Work on a Sunday...no, just having fun

A quiet weekend for us with not much progress to report in the house. We had some stone steps removed from the garden, which now allows us a much cleaner lawn area. We back-filled the holes left by stone removal with soil from the jacuzzi area. Yes the dream still lives.

Today, (dare I say Sunday) we decided to carry out a couple of tasks related to the fireplace. The fireplace was built some months ago, and since then the plasterer has been finishing around the fireplace. The problem that has arisen, is that the air vent covers do not fit correctly now, and we had to do some work to get them to fit. We also wanted to move the main cast iron feature door upwards about 10cm from its current position. This is one of the cast iron doors that we rescued from the old farmhouse oven. It is just lovely. Another task was to cut another hole to accept one of the smaller cast iron doors that also came from the old oven. A couple of weeks back, I was seduced into buying a lovely vibrating cutting machine. I tried it out in ernest today, and it was faultless. The new large door is now repositioned, and a new opening has been created for the smaller door...job done.

This coming week should see the completion of the plastering or very close, and more tiling happening. The second set of stairs should be in place on Tuesday, and I should be able to built the glass brick wall.

We are now making plans for a painting party.......watch this space.

Wall, tiles....

At last some tiles have been laid. The great event has taken place in Raphaels' bathroom, and they look pretty good. The tile layer has been preparing each bathroom for the past few days. This task involved building the walls for the toilet mechanisms and preparing the showers and draining slots.

Another piece of progress has been the construction of the main en-suite wall, and frame. This frame will house the glass block wall, which we will construct next week. Before we can build the glass into place, we need to take delivery of the new stairs. Once these stairs are in place we can bring the bath down from the floor above. The bath will then be lifted through the frame into the en-suite, as it is too large to go through the doors.

Following on from the cleaning out of the chicken shed, today we had a couple of tree stumps removed. I asked the trench digger to pop around and do the business. He also took out some garden steps. There are certainly some interesting carved stones in that pile to be explored, as some have numbers carved on them.

Dig it....

The trench and hole digging really got going today. This coincided with a powerful hail and rain storm. The deep hole that has been cut, is to house the new sewerage line, the new heating line and we think the electricity and telephone.

The tile layer arrived today, and has spent the day preparing the bathrooms for the tiles. We need to check our pattern designs tonight to ensure that we get it correct.

The long suffering plasterers are working to their conclusion. They have been completing most of the door recesses, and are about to close the last of the ceiling in the kitchen.

We have decided to leave some old cottage stones exposed, so we will need to go and mark the walls in the morning.

A whole lot of shaking goin on...

A bit of a weird day today. I visited the house at around 7:15am to have a quick chat with the plasterer, and the old full skip had been taken away, to be replaced by a digging machine. I presumed that this would be for the trench cutting which would begin on Tuesday.

On my return home in the evening, the trench work had already begun. The neighbors soon let me know that their house was being subjected to a terrible shaking. I feel a little sorry for them.

The plasterers continued to work today, and closed the window in the bathroom of Raphael.

Another piece of good news, is that we have received a good quote from a great painter.

Another day of progress.

It`s driving us up the wall

Today we spent some time in the garden of the house. The fruit trees are dropping their apples and pears, so we decided to harvest some of them. The apples will be taken to Gelterkinden, and squeezed for apple juice. I have promised my son Lewis that he can taste it when he visits Switzerland in January.

The afternoon was spent pointing the great wall. We managed to point over half of the brickwork, to a standard Les Harrison would be proud of. We really had to take control of this task, as the new stairs arrive on Tuesday, and the pointing would be more difficult with them in place.

Yesterday evening we drilled a hole through the wall of the guest room to run a cable for the satellite system. The drill bit was 90 cms long, and just made it through the wall.

The guest room is where Lewis, Thomas and Elliott will sleep when they visit, but it will also double up as our Tv room. The famous Harrison round sofa bed will be located in this room, and is mighty comfy.

The only way is up

Today has been interesting thus far. We completed the wall scraping from the great wall, and this was followed by the cutting of the floor in the workshop. The hole has to be created to accept the stairs that will be relocated from the first to second floor (these are being replace with much nicer open stairs).

Chainsaws always phase me a little. I think it is the length of the exposed spinning blade and the noise that does it, oh yes and the method of starting them. Anyway I plucked up the courage, but before cutting the hole I had to pop up into the roof of the workshop and remove quite a few roof tiles(we have stacks of these all over the house).

The job took a few minutes to complete, but it left me filthy dirty with dirt and old dust, as well as sawdust.

The tiling from yesterday is but a distant memory. I now need to turn my hand to tile cutting. The cellar, come laundry, does not have a 90 degree angle between any of the walls. This will necessitate lots of cutting.

The plasterers are still working their way around the house. The quality of their work is superb.

I must now get cleaned up before the architect arrives to discuss the budget. This should be a fun meeting.

The Great Wall of....Reggie

What a day. Reggie has been cleaning the old mortar from the wall in the stairway, and the great news is...the task is complete. The job has been quite difficult, with differing hardnesses of mortar. We tried the technological approach but this failed, so it was with old hand tools that the job was completed.

