Willy's holiday

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After last week's lime work, Willy decided to have a few days off. We spent Saturday doing ordinary weekend things like going for a walk in the grounds of Hopetoun House, which we haven't managed for ages and doing housework.

On Sunday Willy decided that we'd go up and look at the house and maybe do a bit of cleaning. So we did a bit of cleaning and I took some photos, but left the camera in the house, so no pics till later. I also lost a contact lens - first time for about 10 years.

Wow! It really looks like a house now - the plaster has made an incredible difference and it looks absolutely fantastic. It's an absolute transformation and in such a short time. This is definitely the way forward for plastering straw bales in Scotland, where we have such a short guaranteed frost-free season and so much rainfall.

Then we came home and Willy had Monday off... then on Tuesday, he decided to go back, even though he officially had another day of rest, but he was moving into the Manse while K&D were on holiday and wanted to be sure he knew what to feed the dog, the cat and the boiler.

On Wednesday, more change - WWOOFERs Christina and Lea from North Germany arrived to help.

Thursday, that's today, Dean & John came back to do some finishing off, touching up and help to put the window cills in.

Rumour has it that tomorrow they will hose down the scaffolding. Maybe they'll unearth the contact lens I lost.

Tomorrow's Friday, so I'll be off to Tombreck after work tomorrow. Andrew, Maria, Ben & Thomas are coming for a very short visit, so we'll try to have a bonfire behind the house.

Incidentally, the straw house must meet all the criteria for "house" to small children, as Rory & Theo distinguished between our two houses by the fact that one had " a bath and a television" and one didn't!

Will add some pics when I get my camera back

Now Sunday and pics added so I can add my tuppence worth. Things did indeed proceed pretty much as described. I did go back on Tuesday but didn't achieve much feeling bit flat after efforts to get lime on walls. Moved into the manse only to find it was the location of a wee get together between Tasha, Marcus, Ian and Bryn so between that and strange bed not much sleep.
Weds still feeling knackered and lacking impetus telephone call, via Sue that WWOOFers were on their way from Glencoe. Pottered asround cleaning windows (lime splashes), sorting things out for next few weeks. Wondered whether to go to Crianlarich to pick up woofers but unsure as to what bus they were on. Then about 4 o'clock Tober returned from Killin with the ladies in question - Lea and Christina. I showed them round, they settled into the Caravan (with a couple of extra sleeping bags just in case weather turned cold).

Thursday we unleashed the wool - on opening a bale of wool it expands several fold. Lea and Christina bagged and sprayed the wool ready for stuffing into the roof. Dean and John arrived around 10 and got themselves set up to fix the cracks and sandblast the lime from the scaffold and eaves unfortunately the compressor supplied by local plant hire firm didn't work so no sandblasting. Once the cracks had been filled Tober and I installed the cills and Dean and John then tied them in. Finished about 6.30. A nice surprise, Lea and Christina cooked tea - a tasty chilli then a quiet night and early to bed.

Friday spent the day working with Dean and John mainly cleaning down windows once limewash had been applied. They left around 4 then Ben and Miki turned up for Nicole's farerwell party. Picked up Wendy from Callander had tea at manse again provided by our wonderful woofers.

The party was to be on the beach but first we all (Wendy, Lea, Christina, Bryn and my good self) went up to the farmhouse then, eventually (after a couple of glasses of wine etc) we wended our way down to the beach leaving Tober, Sue et all to follow. Ewan and Marieke were already there with a good fire burning. There followed another of these magical evenings where people sit rouid a fire talking about sailing ships, sealing wax, life the universe and whether pigs have wings. we eventually got back to the manse sometime after 3.

Saturday Wendy's brother, Andy, dropped in for a visit with Maria,his wife and Ben and Thomas their kids. They're of to Dubai for a while in a couple of weeks. We went for a walk to the beach which Ben and Thomas thoroughly enjoyed at teast the walk down to the beach but the walk back up was another story. They then left to head back to Preston. Good luck guys.

I felt rather the worse for wear and wasn't really achieving much so went back to the manse around 4 and slept for an hour or so leaving Wendy to soldier on womanfully. A quiet evening and an early bed (to watch Match of the Day on Dolan and Katy's TV.
Sunday - a beautiful morning so Christina and Lea set off to follow track up to Lochan- nan-chat.

I patched lime on the west gable, Wendy stuffed straw into upstairs south wall In the afternoon Charlie turned up to see how things were going (and to give his bike a run out), then we tidied up some of the mess and headed down the road around 4.

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Photos

Grafitti already
Can't leave a wall for five minutes before someone writes their name on it!

Ready to go
Dean - I think!

Lime crew
Dean, John and Willy

Christina and Lea
Our latest WWOOFers - from north Germany

Look no scaffolding
I was so impressed when I saw the wall that i didn't even notice the lack of scaffolding

First window cill
This is by special request from Uncle David

Insulation
all this wool will disappear between the rafters - thanks to Christina and Lea

West gable waiting for cladding
The north wall is whiter because it has limewash on

East gable
Camera must not have been straight - the house does not tilt in the way it appears to on the picture - but it does look like a house now

Boys and their toys
Ben and Tom on Bea & Innes' electric car