As the stove arrived on Monday we had planned fitting the chimney but the manufacturers had got the parts wrong and it took till Thursday to sort out what was needed. This meant a trip to Leith to pick them up. I then spent most of the week slapping plaster on to the remaining downstairs walls - the plan/idea was that it would give a rustic effect. You can decide for yourselves when you eventually see it. I'm waiting to see how it will look once limewashed but am reasonably hopeful of the results. Meanwhile Ewan boxed out the shower room downstairs in readiness for Ronnie the plumber returning in 2 or 3 weeks. Quiet week apart from latenight with Tober on the Weds with a cheeky little Spanish red (Co-op special £2.99) After pleasant weekend ... read more

Spent last fortnight continuing with plasterboard and fixing door surrounds etc. Despite one or two hiccoughs (incl temporary loss of table saw which we managed to repair) )work progresses. Lots of COLD clear days and picture card views (especially first thing in the morning when the sunlight first hits the peaks and turns thenm orange then pink. Also the sky at night with its infinity of stars. Socially quite quiet though an old friend John Hobson and partner Irene dropped in as did one of last years Czech volunteers (Jan). Good news on Friday stove should be delivered next week so once plaster is complete and flooring down we can get Ronnie, the plumber, back to install heat and water (including bath!). So hopefully I should be able to move into house, in some form, by ... read more

This was just a brief visit to see the new floor and walk on it and talk to Brian from Callander about plastering the inside. We arrived after dark and went inside using a head torch to see. One corner was glistening and we could hear a drip. The light was upstairs - and the ladder to get upstairs with had been taken down for screeding the floor, otherwise it would have set in the concrete and formed a permanent feature. So off we went outside, in the dark, amid all the rubble and debris to find the ladder. Then I climbed up and discovered the cause of the problem - the water pipe was no longer dripping into the bucket, but onto the floor, which had eventually started to drip on the floor below. Willy ... read more

Nearly ready to shut the house up for the mid-winter celebrations. Before that, a challenge for the creatively inclined. We have an irregular four-sided gap in the east and west bedroom wall adjacent to the double height sun-space, that's formed where the big roof beams and the vertical and diagonal posts meet. There's a photo in with this entry.. We could just fill the space with plasterboard. We can't just leave a gap, as Building Control is not fond of features which allow small children to fall from great heights. We are thinking of windows possibly with a stained glass inset - ( as we can't afford to do both as full stained glass). What else is feasible? I'm home for a long weekend to see if my back recovers. I think I knackered it fitting ... read more

We haven't had a Winnie the Pooh story for quite some time. Winnie the Pooh arrived at his house on Monday morning and the ground was white - he also noticed a slow puncture in one of his tyres, but that's not very relevant. His friend Thumper liked the snow and spent all day catching snowflakes, ending up with white whiskers like an arctic explorer. At lunchtime, when all the sensible people had gone home for lunch and he was all alone in the house, Winnie the Pooh decided to do some work. He climbed carefully up the stepladder and stretched, but he couldn't quite reach. So he climbed right to the top of the stepladder and reached again. Suddenly he woke up sitting on the ground with a very sore head. Winnie the Pooh had ... read more