Box of bits

We visited the charity shop Emmaus last year when we first arrived, and one of the things we found was a box of old wooden carved decorations. We think they probably came off an old bookcase or dresser. Brian thought they would come in useful at some point so bought them for ten euros, not really knowing what he’d use them for. I have my eye on the wooden box, I know just where I can use that.

When we started decorating the Magnum we both felt the fireplace was missing something but were not quite sure what. Brian remembered the box of bits he’d bought and we started to consider how we could possibly use them. The challenge was that they were all cut with angles on their edges and not quite wide enough for what we wanted. Ideally we had thought they would look good at the top of each of the side pillars but they didn’t fit.

After a few days of revisiting the box and looking at what we had we could see that it may just be possible if we could join two pieces together on each side, but that would take some very careful cutting to make it work. Brian was up for the challenge, so took the time to carefully cut away by hand what was needed and join two pieces each side to fit. He now needs to seemlessly fit them to the fireplace to make them look like they have always been there.

Board

Joël was back today to continue work in the atelier. We love how he has fitted the boards around the beams and with the stone wall it has some real character, it’s a great space. Unfortunately he didn’t quite finish, the joints need a further covering, so he will be back next week to finish off.

In the meantime we can measure up for the flooring and get that ordered.

We are still making progress in the Magnum. Having the fabric covering on the walls, means I’ve had to be extra careful with the painting. But it’s starting to come together now and the farrow and ball ‘blackened’ we have used on the walls is really bright and fresh. I’ve noticed the light in the room change since I’ve painted the walls, it’s really exciting seeing the vision come to life.

For the art of coffee

Brian has been mastering coffee art. It surprises me as to everything that needs to be considered to achieve the desired effect. He has to think what type of milk, how fresh is the milk, what size of the jug for frothing the milk, level of froth, shape of the spout, what type of pattern is he aiming for.

Once he’s pulled the coffee and frothed the milk, he then pours it onto the coffee to create a brown base layer, which he then carefully tips the froth onto to make the design. Et voila!

On another note, Macron spoke to journalists last night to announce his plan for coming out of confinement. It is a four stage plan, with three week intervals between each stage, which will provide a period of review before moving to the next stage.

The first stage starts on Monday where we will have freedom of movement. We had been restricted to 10km from home for the last four weeks. The 7pm curfew will also remain.

Then on 19th May non-essential shops can re-open. Cafés and restaurants can also open their terraces. We have started to see some local cafés and restaurants extending their terraces into the road to gain more space. I understand this has been happening all across France, and Paris has embraced this by pedestrianising some of its roads. Cinemas, museums and theatres will also re-open with restrictions on numbers of entrants. The curfew will be extended to start at 9pm.

Then from 9th June, pretty much everything is due to open, except nightclubs, and people are still encouraged to work remotely. The curfew will start at 11pm.

From 30th June the curfew will be withdrawn. Larger events such as sporting events, concerts, festivals etc will be allowed, but with various protocols and a ‘pass sanitaire’. The details on this are yet to be released, but the expectation is it will be app based.

The pass sanitaire will also enable travel within the EU and USA from 9th June. The requirement is to have had both jabs for your vaccination. I am having my first jab next week, with the 2nd one scheduled for 12 weeks later.

It is great to understand the plan, but obviously the review periods would need to see a continued strong roll-out of the vaccination programme, and the number of cases reducing, but there does seem to be some light. It would be good now to understand how travel to and from the UK can be incorporated into the plan

Gold

One thing I’ve found with Brian’s new found DIY interest is that he never throws anything away. These bits of wood may look like tatty or second hand toot, but to Brian they are gold. Today for instance, we made a list of all the little bits we needed to buy from Weldom (diy shop) to help us finish the Magnum. Brian vanished for ten minutes and returned with what looked like a hodgepodge of cut-offs, but after we’d finished chatting about them and then measuring them we found we actually had most of what we had put on our list, and some of it was better suited than what we know we can buy. Okay, some of it needs sanding and filling, but that’s at least good for our green credentials.

Bee early

It’s hard to believe we are still in April as the days are full of sunshine and warmth. The evenings are cool, so we enjoy a drink before dinner in the courtyard before coming indoors to enjoy the crackle and the heat of the fire.

