It's all or nothing here!!

Those of you avidly following the progress (or otherwise) of the pool and other work we're waiting to have done on the house and garden will know that precious little has happened for the past couple of months.  This week we would have come close to getting the pool installation started BUT we have been hampered by the most awful weather.  It seems to have rained almost constantly for the past week plus we have had 'orange alert status' storms.  To digress slightly, let me share with you the fact that on Sunday night we had hailstones the size of golf balls!  Our cars now have little craters all over them! Above our bed is a Velux window and I was convinced that, at any moment, the glass would give way and we would be showered with hailstones.  Luckily, that didn't happen but I have moved the getting of blinds for the Velux windows up to a higher position on my "to do" list!

But back to the work on the house and garden......as soon as the weather improves, work IS going to start on the pool installation!  We're not too hopeful about having the garden just how we want it this summer but it will be nice to be able to see it evolve.  And you never know, we may get an Indian summer and be able to use the pool later in the year.

In the meantime though, other jobs have been piling up.  You may recall we bought a fireplace some months ago.  This is what it currently looks like...in bits on the drive...

Well, today.... YES, today... work has started on ripping out what we have at the moment and putting in this new fireplace.  This is the work in progress so far....

Literally, as I write, there has been a hitch!  The tool that the builder is using to remove some of the existing stone has "died" and the job has had to be postponed until a replacement tool can be commandeered from someone/somewhere!  Why is it not the simplest thing for these people to just go and buy a new one?!

But all is not lost!! The builder is going to move on to cutting out the stonework in the room that is to be my utility room to put in a door through to the attached barn.  (Evidently, it's a completely different tool that's needed).  Fortunately, where we're having this doorway is exactly where a door used to be at some time in the past and the 'hole' has been bricked up.  In my little non-technical brain, I think it should be the easiest of things to simply open it up again BUT experience has taught me that it almost certainly WON'T be that simple!!!  

If we succeed with the fireplace and the utility room door, the builder is then going to cut through stonework in the kitchen so that we can change the existing window to double doors!  

We have waited so long to have these jobs done and even though the whole house seems to be in pandemonium at the minute, Danny and I are thrilled that it's all finally happening.  All of the jobs are triggers to us being able to complete the things we want to change in the house.  In the lounge, once the new fireplace is in, we should be in a position to strip off the wallpaper, have some more power points put in then decorate it to our taste.  (We may change the staircase but that's for a later date!).  Once I have the door from the utility room-to-be into the barn, we can plan out the utility room, get a washing machine plumbed in there etc.  We want to be able to get into the barn without having to go outside for a number of reasons, not least because it's where we plan to have our chest freezer and it will be a good place to collect our recycling stuff (which we have to take to the déchetterie - or tip - ourselves).  And of course, most importantly in my world, is that once we have the new doors in the kitchen, I can have the kitchen refitted.  I don't think I've told you but we have already bought the kitchen and it's all stacked up in the large barn!  Why have we bought it already?  Because IKEA had an amazing offer whereby we got back 10% of the price; the offer was on for a limited time and we figured it would be silly to not avail ourselves of it, even though it means having stacks and stacks of flat packs!

So there we have it... one minute nothing was happening... now it's all happening!