount of co2 when it is burnt as it does when it rots. 

It will just be a little bit of a pain having to add a load of wood twice a day but again, but it will only cost what wood costs which is cheaper than gas and electric. 

Having spent winter just gone relying on electric to heat, it ain't cheap (we were spending 50 a week)! If we got gas, we'd need calour gas bottles or a tank and that is a lot more pricier than normal gas and there is not enough room for an eye sore of a tank. So, wood fuelled seems the cheapest and most logical option to us. 

Sorry for the lack of photos this time!

A picture of our house before it was a house in the 30's

A picture of our house before it was a house in the 30's

http://www.east-garston.com/site-content/history/the-goodings/the-goodings.htm

Bargain purchases

There's been lots going on this week!

We had a chap come round and give us a quote on treating the wood. We managed to get a reasonable price on the condition that we brushed down all the exposed wood to remove dust and cobwebs. Which was fine by us! So we had this weekend to do that ready for his arrival with the chemicals on Tuesday. 

It was going to be an annoying job with 1 ladder, so it was a stroke of luck that we won a 5.5metre scaffold tower on eBay this week too for less than £130! It's a bit old school, but it does the same job as a newer one would.

Unfortunately, I couldn't quite get up to the top without freaking out, so Andy had to do the conical bit whilst I did the other bit on the ladder.

Our second bargain buy this week was this:

That's right. A caravan!! 

The end of the month is approaching quickly (which is when we have to leave our rented place) and we need somewhere to live! 

Again, it's old school. 90's decor. 

It is a 4 berth, which means we can have a bed out all the time and a separate seating area. And it comes with an awning, although a few poles are missing...but that's to be expected when paying £700! 

We spent Friday evening levelling out the front garden, taking the fence out and taking some more roots out to prepare for the arrival of our temporary home.

We also met an architect this week who has done a lot of work in the local conservation area so is used to fighting and winning against West Berks council. Andy and I always thought it was a case of rebuilding the two flat roof extensions but he seemed to have other ideas. I'm looking forward to seeing those ideas in sketch form!

Highlight of the week was Andy trying to cut through a live wire thinking it wasn't live. He's learnt a lesson he'll never forget - make sure the electric is off! 

And finally, and most importantly, I put up a bird house :-)

Down comes the ceiling

I returned from a mini break with my good pal Lottie Booth yesterday.

Andy was left in charge of the house, so I was lucky to return to find it still standing. Just!

Andy had the 'sewer dweller' Ben come around along with his brother Sam and they started pulling down the ceiling plaster 

We needed to do this for a few reasons:

1) Check the rafters are still solid, not rotten or wood wormed

2) Check the felt was still in good nick

3) Check no critters or bugs had set up home in there

4) We need to add insulation and re-plaster anyway.

Some of the rafters have the tell tale holes of the woodworm but seem in good nick. We're going to have to get someone to come and spray the lot as a precaution. That's the risk with older houses. Untreated wood = woodworm's dream.

They did find an old wasps nest that had long been abandoned and nothing else. No bats which is good!

The conical part will definitely need to be re-plastered so it's a smooth finish.

The other bit would actually look quite nice with the rafters showing. So now we are torn again.

The most annoying part so far for me is trying to decide what to do in terms of the finished look. I think I have an idea, then I see something I like or Andy suggested something and it throws it all up in the air again. 

The water tank needs to be moved so its up in the roof and we will have the hot water tank in the kitchen as it will be connected to our wood burning heating system. We have someone coming out this week to assess the suitability and where the flue should go.

In fact, we have 2 tree surgeons coming for quotes to cut back the chestnut trees away from the roof, the architect and the flue man all coming this week.

Andy also wants to buy a caravan as we need to be out of our rented place by the end of this month and we can't move into the house yet! There's so much going on and so much to think about and so much to spend on that you just don't think about at the initial planing the stage.

It is daunting to say the least.

EDIT: I completely forgot to mention the kitchen we have bought! :-)

When Andy came back from his holiday, he said he had an idea around a kitchen. We were never keen on getting a brand new kitchen because of the cost and had looked on eBay for people getting rid of kitchens.

Andy found a listing for a HUGE kitchen, much bigger than we needed. He said that was perfect because then we could pick the parts we liked and fit it exactly to our kitchen size and still have plenty left over. The kitchen is lovely! I really like the units. 

We won the auction and Andy went to pick it up on bank holiday Monday just gone in his racing car truck. He returned many hours later advising that he only managed to fit half the kitchen into his truck!

Now we were tasked with somewhere to store it. We were going to keep it in the truck but given the truck now needed to be empty to go and get the rest, we needed storage! We spent that night looking for places to rent. It was looking liking it was going to be a storage container in Greenham until we came across the Sovereign website which had garages to rent for a tenner a week just down the road in Great Shefford. What luck! I hadTuesday off so went down to Sovereign  and managed to get the keys there and then. That evening, Andy and I unloaded and let me tell you, it was one hell of a workout. The next morning, I was up at 2 to get to Stansted and I was aching!

Andy went back this weekend and Ben helped him unload round 2. 

P.s I also just want to let people know that I am updating this blog all from an iPhone which if anyone has one, you know how annoying and stealthy auto correct can be. I've always been one who doesn't properly re-read things I have written and it probably shows. But hey, this isn't an English test, it's a blog! The pictures are the most exciting part ;-)