We have noticed a few bees around, which does seem very early. Some have been a little bit slow and just crawling across the floor.

I think it’s just because we do not have an abundance of flowers out yet, although the peonies are starting to bloom. We have a beautiful soft, pale pink peony bush that has been first to flower. It looks gorgeous - with delicate translucent petals.

The bees do need a little bit of care, so Brian puts out a saucer of sugary liquid for them to drink, he likes to use a brightly coloured saucer to attract them - it seems to do the trick and help them on their way.

That

We are at that stage of decorating where it looks like we’ve gone backwards, and there’s complete chaos, with no one job finished, you need to wait for that to dry before you do that, and you can’t do that as that needs doing.

One of many little filling jobs that need doing, then sanding off

I think the work Brian has put into the fireplace is really showing, and it’s looking so good. He has further plans for it though, and I’m looking forward to seeing how they develop over the coming days.

Sausage and champagne

We woke again to beautiful blue sky. The temperature was going to peak around 22°c today, so I suggested to Brian we would have an early dinner and enjoy the glorious afternoon.

We started with some smoked sausage from the Ardeche with a glass of rosé champagne from a local producer in Bar-Sue-Seine, Devaux. After a light mozzarella and tomato salad for a touch of freshness, we had smoked haddock with some new potatoes enjoyed with a very delicious bottle of Sancerre. Which we’d bought from Henri Bourgeois when we visited the Sancerre region in 2019.

It was a delightful way to spend a late April afternoon after a busy week working on the house.

Enough’s enough

Today was a difficult day getting out of bed, however we did not have time to laze around as Jöel was back to progress the ‘Atelier’ (studio). That’s what we are now calling the work space in the barn. He arrived just after 8.30 am.

I think we were both tired from yesterday’s floor creation, so I cooked us scrambled eggs on toast to give us a good wholesome start to the day. Brian was then going to tackle the fireplace in the Magnum, and I needed to paint some wooden strips to be used to tidy up the skirting. It was such a beautiful day, clear, bright blue sky - not a cloud in sight - that I set myself up outside and got to work.

before long Brian was asking if I could look at what he’d done, and did I think he should go any further. It was one of those moments for me of ‘I’m not sure I knew it was that bad’. I thought he was going to fill a few gaps and cracks. But as he explained once he had started he realised it needed more work than we had both thought, and to be prepared that it would look worse before it got better!

Behind the plaster he revealed some beautiful looking stone, so then he proceeded to look to see what was behind the tiles at the back - that was less exciting, he found nothing! That was when I said, ‘I think you’ve gone far enough, you now need to rebuild it’.

La buanderie - part 1

Back in the laundry room ( La buanderie) Brian had prepared a base for the partition he will build around the pipe work. That is a job a few months down the line though.

He also wanted to smooth off an untidy joint where he’d knocked down a previous dividing wall. He did this by fixing some chicken wire over the broken bricks then smoothing concrete to it. He worked meticulously all the way up the wall carefully covering the wire.

We’ve probably been putting the cement floor off, because we have no experience when it comes to that kind of thing, but we wanted to get it going. The plan was to board half of the room off and lay that part first, I was going to be the ‘cement mixer’ whilst Brian did the laying.

This is the area we wanted to cover.

It really was tough work, I mixed over 250kg of cement by hand in a yellow trug. But we had fun doing it and got the job done.

We were both pleasantly worn out afterwards, but rather pleased with our achievement. Brian’s new laser definately played a very important part.

Just need to leave it all to dry now

The case of the Disappearing floor!

All the work on the floor was nearly complete in the ‘Magnum’, that’s what we’ve called this bedroom at the front of the house. My aim was to start, and complete, painting the ceiling. I wanted to get that painted so we could take the plastic down, which would mean we could then start painting the woodwork and walls. All this was going to be quite a big job so we wanted to get on. There is a lot of cutting-in right up to the striped fabric, and a lot of filling, so we would be taking our time. To be honest, we now take our time on all the jobs we do - life is enjoyably much slower.

So, I made a start on the ceiling.

