Please, Go ahead Mrs Mills...

Without a bush to beat around I'll get on and say that last week the good Councillors at The Forest of Dean voted 14 to 1 in favour of our little Glamping project! They mainly said it was exciting.  And any concerns they had we had already answered.

Mrs Mills' Yurts and Bed and Breakfast will (hopefully) be open next summer.  The fact that our land is how I imagine the Somme once looked, is the only thing that can stop us now.

On Wednesday the local newspaper rang me and asked me to comment on the stir I had caused in the community with this blog.  The article is below, but clearly the reporter didn't think it was all the bother our objectors were going to.  They also kindly called the B&B an upmarket one.  I guess any press is good press.

If Anne Charnock (left) had looked as livid in the photo as she did when the decision was read out, the article might have been a little more convincing. As it stands I reckon it's pretty good PR.

So we returned to Longhope under stormy clouds and celebrated with a quick half before picking up our little champ from Nursery.  When we returned we discovered the whole of May Hill was in a blackout.  I have never been so thankful of being in a caravan with a belting gas fire and the ability to cook our celebration dinner by candlelight!

Candlelight and a clay pizza oven.

So its been a long process getting to the meeting.  A revised and revised again Landscaping plan, the battle to convince the planners to let us have white canvas, the ins and outs of composting toilets, the exact location of the car park, the promise of more expense spent with a structural engineer.  We have a beautiful and knackered old barn that we want to have an outdoor clay oven & a fire pit - maybe even an eco hot tub.  So we have to make sure the barn won't get any more knackered.  We'll have to reinforce a ruin. And that will need planning as its listed (ahhhh................)
But its done and now I can get on and find my cast iron bath tub which is so much more fun.

It was rather less of a local event to also get all of our other planning permissions through.  Linda and Steve now have a windy old heap of stone that's full of bats. The perfect retirement property.  The planners are letting us put a freestanding bath in the attic (for the most amazing bathroom!) and insulate the whole house.  We can have our en-suite and disabled toilet downstairs.  We can make it a 5 bedroom house and knock down the old kitchen.  They have let us do everything we've asked.  I have heard horrendous stories about the planning department at the council but our experience has been laborious, but easy.  Its been pretty good going to have got planning on a Barn conversion, a change of use of land for the business, and 6 separate Listed Building Consents all in 3 months.  I think that's enough for now.

As I've been beavering away at my computer, the house has taken on leaps and bounds.  Once we got planning the boys got on with making Dursley Cross Farm warm with a selection of foam, fur and foil.  The caravan is getting colder and the race is to get us into the attic before the snow comes.

Gary's uncle Graham came for a whole week, and Arthur and I de-bunked to make room.  Gary slept on the floor of Arthur's room and his feet came out the door.  Graham is a sucker for punishment and the kindest uncle we could wish for.  He knew exactly what to do and led the troops.  He re-wired the house and made stuff out of wood.







Then Ben came to help for the weekend and seemed more than happy to get dusty and dirty.  Secretly I think he was harking back to the ol' days on the job, before his shoes got all pointy.  With four of them here it must have been snug, but they did so, so much and only ate Chips once.

Doughnuts were another matter though...

We ordered enough materials to insulate and lay the underfloor heating on the top two floors.  It took 4 men, a whole week of 10 hour days to get one room to plasterboard.  Our optimism should be commended, but how naive we were to long this will take.  It has then taken a further 3 weeks for Linda, Steve, me and Gary to do the other room.  Gary has been working in London Mon-Friday then all weekend on the house.  When Gary is in London; Steve is head Foreman and Linda and I have learnt how to use a saw properly (point the finger) and Steve has learnt (although he probably knew already) that women have their own ideas about how to do things!  I might just say here that Steve has been here working, every day since the break-in and kept me in company and curry.  The hard work everyone is putting in, is astounding and humbling.
And I know there is more to come.

Gary and Steve put the metal flues down the Chimneys.  We decided to have open fires in each room - so they'll be somewhere awesome to relax of an evening in the *upmarket B&B.  This means coils of weird metal tubes that got poked and pulled down the chimneys.  To make room for them - 300 years of birds nests had to come down.  With soot and dirt too, the boys went all Dick van Dyke for a day.

It took me a week of visiting salvage yards to find the pots I wanted at the price we could afford.  Note to all - don't bother going to the Cotswolds! anyway - found myself a keen little junk wizard to help on future ventures....

