A Little Piece of Christmas

I need some Christmas at home, I decided this weekend! Despite the building rubbish everywhere and the hectic week in the shop, I picked up the Hoover and attacked the mess that seemed to cover the whole house in a fine film. I could draw some quite interesting patterns with the Hoover in the dust! So, I managed to salvage one room so we can have some sort of Christmas Day. The children don't seem to mind, to them it's all a great adventure.

A Little Bit of Christmas

The building work this week has been rather stop start with the heavy rain and showers making working on the roof difficult. The builders have continued to strip and save the tiles, carefully stacking them on the scaffold. I took a trip to see the old roof first hand and it's quite amazing to still see the old lath and lime mortar plaster, bound with hair, on the ceilings beneath.

Lime Mortar and Lath Ceiling

Of course there was no insulation between the tile and the ceiling and that doesn't give us much space to add any in. I think in the long run we will have to take some of these ceilings down to adjust the height and also because the roofer have put their feet through it in a few places!

The view from the top of the scaffolding across the farmyard helps to put the farmhouse in perspective as it is the heart of this ancient site.

The Old 17th century Barn and Walled Yard

This week will see the building work winding up before Christmas. We will hopefully have a sample window to look at and we will have to plan just how far we strip this house back.....oh yes, and we have to do that little job of moving out.....! Joy!

Rotten Roof

The winter weather continues to batter the house, rip the plastic sheetings off at night and seep into the roof. I had rather a cold shower of rain water from the roof accompany me in the shower at the weekend! Refreshing!

I also had a day of light relief away from the house attending an upholstery course at Annie Sloan Interiors in Oxford. I'm hoping learning new skills will help me when tackling the interior of the house. A night in a warm hotel was lovelier than ever!!

Lovely ladies on the Annie Sloan Workshop

The roof work continues with stripping back and insulating. In one section at the back of the farmhouse the timbers had completely rotten and it was only the tiles that were knitted together holding it! Good job we hadn't had a heavy snow fall or a section of the roof may have gone completely. 

At the rear of 'The Cottage' side of the house. The raking out of grout has begun. Water over the year has run down this wall and penetrated into the brickwork. The hard grout held the water in and this in now being removed and replaced with a lime based, softer mortar. 

 

Replacement Lime Mortar

Today I began to look at how we are going to heat this heat house after the new roof. At the moment we have a couple of ancient oil fired boiler and two rather lovely wood burners. We have a 'free' supply of wood on the farm and we are keen to perhaps look at pellet wood burners. There's also a part of me that love a gas guzzling Aga! Though I think this option is seriously outside our budget!

Today I visited Ludlow Stoves to investigate and I fell in love with this pellet boiler that also acts as a cooker and water heater! I think we will have to visit Ludlow Stoves home where they have one working to view. I just can't decide which colour I would choose?! Red or cream!?

Barney!

This week for me has rather been taken over by Christmas at my Shop, Tea & Roses. On Tuesday customers and staff kept telling me we were in for a storm. Having not watched the weather forecast being caught up in my little world, I failed to take much notice!

By the end on Tuesday the gusts of wind were getting rather interesting down Bridgnorth High Street.  Needing food supplies to feed a hungry family and leaving work late after painting a rather large gingerbread house, I popped into Sainsburys with the children. I could hear the wind in the store and my thoughts turned to my house.

We quickly loaded the car and were buffeted by the wind and avoided branches on the road on the way home. We pulled up outside the house to see the black plastic on the front of the house billowing in the wind madly. This black plastic flapped to reveal the missing wall in the front of the house exposed to the elements. With the removal of the wall, all that supports the roof was the props... Each gust of wind into the house just made me wonder if the roof would be lifted off!

I pretended not to be alarmed and hustled the children into the other end of the house. The noise from flapping scaffold board and farming buckets etc. being blown around outside made the children quite interested! Thank goodness for ready cooked chicken as no sooner had we unloaded shopping than the electricity went out. Candles were found from the exposed end of the house and dad arrived home making the children feel happier because of his presence! I think must have thought he could hold the roof up if the wind was too strong! I slept in the safest room I could find!

Morning revealed a beautiful view through the front of the house, literally! The black plastic was gone showing the bare bones of the house but, we were in one piece. I think the builders were releaved that we were in one piece too.

