Winter has settled in around us with its extremes of beauty and damaging and deadly cold. We have seen it well below -10 here on occasion over the past 2 weeks.

Well, the house is up and inhabited! We have a lodger and are seeing how the building likes winter! The exceptionally heavy snow caused some gutter damage and the low temperatures revealed a weak spot in the water supply to house which is easily remedied. Other than that, the project can be deemed to have been completed well. Thanks to Rob, (architect) Arthur (builder)and his doughty team.

Nearing End

Well, we are nearly there. All bar a few snagging details.

Day 46 Fri 7th May

Posts are happening less frequently now because there are fewer changes of dramatic proportions. This is where we got to this week! However the putting in of the insulation is a dusty wearisome task as the stuff has to be cut to size and then jammed in between timbers.

Day 41 later

By the end of the day this is where we had reached!

Day 41 Friday 30 April

It's more difficult to see dramatic changes on a day by day basis, but the inside is slowly being licked into shape, or getting plastered!

Day 36 Fri 23 April

The focus of the work is transferring indoors although there are still things to be done externally. We are into the season of choosing kitchen furniture and tiles etc etc. It's obviously not enough that we are also getting married in two weeks time. How do you add a smiley to these blogs? f

Day 34 Wed 21 April

Cabling days, inside and out! Flooring started too! And time for tea at the builder's retreat too.

Rannoch Moor

As a diversion, here is where I was on Friday!! The vast expanse of Rannoch Moor was a good place to test my Garmin Etrex and my map reading skills.

Day 31 Fri 16 April

Well the team are having their whole weekend this time. The internal partitions are starting to go up and we can see how the rooms are going to work.

Day 30 Thurs 15 April

Inside is taking rapid shape. Ross was getting the first of the inside walls up towards the end of the day. Andy managed to finish the bric work on the near gable end. Well done guys. I see the child entertainment service is working well too.

Not much happening on the outside today, apart from sills going under the windows. On the inside insulation was being put up on the walls. Arthur was looking a bit vacant until he realised I was on the prowl with my camera! He told me that Beth and Scott and Paul enjoy looking at pictures of him at work, but these are very very hard to come by. I'll try and persuade him to pick up a hammer and hand it to someone next time he comes.

Day 28 Tues 13 April

The Granny Flat is becoming an accepted part of the garden landscape. I saw a jackdaw settle on it this evening. Hopefully they won't move in before we have!

Day 26 Sunday April 11th

Chris decided he needed to come in over the weekend to get on with slating the roof as he goes on holiday on Tuesday. Thankfully the weather was brilliant.