There was however, one small area of floor that still needed doing, just below one of the radiators. It had been filled with concrete or plaster at some point in its history. We think maybe the floorboard had rotted and the wooden floor board at the edge had been replaced with either a lime mortar, concrete or possibly plaster. Either way it didn’t look right and needed some work.

Brian had told me he was going to paint it. I wasn’t overly enthused with the idea of painted plaster, but anything would be better than just plain white. Brian said he would make it ‘disappear’ though. I thought he was thinking maybe grey like we are going to paint the walls, so you can imagine my amazement when I saw what he was doing

There is still a lot to do here cleaning up the walls and pipe work, but he really has made the concrete patch completely disappear.

Levelling up

Big excitement today, Brian had finally ordered his self levelling laser and it arrived this morning. I’m not sure why it had taken so long, I think part of it though was that when he went on to research which one to buy, the reviews he was reading were very mixed, so he kept procrastinating on which one to get. The Bosch seemed a pretty good choice though, and it came with a tripod, which although he has one for his photography which he could have used, this one has a small level in it as-well. I know he is going to get a lot of use out of it.

First job is the floor in the laundry room. Brian wants to separate part of this as it’s where the hot water and heating pipes go underground across to the house, so we need to ensure there is access to them, the plan is to section this off and fit a door for access. But before this the rest of the floor needs levelling.

Get cementing

We needed to get some building materials and wanted to try out a different builders merchants. We normally go to Weldom, which is similar to B&Q, but we thought we’d give Point P a try. It is set up more for trades people, however their sign said they welcomed ‘particuliers’ (individuals) that’s us, so we thought we’d give them a go.

We entered the prefab on the side of the warehouse, and were greeted by a very bright ‘bonjour’, ‘bonjour’ we both replied, I’m sure immediately giving away that we were English. The young chap behind the counter, asked in his best french if he could help, and we were soon reciting our translated list of what we needed. We actually did quite well, or so we thought. We ordered our lime mortar 3.5nhl, our ready mixed sand and cement, and our self levelling cement. He told us that his colleague would bring the order round the side, so to pull up near the front door.

Excellent service. I pulled the car round and Brian paid the bill.

As the forklift pulled out of the warehouse, we looked aghast at each other. The forklift had a pallet of cement and sand on it, there must have been 40 bags. ‘Crikey, have we just bought all that?’ I asked Brian. I was thinking, ‘It’s not going to fit’. Brian was quiet to start with, then repeated back to me ‘Is that what we just bought?’ We looked at each other, both thinking we might need to start this conversation again. I suggested we look at the invoice, and try and understand what we had bought. I could hear the relief in his voice as he read out the volumes of bags, ‘it’s not all that!’. There was a lot of chatter between Brian and the chap, and after some very raucous laughter, and them both loading just 20 bags into the car, we drove off with our hoard of building materials.

Now we need to get cementing.

Tartiflette

I thought I’d show how I make a tartiflette. If you haven’t eaten this before it is rather delicious, full of hot, creamy, garlicky, cheese sauce and salty bacon. It needs something quite plain with it, crusty bread or a simple salad.

I hope you enjoy the video, and I hope you will enjoy making it yourself.

What hole?

After the shock of seeing eight floorboards taken up, and a great big hole in the bedroom floor, I thought I needed to prepare myself for delivering encouragement to Brian about how replacing all these boards was going to be straight forward and well within his abilities. What I hadn’t realised though is how much quicker and effective he had got at cutting the new boards to fit.

Day one and he had fitted all but two boards. Day two, all he needed to do was fit the final two boards and then nail them all firmly into place. It makes the whole floor look so much better, and feels much stronger.

Just one final little fix to do, where the board was flexing and had split - you can hardly see he has cut it now!

I am now looking forward to getting in there and helping out with the decorating.

Helpdesk

Work on the floor begins with having to re-cement or lime mortar in some of the loose stones after removing the rotten boards. Brian will then work to fit the reclaimed boards back in place on the top of the wall. Luckily when we fitted the bathrooms out we kept all the old floorboards as we tiled one of the floors and put new floorboards in the other. We needed to get perfect levels for the showers to be fitted, hence new floors. These are the boards he is now using.