And the pots go on the top.  And we climb on the top.  For the moments when we know this place is wonderful and this mission will be worth it.

.

Linda retires in a couple of weeks (yeh!) and her and Casper the MASSIVE dog will be here full time.  The snow will come (although the rain is annoying enough) and the room they live in is damp to the touch.  The caravan is still keeping us warm and we are being inventive;
Linda and I made a path to the house so Steve will stop falling over,
Gary insulated the caravan bottom with foam and we stuck cling film over the windows.

This was all working perfectly until the rain came...

Unfortunately the path has turned into a mud slide.
The insulation has fallen out the bottom and absorbed the torrential rain like a huge yellow tampon and the cling film causes such condensation we can't see out of the windows.  Then the cat got a shock trying to get out of the window; major cat plastic panic occurred.
Finally some thieving toe rags broke into the yard and cracked into our storage unit and scared the living daylights out of me (I was on my own with Arthur - whose Ninja skills aren't quite there yet).  Can you believe 8 years in London and no danger - 4 months here and we get picked on.
So we are all looking for somewhere to rent.  Short term. with a dog.  Not the most prosperous of tenants - but we'll see what we can up with.

Living here, in a caravan, on a hill is, er... Peaceful.  I go to sleep at 9.30 most nights and would no longer have a clue what to wear if I did have any social event to go to.  I have adopted the country code of thinking its acceptable to team a dress with walking boots.  My winter wardrobe is 3 years old and even though we've moved here for The Good Life, all we can really afford to buy is clothes made in sweat shops.  An inconsistency somewhere along the line.  I am trying much harder in charity shops but have so far bought a fogey skirt that just about zips up under my armpits and a jumper with a hole; discovered only when returned to the caravan. humph.

I have also discovered most tourist attractions round here are run by children.  At The Cotswold Farm Park I was told by the teenage (head!) chef that they couldn't boil pasta to accompany the Kid's special of Spaghetti and Meatballs.
'We've got it, I just can't do it''
SO JUST CALL IT MEATBALLS!

At the local softplay centre I had to police the bombardment of plastic balls directed at Arthur from a 6 year old as there were no parents to be seen.   The teenage staff were too busy making each other sniff the customers shoes in the shoe hold.

Arthur at the farm park.

Oi! Luca, I need help... can you see it?

No mate... nothing down here either.

Thankfully people are still coming to see us and there is no fear of the Caravan.  Katie and Matt are 100% decided they want one and waxed lyrical about the seating areas and space.  We tried to go for a walk, but the mud made us retreat to a great pub in the heart of the Forest of Dean.

Suzie and Nizzy visited and shimmied down the scaffolding Bridget Jones style. We walked over May Hill, under the thunderous applaud of horses hooves in a full out gallop.  Amazing.  Ate lunch in the Yew Tree and drank ale.  

Polly came in her walking boots and we sheltered from the rain.  Rustled up a quick dish that Ottolenghi would have been proud of - and one Steve wouldn't have recognised as food!  We drank beautiful dry wine from the local Three Choirs Vineyard and talked about boys and London 1980.

It has been a long month and a testing one.  But when I write this I can see how much we've achieved in and how determined we are.  We can hopefully forget about the planning difficulties and in time the neighbours will come to see change won't all be bad.  It might be a while in the making though as I should think we have a fair few glamping credits to pay back for everyone's hard work.

The White Isle Remedy

The night starts with such good intentions...

I don't think a holiday has ever made such a difference to my life before.  Whilst I'm quite sure that staying in a pimping music producers mega Villa for a week with my amazing friends probably isn't the reason the work has started; it certainly lifted my mood and bought me back to grim England with a smile on my face and a horrendous hangover.  The best thing was hanging out at 6am after 4 hours sleep with the other on-duty parents.
CBeebies has never been such tonic.

It always ended in the pool.
Suzie has a very small head as she kept diving on her face.

I have also never been on holiday and come home paler than my arrival.  A slightly over zealous tanning assistant tangoed me and after staying in the shade with Arthur and mistakenly using his factor 1000 I made sure I came home whiter than white.

It was the most fabulous belated 30th I could have had - and I'm pretty pleased to say we've all still 'got' it.  Just don't show me the Amnesia pictures please!....

