On a down day...

So, I try to write my blog in the most positive of moods.  But it would be misconceiving of me if I didn't tell you what it was like on a down day.

Blind panic.
I want to shut my eyes to it all and it might go away.  Except it won't and I am a god damn adult now who has to sort out this mess (that we got ourselves into) how ever we can.  Otherwise we loose everything.  Sometimes its too big to  think about it.

We are supposed to be moving into the attic in 3 weeks and that is immense pressure.  The stairs to the attic have collapsed, meaning you have to double step upwards teetering dangerously to avoid being stabbed my the metal gypliners that we are using to insulate every nook and cranny of the outside walls.

The work in the attic is so slow, especially when I am an utter eejit at it,  Can't cut plasterboard in a straight line, not strong enough to lift a sheet of celotex and a cack hand with a drill.  So after I've mis-screwed some screws into the side of the plasterboard, missed the wood its supposed to be screwed to behind it and wrecked the plasterboard edges,  I then throw the drill and walk off.  Into another derelict room where I blankly stare, wondering how the hell we'll ever afford to furnish it, heat it, decorate it.

All this is on one of the days Arthur is in Nursery and those days are the days that feel like my days off.  Just the pleasure of being able to make a Sandwich without being interrupted to stop him banging the glass doors with his toys, or from poking his fingers up the dogs nose/bum, or to retrieve the hot cross bun he's just stuffed behind the radiators.

I feel like a total failure on these days and I avoid make-up because that means looking in the mirror.  I wish I was happy with taking the easier route.  I remember saying before we moved that we had to leave London beacuse we couldn't afford another bedroom.  How on earth does that jump to needing an extra three?!

On these days I buy chocolate and get under the duvet.  Which is where I am now writing this post.

My blog is my diary and it has been a very hard few weeks.  I've doubted the entire project, and my mental health.  It is the most frightening task we have ever undertaken and our initial enthusiasm has been worn down by extra cost, winter and sickness.

Now - today is not like that. So please don't worry.  We are back on the horse and fighting fit!
The purpose of writing this post is so I don't look back in 20 years and think it was easy -
I worry that one day we might think...
'Oh Let's retire in France and buy a knackered Chateau.'  Try and do it all again, but with weary bones and a different language.  Just to spice things up a bit, 'cos that Dursley thing was easy!
This is a note to my 60 year old self.
Today - Gary is home from London and holding the whole thing together (as he always does) with his positivity and drive and it's rubbing off on me. 
We have a strict written plan to get us into the attic and I'm buying carpet. 
The daffodils are coming up and things are feeling alive again. 
I have no doubt we can do this today, and do it well.
I'll let you know if we make it into the attic.  I'm going to be a little busy until the end of the month.




 

To en-suite B&B, or not to be?

My 2013 inspirational boots.

Happy New Year! to all.  I hope you are as motivated as we are for 2013.  We raced through Christmas knowing we had to get on - this is going to take us all year, at least.

I may have started to invite everyone to NYE 2013 already - so the pressure is on.
A phone blip meant I lost loads of my photos.  Since a nasty little DC10'er stole my lovely camera in Ibiza, we are a little stuck for visual aid this month.  But I'll do my best.

Since we have successfully received all our planning permissions we have finally breathed a sigh of relief and even, very gratefully, received some Christmas cards from neighbours.  I hope this means we can move on and eventually we won't be the Pariahs on May Hill.  I've joined the W.I in Longhope (our next nearest community) as its a popular one and they have lots of speakers.  All good souls there and I am meeting more nice people who know how to make tea and who don't immediately know me as that Yurt lady come to ruin the village.   My hopes of baking advice are so far dashed - but there is a W.I Cheese making course I am going on, and I've signed myself up for the inter WI Quiz.  Perhaps a little too readily, as I expect there might be the odd question on latin plant names and knitting techniques.  I doubt much will crop up on what is going on with the Kardashians.   I'll have to start some homework, but bearing in mind it is my only social event in the Gloucestershire diary, I'm actually quite excited.

Lack of social interaction means I am rapidly letting myself go.
Stuck halfway between functional country style and London acceptable.
My walking boots are now simply; my shoes.
And I doubt I'll remember how to walk in heels if I ever get to go anywhere that requires a pair.
When panic used to ensue as my Estee Lauder was nearing its end, now I embrace a day or three without make up.  My legs get moisturised when there is a full moon and I skuttled out of the waxing salon with my head hung in shame.  There is no possible time for Gym or preening.  The only real exercise I get is at Soft play with Arthur and trips back to London fill me with self styling fear.  I wondered if a Harris tweed jacket was a good idea the other day.  But this only really works for people Made in Chelsea.
Not Made from Chelsea Bun.
My Jimmy Choo Hunter's are inspirational.  Me, a glam floaty dress and my welly boots surrounded by mud for a piece in Herefordshire and Wye Valley Life.  Ha.  Maybe come summer.

The one thing we have done is find a cinema. We discovered an amazing one in the next town on from us.  I had thought it was a pretty bleak place after we visited a nursery where the kids were sucking felt tips. However, following a tip off from one of the ladies from toddler group we went to The Palace Theatre.  Originally built in 1910 it is apparently one of the oldest purpose built cinemas still operating.  The tickets were only £5.50 each and we bought delicious ice cream for £1.30 and popcorn for £1. The seats were lovely red velvet and there are snug two seater sofas to cosy into on date night.

Gary has mastered the casual lean

Off to the flicks

Just add a G&T in a tea cup

'Do you take Amex?'