Downstairs the task of sanding the beams in the hallway and kitchen is now complete. (It is nice to tick these as completed on our huge to do list).

The plasterers are going strong, and some rooms should be ready for painting next week.

Tomorrow is tile laying day in the laundry. This should be fun, as no wall is related to a 90 degree angle in any way.

It is great to work in the kitchen where the light streams in through the French doors.

Lots of tasks to complete...

Today has been filled with many tasks. The electricians are still busy at work, as are the four plasterers.

Reggie has been engaged this afternoon removing old cement from between the bricks in the stairway, before we re-point the joints. This is a tiring and long task, but Reggie is really into it.

I started the day removing rubble from inside the house. This was followed by 3 hours of painting in the cellar. I then moved onto sanding the beams in the corridor. This is a nice task, although rather messy. I should finish the hallway tomorrow and get started in the kitchen.

We also had the pleasure of removing the tarpaulin from the french doors. This was pleasing for us, as it let us know, how much light would be let into the kitchen.

The close the day out, we picked up Raphael from childcare, and headed to Germany again to buy more items for the bathroom and other places.

Details - things are warming up

Well it has been a busy week in many respects. Most of the workers are back from summer holiday, and lots of activities are running in parallel in the house. The plasterers are back in town, as are the electricians. An electrical warming device has been attached to our fully charged under-floor heating system, and it will run for several days. This will cure the flooring ready to accept tiles and parquet.

The first set of stairs linking the ground floor to first floor have been constructed and assembled into place. The treads are temporary, and will be replaced the week we move in with oak treads.

Yesterday we decided on the surface finish for the rooms. Needless to say, we have another job lined up to apply the finish to the walls. Reggie and myself keep joking that the money we save will go to a Jacuzzi. This is our joke, as we know we have overspent the budget.

The electricians are interested that we are installing high end LED lights in the gangways. These are rather expensive in comparison to halogen spots, but use 85% less power. We now need to see if we can find the same which can be dimmed.

Tonight we were again in Germany buying the glass bricks for the main en-suite. Mission accomplished.

Tomorrow will be fine weather, so we will be up early to paint for an hour in the cellar, before heading to Luzern for a swim and to pick up the tumble dryer.

Ok.... Enough for now.

Stairway to....

I haven`t posted for a few days, as the work that is being undertaken is not that obvious. The main distribution unit for the underfloor heating is now in place, and will be connected to a heating device on Thursday. This will pump warm water through our whole house, and will warm and cure the floors. On Monday of next week, the tile layer will start his work.

Today the company that is fitting the two new staircases came along and in quick time removed the main staircase. This process involved the not too subtle task of cutting it in two. We were impressed at their work ethic, and skill.

This afternoon saw us meeting the architect again to discuss more detail. We had a visit from a painter who will quote on painting the house inside and out. We also met once again with the window supply company. The order got a little scrambled, but we resolved the issues in quick time, with no pain or remorse.

Today I started a break from work for almost two weeks. I will be working hard on the house. I applied some bitumen to the flat roof over the laundry this morning, and this was followed by a trip to the green waste tip. This afternoon I carried on removing old plaster from the kitchen, and will conclude this task in the morning. Oh by the way, I removed the forlorn looking tractor tyres to the local tyre recycling centre.

I have a number of things to complete in the coming days. I need to lay some tiles in the laundry, I need to apply bitumen to the roof of the garage. I need to purchase three double glazed window units, I need to build the stairs in my workshop...and ...and ....and

More news tomorrow...

Windows and back door are now in place

As expected the remaining windows are now in place, apart from the two cellar windows, and Raphaels bathroom window. We will find out the progress of these tomorrow when we have our next project meeting.

We have noticed that the downstairs bathroom window is sitting too proud, and this will be on our list to discuss.

The frame with the three back doors is nicely in place, and we look forward to unveiling it when the waterproofing around the frame is set.

We once again imported more tiles today.

Seeing clearly....

At last the windows have arrived and are being installed. I popped around to the house this morning and low and behold the windows were being delivered along with the frame for the back door. I helped the crane operator position the large frame before leaving for work.

On return some 12 hours later (blimey....did I have such a long day?).

The good news is that the windows are now installed on the first floor apart from the one for Raphaels bathroom. This is a window where the opening was enlarged for the window. It needs some more resizing for the window to fit.

It is a real pleasure to walk into the rooms now, to look out through new double glazed units. The quality is super, and we are happy that they come from a local supplier in Arisdorf.

Tomorrow should see the rest of the windows fitted downstairs.

On another note, we picked up the V-Zug washing machine today. It is a nice unit and still under warranty, so we have a second hand one, but are happy with the price.

Reggie also picked up more tiles from Germany, leaving only a couple of more trips before we have them all imported.

This week we need to order and collect the sink unit and furniture for the laundry. This should be easy to achieve. I will need to improve my tile laying skills, before this unit is assembled.

But the one task that goes ahead of all of these is the removal of the spare tractor tyres from the cellar (laundry). Well, let`s face it, who could ever live without a couple of massive tractor tyres?