So we arrived home on a Saturday afternoon to a house half eaten by scaffolding.  SO good to see.  And the not so great news the Parish Councillors had visited and our local Parish planning meeting was on Monday.  Oh god.  Hit the ground running.  The first time to make a speech about Mrs Mills' Yurts to all the neighbours that are objecting and the Parish planning committee.   The planning application for the Yurts has been sent to District planning level, which means that in November we have to go to a meeting where 12 Councillors make the decision if we are to be granted permission.  It has been taken out of the hands of our planning officer because of the 'Hoo Ha'

That's a quote.  Not an official planning term.

So - the deciders come to Dursley Cross and look around and read the plans, and then I have a chance to speak and so do the objectors.  It's all very courtroom.  

The Parish meeting was a mini version of this but still a voice trembling moment.  Especially when a couple who live down the road from us stood up to SUPPORT us! I think it meant more to me that one couple - than the Petition the objectors presented the Chairman with 46 signatures.  They said it was great for kids - to get back to nature.  That it was enterprising and they liked the look of Yurts.  Amazing.  I wanted to Woop Woop with an arm roll.  

Thankfully I didn't.    

So they said their bit and I said mine.  They called the Yurts gigantic when they are nearly the smallest you can buy.  Gary managed to stand up and say 'They are only a little taller than me...'  

To which an objector said grimly; 'Gigantic'
Nice one.

The Parish said they won't recommend the proposal but they appreciated we didn't get into a slanging match and said they would write the review of the meeting with some positives as there was some support.  Unfortunately somewhere between the conversation with me and the consultation response to the council our one vote of support from our superheros was forgotten and now there is no official record of it.
A darn shame.  

So now I can prepare for the District bad boy and make some jam in the downtime.

Gigantic Gary and little Arthur help me pick plums

We have had nearly one million letters of objection (or at least enough for me to loose count)
Every day I log on to the planning website to see another neighbour has dammed us.
Some outright lies...  ''The Yurts will be used as workshops when there are no tourists''
Ha! I have not the first idea where that came from.
Some hilarious truths....  ''The target market will enjoy Champagne, Cavier and Chats''
Oh god no.  Not CHATTING.
I am still addressing each one - and making sure we can make this okay for the neighbours (we've just agreed to spend £5000 on frickin' trees and hedgerow! bye bye kitchen!) but I feel so battered by it all I am caring less and less about them with every pointless letter. I Could have easily dealt with the houses I think have reason to write.  But not the petition and the lies I am fearful are driving residents to sign a ready made letter to the council.  The campaign against the Yurts is damaging my willingness to help - reasoned letters would have been fine but the rest is making me want to hide.
Our Yurts are a little over 5 meters wide.  Just measure it out and see how many beds you could get in there.  They think 6-8 people.  How many times can I say its for couples.  Or couples and a small kids bed.  No one is listening, or trusting us.  Went a bit on the overkill with the decking - had no idea it was so offensive so frantically trying to scale down plans.  So we leave it up to the Planning committee at the end of November.


Otherwise planning is looking good - they seem happy with the plans and the method and thankfully it would seem all the stress of getting the information together and the hard choice over the Architect has paid off.  We will have our planning consent decided on October 26th.  Big day.
I'm hopeful for the house and the barn at least.
We will have to repair the barn roof next as that is on its way out.  Its all we can do until March (yes, bats) but I think it will make a nice dry shelter to shield the touring caravan Linda and Steve are talking about buying to move here while they wait out winter too.
We have commanded a shipping container in the yard for lots of stuff - we are gradually managing to make the whole place look more and more like a gypsy site everyday.
There is mud everywhere and pipes and everyday the roofers come in a whole selection of BMWs
The Mills pikey site.  All we need now is some puppies.

 

In the meantime on with the house! Hurrah!
Our Licence came through for the Bats so it meant we could start work on the Roof repair. The licence says its okay if we disturb the ONE bat that MIGHT be living in the roof. Pah.

It was amazing to see the Roofers up on the house and finally things starting to happen. For about two days solid they chucked broken tiles at the ground and I ran with Arthur for our lives back and forward from the caravan to the dishwasher.  With Arthur in my arms - it took quite a while to unload.  I looked for a baby hard hat but they only come as jokes.  But we have survived and the timbers are fixed and the tiles are going back on.  It looks EXACTLY the same.  Of course it should but it does feel a little like what have we paid for!  The amazing thing is getting on the scaffolding and climbing on the house! Now we can really see how effed the chimneys are and get right up to the windows.  You can see for miles.