We do not have much experience with cement or lime mortar, so we thought a call into dad would be useful, so he could share his years of knowledge with us. I was able to reach him on FaceTime, which was better as we could show him what needed to be done.

After we had chatted it through, the decision was made, in this instance to use cement. As we had some cement and sand already we were able to move forward.

And so it begins…..

Bloomin’ pump

I have some gorgeous sharp yellow tulips in the garden, so I cut a few to brighten up the house. I like to use different types of containers for vases - this is an old teapot, which works well for a small posy.

The plumber arrived this morning to fit in a second washing machine for me in the laundry room, this was where we used to have the old oil boiler, out in the barn. We have two washing machines, as we brought on from the Uk when we moved, so I’m thinking once we open up the three bedrooms for the ‘chambre d’hôte” it will be good to have the second machine working. We still have some work to do in the laundry room, but the first thing to address in there is getting the floor level. However, because we have been experiencing unusually low temperatures Brian has not been able to do the concreting. But hopefully next week. That room is definitely a room in progress.

Whilst the plumber was here doing that job, he took a look at the radiators we would need for the room we have created upstairs in the barn. We will wait to get them fitted once the walls and floor are all finished. The pipes will come from below, so no need to run pipe work behind the plasterboard.

He also had what we thought was a small job fixing a burst pipe to the external tap at the pool, but when he went to try it out, which required Brian starting the pump, we discovered the pump had completely broken. The water in it had frozen and expanded cracking the joint. Again the low temperatures had got to it, and just popped it open in about three areas. We will need to get it replaced and ensure next year it is better protected. Brian is already getting a greater understanding of the weaknesses we have when temperatures significantly drop, so we can better protect ourselves in the future.

A couple of boards?

Brian was up early to get on with the bedroom floor, I’d called him to stop for some coffee, but he said he would be just ten more minutes. Half an hour later he appeared. “How’s it gone?” I asked, “good”. “I’ll have a look after coffee, did you have to take 2 or 3 boards up?”. “It wasn’t quite that simple”.

You can imagine my astonishment when I saw the size of the hole he’d exposed under the floor boards. Unfortunately once he’d started to expose them he found some rot around the edges, so he wanted to take the opportunity to treat the wood and strengthen the floor. It’s turning out to be more than just a day to do this job.

Samosas

Brian loves a vegetable samosa, so I decided I needed to try and make some to satisfy his craving. He just so happened to buy me an Indian cookery book ‘the Indian cookery course’ by Monisha Bharadwaj.

It’s a lovely book, well written with good clear photography and recipes. I’ve tried a few from it now, and have to say they are very good - they are easy to follow, not too many ingredients (especially ones you cannot find in a french supermarket), and very tasty. I made vegetable, which is potatoes and peas, and meat ones - which I kind of made up as I had some left over mince.

We had prepared the dough during the day, which didn’t take long. I’d got the potatoes all cooked and chopped up. Then when we were ready to assemble and fry them off we had a little industrious samosa line going. All enjoyed with a suitably well mixed G&T. I served them with a choice of fresh mint raita, mango chutney and chilli jam.

Yummy.

It’s big and orange

“Quick!” I exclaimed to Brian, “it’s huge”. He paid no attention to my shrieks of help from the bedroom this morning, he just continued to clean his teeth. I had to leave the big orange thing crawling around on the floor and go and explain to him that he needed to come and capture it, before we lost it somewhere in my basket of socks. I explained to him it was “this big, crawling fast and orange in colour, so definitely ‘well probably’ dangerous.” He told me to get a shoe box to capture it in, and stand back!

The situation was soon under control and he’d located it and captured it in the shoe box - gruesome looking little chap. Good job I spotted it. If anyone knows what it is, we would love to know.

‘No scary creatures were harmed in the making of this blog’ (neither were they orange or 16cm long!)

Right tool for the job?

So finally we finished prepping the room. It took a little while but I think it was definitely worth doing (thanks Chris for the tip to hang polythene up, good idea), it will certainly help protect the fabric from any splashes.

Now the room is all set up to be worked in, I think we both think we have underestimated what needs to be done. Brian pondering on what to tackle first. I’d like him to look at getting the floor finished off, then we can start to work on the walls and the ceiling. We will review the situation tomorrow.