Making slow progress in the games room

We’ve managed to find time to make more progress in the games room in the New Barn this week. The pool table we ordered arrived on Monday and has been set up – we just need to attach the cue stand to the wall. And we started painting the skirting board at last – a job that’s been waiting seemingly for months. As winter approaches, we’re keen to get this room opened so our guests can use it in wet weather. There’s still a lot to do though to finish furnishing it and making it suitable for the various different uses we’re aiming to use it for.

Our fifth guests arrived on Friday for two nights – two lovely families whose teenage children were going skydiving at Dunkeswell in the Blackdown Hills (the same place we took a helicopter ride a couple of years ago). We always find it interesting knowing where our guests go as it gives us ideas to add into our Visitors Folder and on our website. They wrote a lovely entry in our guest book – hopefully they’ll add a review online too as they’re only the second guests to book through AirBnB and we don’t have any reviews on there yet. It meant doing another changeover on Sunday – while it’s good to get the house clean and ready for our next guests, it’s a little difficult losing pretty much a whole day of the weekend after an already-long week. We haven’t got a booking next week yet – while it’ll be a good opportunity to fix a few things in the Farmhouse it would also be nice to get some more guests and get a bit of extra money coming in.

Our carpenter Dave came back for a couple of days this week to finish off a few jobs. We’ve been liaising with Building Control about the final change required before they’ll approve our building work – which is to put a platform in our spare room under the window in case of fire. As the kitchen is very close to the spare room, there needs to be a fire escape route out of the spare room that’s not using the corridor – which in our case is the bedroom window. The window isn’t low enough to pass building regulations so we’ve needed to add this permanently-fixed platform to act as a floor. While it’s been beautifully made, it does take up a lot of space and get in the way, so our joiner has added a hinged lid so we can at least use it for storage.

His second job was to make some shelves in the spare room to tuck our broadband equipment out of the way and help tidy the room up. It makes such a difference not having wires and electrical devices in full view.

Finally Dave installed fixings to the shutter doors on the Old Barn (the three bed barn). The original plan was to have the shutters on top and bottom runners so they could be closed in front of the large windows, but as the windows have slate sills along the bottom we can only install runners along the top. It’s been a little nerve-wracking in the recent bad weather as the shutters were only attached at the top and were flapping about. The new fixings mean the shutters are more secure!

We heard back from the council at last about the conditions for our fourth planning application – which was to install air source heat pumps and various other renewable technology across the site. The council wanted the air source heat pumps screened from view, and after our original plan to plant bushes into the ground was scuppered by the amount of concrete we needed to lay for the driveway, we submitted a plan to install agricultural steel troughs to use as planters instead. Although we originally said we’d plant cherry laurel (as we have some bushes left from the previous owner) we’re now thinking of planting sloe bushes which are far more in-keeping with the native hedgerows. We just need to find affordable planters now… This is pretty much the last thing we’re waiting for from the council so it’s a nice feeling to have all that done and dusted (for now anyway). Coincidentally it’s been two years to the day that we had the actual planning permission approved too! Must be a sign…

John spent Saturday afternoon harvesting the rest of the potatoes and some of our apple trees. We’ve really done badly this year – no plums, greengages or mulberries, very few damsons and pears, and the quinces splitting and going rotten on the tree before we could get them. The focus on building work and then all the cleaning has mean we’ve neglected most of the fruit we did get, so it’s nice to be able to get something from the apple trees at least. We’re making use of our new fruit fridge and our apple rack is nearly full too. We need to get going and start cooking some jam and chutney!

After a very long week at work – and similarly after a poor pumpkin/squash harvest this year – we decided to visit Orway Porch Farm – a local pumpkin farm just 17 miles away in the Blackdown Hills to test it out before we recommend it to our guests. It’s the first time we’ve ever been and it did not disappoint! They had a dog-friendly patch and so many varieties of squashes and pumpkins, although talking to one of the farmers he said they’d had a bad harvest too this year. The weather really hasn’t been good for vegetables. We still managed to get some fab photos and I certainly tested John’s patience by buying one of almost every variety they had. My excuse is that it saves me buying seeds for next year, and at least this way we get an actual pumpkin to eat too…