Our New House–Concentrating on the Annexe

Because my sister is going on holiday at the end of August, we started to get into a bit of a panic about moving dates, because my sister wanted to bring Mum down and get her installed in the annexe of the new house before she went away. It was becoming increasingly clear that the work would not be finished in time, and we were contemplating telescoping the dates to make things as late as possible to give the builders the maximum time and still getting Mum down before my sister went away. This would have meant having Mum arrive the day after we ourselves moved, and thinking about it, it seemed impossible. In my state of health, I would not be capable of doing the necessary huge amount of work involved in this timescale, so we contacted my sister and asked if she could arrange for carers to look after Mum in her absence. She has agreed, and this takes the pressure off both us and the builders – Andy said he wasn’t happy about us moving in while they were still working, which is quite understandable – with removal men, boxes, furniture everywhere, etc. it would have been quite impossible, and not fair on them at all.

We have told my sister that I am going to need some time after we move, before Mum comes down, in order to get half-way straight and allow for pacing myself so as not to overdo things. I feel a lot better now the pressure is off, and it is open-ended. We now don’t need to fix a moving date yet awhile.

The builders are now concentrating on working on the annexe, and once this is done, we can move Mum’s stuff in (it’s in storage at present) and get it sorted out as much as possible before our own move.

They are also going to finish the last bits and pieces in my ARTHaven so that I can move all the stuff in from the spare room, freeing it up for dumping other things during the move.

I wasn’t intending to go over to the house today, but my hubby wanted to work on the garden, so I grabbed the opportunity. Also, we had to call in at B&Q in order to pick up some light fittings for the bathroom and kitchen. I am going over tomorrow, so that I can discuss lighting with Tim the electrician, who will be there again tomorrow – he is going to show me some sample lights for my ARTHaven, and I promised I’d get the bathroom lights so he can fit them, too. I’ve decided to get an identical flush-fitting light for the kitchen as I don’t like the pendant light in there.

We arrived to find Andy working on the wooden surround for the new window and door in the annexe sitting room, preparing it for Paul to plaster.

Unfortunately the tall narrow window pane on the left was cracked on arrival and has to be replaced; it should have come today, but true to form where windows are concerned, it didn’t! Hopefully tomorrow… Andy has installed the cracked one temporarily so that the house isn’t left wide open. He has made a beautiful little windowsill.

On the outside, the corner of the external windowsill was broken when the aperture was created, so Andy has now made this good with concrete. Unfortunately no kitties around yet to leave a trademark paw print!

Back indoors, Paul was working on the plumbing for the annexe bathroom. He said that when the conversion was done, the plumbing was not well done, and he’s had to put right several anomalies.

Outside, running along that side wall of the house, there is a large waste pipe, and the plan was to bury this, and create a usable path down the side of the house, with an independent gate for any future tenant of the annexe, but unfortunately this can’t be done, because the shower drain is lower than the old bath was, and it would be prohibitively expensive to bury the pipe, so we’ve decided to leave it as it is.

The annexe shower tray was propped up against the stairs when we arrived. I thought the blue colour was a bit startling, and said to Paul that I hoped Mum wouldn’t mind it, as I certainly couldn’t put up with it! He said, “She’ll have to get used to it…” and I agreed, somewhat dubiously. He then put me out of my misery, and peeled back the corner of the blue – it is just a protective film!! I was very relieved to see that the tray is white, after all!

Here it is, being installed in the annexe bathroom.

Andy was working on preparing the annexe kitchen for its skin of plasterboard to cover up all of Jamie’s beautiful pipework! He has installed several vertical battens. On the ceiling to the right of the light bulb you can see a hole which is open to the air – Peter was working on the lean-to roof above.

Later on, they started moving the kitchen units in. These are the old units from the original kitchen.

Here is Peter working on the roofing felt on the lean-to. The scaffolding is still up on this side of the house, but we were glad to see that it had gone from the front, which enables parking outside the house again. It came down yesterday – I could hear the noise in the background when I was on the phone with Andy.

Hot work again for poor Peter! No need for him to go on holiday to the Costa Del Sol to get a tan! He’s as brown as a nut.

Our new skylight?

Well, no… unfortunately! It did give quite a nice lot of light! This is the hatch into the void above the utility room/back passageway, and with the roof removed, it was completely open to the air.

When we left, all the felt was on the lean-to so it is now protected against the elements, and ready for Peter to start tiling tomorrow.

An early start tomorrow as I’m getting a lift over with Chris, who lives in our village.