This week seems to have gone very quickly. With changeovers every Sunday at the moment, we only really have one day to spend catching up in the garden or working on finishing our own house (the latter has definitely been deprioritised!). We planted our autumn onions on Saturday (an improvement on last season as they only went in in January) and started making repairs to the cold frame, replacing a cracked pane of glass and re-puttying some of the original sections that had cracked off since we installed the frames. The intention was to replace the pane I dropped a pumpkin through too – annoyingly though the wood had swollen since so the replacement glass didn’t fit and I ended up smashing that trying to force it in. Hopefully we’ll have time for a second attempt next weekend…
We also – slightly indulgently – went out for our annual autumn colours walk in the afternoon. It’s too easy to spend all weekend working so there are a few things we’re trying to turn into habits that get us out together. We were probably slightly too late this year, many of the trees had already dropped their leaves so it looked beautifully autumnal on the floor and a little on the wintery side on the trees. Still very pretty though.
As we had a few days between guests we took the opportunity to make a few repairs and touch up the paint in some of the rooms. One of the garden chairs needed fixing which John has made a nice job of, and we needed to retile around the bath, as some of the tiles had come loose where the bath had sunk. Thankfully we’d invested in/been given some tiling tools when we’d decided to do our own [minor] tiling during the building work, and had enough practice that it didn’t take too long to repair. We also added another block of wood under the bath to reduce the risk of it happening again.
The house has moved a little since the top floor was finished and we’re starting to see cracks appearing in the plaster and very old woodwork. We’ve made a start painting over some at the same time as touching up various marks on the walls, but will need to do a proper fill job soon when we have a big enough gap between lets.
We also changed the painting in the dining room to one we’d commissioned. My mum has already donated most of the paintings in the house – this time we asked her to paint one of our favourite views looking down the Yarty Valley. We live in such a beautiful area it’s fabulous to have reminders of it in the house too for our guests to enjoy.
This weekend we had two firsts – our first 21st celebration and our first infant guest, which meant we had a chance to use all the baby equipment we’d been donated by kind family and friends. Years ago when we were chatting to a friend of a friend at a party, they’d talked about travelling with young children and how you just want to arrive somewhere and have as much as possible set up and ready. And we’ve also had first-hand experience of people staying and frantically trying to dig a travel cot out of the car and set it up before their baby wakes up. Hopefully it made for an easier stay, we’re hoping to get some feedback though about anything we missed or ideas for making their holiday even easier.
We’re gradually making progress in the games room (The New Barn) and are aiming to have it open in January. The skirting board has had its final coat of paint and we’ve touched up the dark blue walls where it’s been marked during the building work. John’s been creating an information folder which explains how to use all the electronic equipment – the projector and TV, the DVD player and PlayStation 3 – as well as having the rules for pool. We keep saying we’re going to try it out ourselves but never have the time!
Ley Farm Cottages 