The rest of the week we have had to think about where we will position new windows at the front of the house and what type of insulation to lay in the roof. Not too exciting to me but it makes a difference with what height the internal ceilings will be inside. We have chosen to go with a thin insulation roll option, though more expensive, there is less waste and it will allow our ceilings to stay high. This will be important as we have many potentially low ceiling height.

The front wall is being being bricked up quite quickly so we are secure by Christmas. The window maker is going to make us a mock up to look at, this week we have to decide the position.

Now the shop is ready for Christmas, my attention has turned to the fact we are 'moving out' the house in a few weeks.......better start planning that too....not sure how I will have time, but I expect in my normal fashion, I will just go and make a few cushions instead!

View of our stair case after the storm!

Roof still standing after the storm! 

Anyone Else?

It seems like the whole world has been here today. We've had some electrical cable work done here at the farm. I counted at least fourteen vans, JCB's let alone the builders vans, deliveries and collections.  Though I felt like I was in a blissful, isolated, dark cocoon. No wifi, no radio, no TV, no lighting as the power has been off  all day. It was quite refreshing apart from the fact I really could have done with a cup of tea.

We've had to make decisions about our windy windows. I've grown quite used to sitting in our bathroom watching the curtains billow in the wind....even when they are shut. I can't decide whether I will miss that if we replace them all with double glazed new ones. I guess that is the whole point of renovations but I'm keen to keep character.

Bedroom 4, my sons room, has a hole for his new window already. It sits in the gable at the rear of the house and isn't quite central to the gable but as it's at the back aesthetically it won't be a concern. To balance this though we are making a small triangular window in the bathroom to help balance the windows on the second floor visually. We have a small triangular window in 'The Cottage' side of the house. Both will look really cute!

In Bedroom 5 today, contrary to our drawings we decided to brick up the small side window and add a conservation Velux. We have drawn out on the ceiling where it is to go with a trusty felt tip pen. Best laid plans always look different once you start to knock things down. 

New Window in Bedroom 5

New wall rising up at the rear of Bedroom 5

Small triangular window in the Bathroom

Room with a View

Room With a View has to be my favorite film. We are blessed that from our Farmhouse we have the most beautiful view of the Corve Dale....now we have the most beautiful view of the Corve Dale from our bathroom too! Not quite what we were anticipating at the start of the week!

Room with a View

After close inspection of the timber frame and the second opinion of a structural engineer it sadly

became inevitable that the timber frame on both sides of the house was rotten through. Previous repairs to this timber frame construction consisted of plywood, foam, wire mesh with rendering over.

All the lead flashing that had been used drew in more water causing everything to get sodden. Such a shame. So everything has to come out, though we will save the oak beams for some something somewhere! I like to romantically believe that they might have come from some other ancient building locally. There was a monastery at Morville or perhaps the 12th century mediaeval fortified 

house that sits opposite the farm, by the village church? Many of the beams have holes and notches 

from a previous existence.

With this gable end extending into the bathroom it means that we're wall less until the rebuild, so we're up in good time to shower these days. If we leave it too late we may have an audience! I'm sure in a couple of weeks time when the weather changes we won't be hanging around in the shower for long!

It's the same in the back bedroom, stripped back to show the most beautiful view. The window at the 

moment is at floor level. I think that we will now take advantage and make this window bigger and higher.

View from the Back Gable

It's all happening so fast! But having had young children, I know that it's much easier to tear down a Lego tower than it is to build it up again! 

Having caused so much devastation to the rooms we will probably raise the ceiling height to roof level and pack it full of insulation. There was no insulation in the roof, or any roof felt either....it's been a very drafty, cold house to live in....though with the holes in the walls it's not going to get much warmer for the while! Anyway the cat is enjoying it, having freedom to come and go through the plastic sheeting with furry gifts in his mouth for us. Delightful, I do love a dead mouse on the stairs greeting me in the morning. 

It made me chuckle this evening, as my husband pulled the front door curtain to keep out drafts. In the background I can hear the black plastic sheeting flapping in the ever increasing wind, like the sails billowing on a ship heading towards a storm....

What to Keep?!