It reminded me of the Hyde Park Picture House in Leeds but there were little American deco touches that made it even better (all it really needed was a bar and it would have been perfect) and I kept squealing every time I spotted another nice touch.  Good films too, and the lady behind the pay box was knitting when we left.

We have moved out of the caravan. 

It froze.

We started to hear rumours of a cold snap in mid December.  Local folk started to whisper talk of minus 15.  So I found us a very lovely cottage in a nearby small town (I can walk to a shop again!) with a real fire and a bath.  The cottage is part of a larger holiday rental place which is an incredible conversion of a stunning listed building and barn.  It is the ultimate party house if anyone needs a place for a stag or hen (and there are weddings on the cards!)  With a sauna and steam room, four poster beds and beautiful beams.  The lady that owns it used to design for Agent Provocateur and her style is all over it.  They are about 7 years further down the line than us and it's great to hear how much they've done.

George Cottage, Mitcheldean

Still rocking the Christmas jumper

The day we moved out, the frost moved in.  We turned the water off to the caravan  but the water left in the pipes came out of the taps like curly icicles and the water in the toilet was a block of ice.  The 'double' glazing had ice patterns all over the glass and the butane gas bottle froze too.
So the caravan has now become a sanctuary for the cats.  Don't tell Gary, but they should be nice and snug with the radiators on.
I had a wonderful photo of the Merry Christmas flashing light that adorned the caravan window.  The cats had their very own disco all Christmas.

So, we have until the end of February to get the attic rooms sorted and to move into there.  Ryan came from Cornwall to plaster them, and they almost resemble a proper house!

They are also wired up for lighting - I think I've spent at least a whole day soley dedicated to Christopher Wray lights on Ebay, and ready for the second electric fix.

They will be incredible rooms.  Warm as toast with all the insulation and with incredible lime washed beams full of old nails and notches .  One has an exposed brick fire place and the original Elm stairs will be amazing once they've had a scrub.  We have just finished battling it out over the bathrooms and the B&B potential.    There is a stunning open space between the two bedrooms and we could either carve it up for two small en suites or have a slightly less functional, but all the more beautiful bathroom.  With folding door system which will allow the whole thing to be open so you can look out of the window and across the trees to the farm.  And my vintage light will look like the moon above the deepest cast iron bath.  It means only one bathroom between the rooms though.  Or a private bathroom for only one room.  Or a suite of the entire top floor.  It has taken Gary and I at least 3 weeks to finally get this decision settled. It limits our B&B potential but creates a wicked bathroom for us.  However, there will now be half a tonne of extra weight from the bath and water resting above Arthur's bedroom.

Not as dark as we thought they might be

Exposed brick fireplace

Panoramic view of Attic room 1

We finally decided to keep this as one bathroom, with huge doors that fold back to  reveal an oversized cast iron bath.

The stairs to the attic rooms

For the last 6 weeks or so we have mainly been making the place look worse than it did before. Uncle Graham came again and kept helping with the attic and Steve is tirelessly there - getting braver and braver up a ladder.  The first and ground floors are looking more and more derelict.

All walls are being insulated

But the old plaster has to go somewhere...

I must get Steve to sign an indemnity.

Or should I say Nanook of the North.

Cleo and Kev came for New Year and the last time they were both here was the day we 'moved' in and they were stunned into silence.  We've stripped the walls back to the brick, and lifted the floorboards (to suck out the rats).  Then we've tacked on metal strips and filled the holes with foam.  It looks barbaric and un-sympathetic, but I'm getting used to it (apparently exposed brick in every room just isn't an option) Cleo and Kev didn't say much this time either but it might have been thanks to the punch I made on New Years Eve.
We are a long way from 'after'  In fact, we've gone a fair few steps back from 'before'.

I've been working in the house when I can.  Working on the en-suite to the master bedroom.  Very satisfying.  And now we have another stupidly enormous room to deal with.

The division cuts the window in two

Now what!? Another freestanding bath  I think...

The walls were full of grain and dead snails.

So the next few months are a battle between the house and the business.  If we can work on the land when it gets warm again we might have a hope of opening next summer.  The next big thing is the Ground Source Heat Pump.  Its fascinating, exciting and terrifyingly expensive but means we won't need oil. As Gary wants to start working the renewable side of plumbing, it works on that front too.  We have a real opportunity to have a sustainable life at Dursley Cross.  Especially when we reinstate the well too.  We've had various surveys that estimate the oil bills for the house and barn will be around £6500 a year, plus the cost of the boiler and tank.  We never factored that in!  If we put in the GSHP it runs off thermal energy from our land - from a warren of 2 kilometers worth of 6ft trenches and if the government sorts out the renewable heat incentive then it should pay us back the outlay within 7 years.  But the outlay will more or less wipe us out - and we'll have to wait for the payback to convert the Cider Barn and sort the porch out, and Yurt's 4 & 5 and probably Arthur's school uniform at this rate.   It's really beginning to roll out just how long a project this really is.  But the Government still hasn't introduced the scheme - so at this point in time, its just another outlay - and we are just too scared of doing it without the payback.  We have pretty well acclimatised to countryside cold though and I think its making the decision less prevalent.  Either that, or we're both exhausted on decisions.  Where the hell is Changing Rooms when you need it.

Its been a year since we first came to Dursley Cross.  I found this picture.

This photo was taken exactly a year on.  The snow has arrived and its beautiful.

Our drive

As far as our silly city car could get us.

But not much is happening this week - even thermals aren't a patch on -5 and the fire and bath are a little too tempting in our little cottage.  Even with the in-laws and their MASSIVE dog... Gloucestershire is beginning to feel like home.

Oh yes, and we've employed a new 'numbers' man.
Seeing as though the budget is long gone.

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.