Long Time No Post

I think I should hang my head in shame!! We've been back over a week now and I haven't managed to update my blog!!!! We always come back to a myriad of mundane things to do - getting hair chopped - restocking the larder - boring things like that! Also we always suffer grandchildren withdrawal symptoms and need our 'fix' of both number one and number two grandsons.

I thought I would share some of the work we have done in our French house. We have owned the property for nine and a half years now and have worked steadily at improving it and making it fit our needs. As so often seems to be the case in rural France, the property we bought is made up of several buildings - a house that was habitable, a smaller house that most definitely wasn't, and a barn.

This was the day we took possession. The habitable house is on the right and the little house to the left was in danger of collapsing completely!!

After a little demolition, removing the plaster on the little house and replacing the doors, windows, shutters, etc we now have this -

We removed the hedge between the two houses .....

and created a terrace......

The barn had lost part of the roof in a particularly violent storm.....

And we had the roofers replace it - although not with the beautiful old tiles but with the more practical, modern tiles...

The back garden has evolved from this - with a hedge between the two gardens......

To this......

Inside the main house we have converted the roof space to make two bedrooms, a bathroom and shower room - starting from this........

And now we have......

Downstairs was already habitable, but we have insulated, plastered painted, and generally tidied up from this......

To this......

Apart from the upstairs conversion and the barn roof, the rest of the work we have done ourselves and learned so much on the way - getting round the French planning regulations as well as the practical skills such as plastering.

Would we do it again? Probably not. We are all but ten years older and Mr D has had a new pair of knees and I had a new hip along the way. Goodness knows what may need to be replaced over the next ten years!!! I think we'll quit while we're ahead!!!!!