We have to still wait for a second licence for the Posh chaps and even when it is granted it will mean we still can't put the heating system into the cellar until March.  At the moment we are trying to find a way to let us have a light in the cellar (so we can see where we are going!) and the Bats still might win on this one.  I am thinking about getting someone clever to make teeny little sunglasses for the little guys so I can actually use the cupboard.

Gary's the brains...

...and Steve's the brawn.

Around the land we have been trying to make it look a bit more like it might as a glampsite.  So Gary and Steve spent a few days trying to level the land and take down an ugly metal barn.






They've been burning all the wood waste from the site and transporting the green waste with Gary's new toy.

It was all going swimmingly until the truck ran out of juice and Steve and the truck gently glided down the slope with no brake or steering control and came to its natural rest on top of the raging wood fire.
'Start it up, get it OFF!'
It didn't budge.
I cannot believe I wasn't there for the photos but you can imagine the panic as they ran from the house with water in a bin, in cups, in their pockets.
Steve moved as quickly as he did when he disappeared through the floor.
Gary turned the air blue.
Thankfully the fire went out but the truck still didn't move.
The land looks more like a scrap yard than a glampsite and the committee are on their way.

Then Steve cleared out the other stone barn.   It's fallen down but its beautiful.  We couldn't see how beautiful until the debris was removed and the vegetation cut back.  I'm not sure if we can do anything with it - but its the most beautiful backdrop for the yurts and is such a stunning building even in its knackered state.

'X'treme building.

Today the biggest bit of repair happened.  A MASSIVE crane came along and lifted our lovely new Purlin into place in the attic from the outside.   It was more extreme building.  Love it.  It was just gutting that Gary wasn't here to see the MEGA crane and ask questions about what the coloured levers do.
Missed him hugely today but he has gone back to London to work to keep us fed and watered.  And its my job to stay here and not spend money, and to not moan about the cold.  Arthur goes to work (nursery) two days a week and then I can do all the things that are impossible to do with him.  We are all doing our bit.

 




Arthur quite happily celebrated his first birthday in the caravan (and at a farm park) and is merrily walking everywhere.

I feel quite sad he doesn't have a bigger, safer area to play so I am thinking about a play room in one of the less terrible rooms.  He managed to acquire 5 sit or push around toys which are 'parked' in the corner of the caravan.   So I think I'll set him up with the tractor inside.  He is still the happiest boy around (and thankfully seems to have stopped hitting me) and is my biggest comfort when things are a bit mental.

Ben and Sarah came to visit and were lucky enough to be here for the Onion Fayre.  The biggest one day festival ever* and we saw leeks the size of Gary and teeny little polished onions and birds made out of carrots.
Arthur went down the helter-skelter and we ate pork buns and drank bitter.
Country wonderfullness.

*about Onions



The trees in the Forest of Dean are beginning to change colour and it is the most beautiful place.  I cannot wait for you all to see it.  It is the one season we hadn't visited Dursley Cross (can you believe we found this headache back in February) and I am very excited about Autumn, even if Winter scares the bejesus out of me.
I have just carpeted the caravan in an off pink (very impressive first carpet laying experience) and the insulation is on its way.  Opted away from the straw as I read an article that suggested there might be a chemical reaction with some types of straw that leads to spontaneous combustion.
I wasn't really on for living on a bomb

And I'm sniffing out the good food; Firstly I fell over myself when I discovered our local Morrisons was stocking Heirloom tomatoes, Black Kale, Samphire, Candy or Yellow beetroot and Chard!  I'm not sure any of the staff knows what they are but I snatched them up and went to hug the manager.  I hope I don't find them in the bargain isle next week..

I went to the Forest Showcase - a food show of all Artisan produces in the Forest.  Met some amazing people, ate a duck burger (delicious) and some Gouda from Gloucestershire cows, then I watched Lindy Wildsmith cure some pork as I had a microbeer.  It felt very normal (made me miss La Fromagerie) and gave me some good leads to create the food hampers for guests.  Its very exciting though - there is an amazing bakery and some country wines - didn't dare try the Marrow wine but I should think it does the job!  I'll stick to the Strawberry one to warm my cockles as the nights draw in.