The race is on! (in more ways than one)

This week’s blog has been written by a guest blogger – John’s first full blog! So – I hope you’re sitting comfortably, and here goes:

Have you heard the philosophical analogy of the ‘full jar’? If you haven’t heard of it, just google ‘jar, golf balls, pebbles, sand and beer’ and you’ll soon find an informative link. Essentially, it’s about how our time is finite, and what really matters is how we choose our priorities in life. I honestly think Kate’s take would be to cram the jar until it explodes, then go out and find a box of new empty ones to fill.

Despite working a challenging job often 10+ hours a day at the same time as starting a new holiday letting business, Kate also decided to take on overall responsibility for planning and executing the parish’s annual flagship event, the Yarcombe Terrier Races. And because this year was the 50th anniversary since the first Yarcombe Terrier Races, this one had to be extra special. It takes months of planning, evenings in a church chairing the committee meetings, noting actions, writing and circulating minutes, chasing things up, coordinating volunteers, the list goes on…

To be fair, I’ve done my little bit too (including writing this week’s blog so Kate can actually relax on a Sunday evening – who am I kidding… right now she’s decided it’s the right time to silicone the conservatory windows…), spending a large part of the week shifting various items out from storage into the field neighbouring the village, and then both helping to set up the site ready for Saturday. It’s a rewarding community effort and the fair weather certainly meant for a better experience this year.

As it’s the 50th anniversary year, the Terrier Races were featured in this month’s edition of The Field magazine. Reading our names in a title which celebrates all thinks ‘country’ reminds me of how much our lives have changed these past four years.

In stark contrast to last year’s event which took place under an amber weather warning, this year was a roaring success, and I reckon over a thousand people must have attended. As per last year, I oversaw the Race Tickets stand while Kate spent the day running around making sure everything was going to plan.

We then spent Sunday morning taking everything down and moving back into hibernation for another year. I feel so proud of Kate for what she’s done to help integrate us into our community. I genuinely lost count of the number of times people mentioned how much they appreciate the effort she goes to make the event happen, and I’m so glad this was recognised with a lovely gift. We were also both very grateful when we got home at Sunday lunchtime to find our house guests/dog sitters had taken it upon themselves to start de-brambling the front garden which was desperately needed. We almost got in the car and drove away for a bit longer, but we got spotted!

Meanwhile, our own race is on with getting the rest of the Farmhouse ready to welcome its first guests, hopefully near the end of August. I finished the second coat of paint on the ‘loggia’ this week and hung the new outdoor lights before we both spent a productive evening constructing the new garden dining furniture. It looks so much better now than when it was grey concrete – we wish we’d done it sooner so we could enjoy it!

Kate emptied the conservatory of her countless chilli plants last weekend, and I spent Tuesday morning giving the inside a proper clean. Then at the end of the week we finally cleared the kitchen. We’ve been able to add more photos to our listing on cottages.com, but we’ve still got some way to go until all the rooms are ready for the professional photographer to visit. Our calendar has been updated to allow much greater flexibility on booking dates outside the school holiday weeks which, together with an ever-increasing set of photos, should tempt our first visitors soon!

As the building work heads towards completion, we’ve made progress on some of the final items. Our builders installed the final glazing by the door for the one-bed this week after Kate finished painting the door frame last weekend. And the external windows along the shippon have been beautifully edged with mastic so they’re waterproofed. In the Games Room the flooring has been installed so we can now finish painting the shirting boards and start the process of furnishing it. And our builders have laid the last bit of concrete at the foot of the shorter section of stairs.

Our plumbers were back on Friday to plumb in the laundry appliances and the kitchenette in the Games Room, and the ‘mastic man’ sealed the top of the laundry tiled skirting. Just a little bit more work from the electricians – it’s starting to feel like we are almost there…

With the sunny weather at this time of year the grass grows at a rate almost visible to the naked eye. This isn’t a bad thing when growing new lawns although it does mean regular watering of the young growth. This week the lawn that will become our new garden got its first cut and is looking good (if I do say so myself).

Now, if you have no interest in renewable energy stuff then I suggest you park this week’s blog at this point as it’s probably about to get a bit geeky…

The sunny weather has also meant the new solar inverters and batteries have been put through their paces this week. A few technical issues needed to be resolved (remotely), but the Farmhouse and New Barn (communal building) are now mini power-stations operating for our side of the valley. With everything now hooked up and the sun shining we’ve been exporting up to 39 kWh over a single day – that’s enough energy to supply around 5 medium sized houses. Unfortunately, it’ll be a while before the export tariff is set up for the New Barn, so for now we are supplying the grid with green energy with no return. With only a couple of freezers drawing power the batteries don’t take long to fully charge each day before the surplus starts exporting. Hopefully the sun will still be shining once the laundry is up and running. Our first EV charger will also run off the New Barn’s supply.

Meanwhile, the Farmhouse now has both east and west arrays hooked up after the second solar inverter was finally installed last week. With both arrays live it doesn’t take long before the batteries get fully charged and we start exporting. Thankfully we get paid for this energy, and the best export prices are in the early evening, so I’ve been force-discharging the batteries between 5 and 7pm each day. In case you’re wondering what the large early morning spikes in consumption are, that’s our ensuite electric shower which pulls an astonishing 8.5 kW. Our battery inverter can push out around 3 kW so this is the only time we currently need to pull from the grid. Otherwise, it’s all home harvested electricity at the moment!