How can a family of five acquire so much 'stuff' within thirteen years? So, I have a bit of an excuse for the accumulation of stuff by blaming the running of several businesses and chasing round after three children, a farmer husband, dogs, cats, chickens all these years! Each forgotten cupboard I open heralds a plethora of discarded children's toys, started 'projects' and grown out of clothes. A weekend of ruthless clearing with bin liners soon sorted most of it.

The idea is, that we live in the farmhouse for a while until we decide what to do with the troublesome gable end of the house. How much will that cost and what can be saved? So we have decamped into one end of the house. It's rather cosy, but needs must and all that. Children aren't too impressed by lack of internet signal however! 

Monday morning saw the prompt arrival of a team of vans and trucks equipped with an instant, all important site hut and scaffolding. Our dog didn't know quite what to do with herself but, I'm sure that she'll work out soon enough that builders means a ready food supply! She'll soon calm down. 

Scoffolding was soon up on the gable end, and a garment of plastic sheeting spread to reserve the old girls modesty! 

Gable End Shrouded in Plastic Sheeting

After poking around, some basic investigation by sticking of hands into holes in beams and ummming and arrrrring, it became quickly evident that most of the beams were rotten.....

State of the Bedroom Wall

Once all the furniture was removed it was clear how much damp had come through the walls. These walls had no cavity or lining.

Supporting prop in the Small End Bedroom

Props were put up inside to take the strain of the roof. However I don't think there was actually much attached to each other before work began!

Inside Beamed Landing

In the past metal supports had been put around the beams and bolted together to add support. The problems had been skimmed over and lead work added that acted like a sponge just meaning that the beams had become more and more rotten. Sadly it will be difficult to save any of this.

And so it begins!

Tea & Roses Farmhouse

Just how long I have wanted to begin this project? Now it is here, I am filled with fear but excitement!

My husband and I bought this beautiful farm about thirteen years ago now. At the time we were living in Northamptonshire with one young child and one acre of land. We'd always wanted to have our own farm but simply could afford it. After many failed attempts we'd thought perhaps our dream wouldn't happen, until one day the details for this dairy farm dropped through our letter box....and several slow months later it was ours!

The realization of what we'd taken on hit my after the first week when my husband had to go back to work in Northamptonshire for several weeks, leaving me expecting child two, to farm alone. Not from a farming background this was quite a learning curve. But still that is perhaps another story in itself. I wish I'd kept a diary of what we've achieved in the last thirteen year on the farm, it's been an adventure.

However needless to say the farm business, raising a family and the creation on Tea & Roses has left the farmhouse rather neglected. It's now the turn of this grand old lady, for I do think that this house in my mind is a lady, to have some love and attention.

Over the years I painted her and cleaned her, dusted her and gardened around her but have never been able to uncover this old ladies secrets and beauty. I know it lies underneath somewhere. From a distance she appears to be a grand elegant building but take a closer look and her failing structure and facade can be seen.

Front Right Gable End

This is the front timber framed section complete with the original wooden beam. This section is where most of the work will begin and it leans inwards at quite an alarming angle. Water runs in the house when it rains and is collected in buckets. The children have got quite used to putting down towels and buckets when the wind blows it in from the south! Hopefully some of the woodwork can be saved! 

The other huge problem is the fact that the whole roof is unlined, not insulated and lathes and beams are failing! We've hoped for several years that it might just be okay....but sadly this old lady needs a complete new roof. This is where we will be starting along with the gable end.

The farmhouse was split into two houses, this is 'The Cottage' side....spot the daylight coming 

through the roof...

East Side

The cottage side also has the most beautiful original wooden structure exposed on its side wall. Here can just be seen the remains of where a chimney once ran. Perhaps we will find evidence of it inside? Underneath The Cottage also runs a disused cellar, accessed from the door outside.

Back of The Cottage

The old lady has also taken quite a beating from the weather over the years. All the walls will need raking out and filling.

So where to begin? We have a 'Master Plan' that has on ideal finish, which includes a garden room, removing walls, replacing bathrooms etc.. But whether we have funds for all of this we shall see what we uncover along the way! For me, the best part will be the interior finish, what I have dreamed about for years. This will be my joy but, in the meantime the scaffold arrives and the house clearing and moving begins! Bring it on!! And let's hope for a mild winter!!!