Toilet done, men away for a while

The men were back in today, for the final day of working with us for a couple of months, but first of all let's go through the weekend.

Camping time with Roo

A quality early morning sky

Setting the stones under the bench

Old bench and new

Rosie on the swings

A party display at the park

Picnic in the garden

Friday night was awesome as I pitched the tent and me and Rosie camped the night. She just loves camping, and slept really well. I was up super early, as usual, and went out to do the final tasks on the bench which involved bringing up stones and spreading them, and shifting the big pile of spoil left over from digging out the footing. It looks great and Rosie has been sitting up there loads. She really likes the heart shaped stone that I dug out and have leant up against the fence. We headed out to the courier midmorning and stopped off at the park for some fun before heading home in time for a call with my family and then we took the blanket into the garden and had a picnic lunch.

The huge tent is set out for erecting

Rosie fits inside the bag for the tent

This tent is just superb

Excited to be back here again

Louise is grumpy that Angela isn't around

In the afternoon Rosie and I took down the small tent we'd stayed in, and then put up the huge family tent as Angela and Rosie camped on Saturday night. It went up really well, despite the wind picking up quite a lot, and then we rushed out the door for dinner and playtime at the restaurant up the road. It was a very lovely time, and we met a Bulgarian couple who live in the UK and were over for a holiday to visit family. They had a daughter the same age as Rosie and we invited them to visit next time they're in the area. That evening the camping was a relative success (though it rained heavily) and I had the puppies up with me who were sulking a bit that they weren't able to cuddle with Angela.

Smashed hatch glass!

This was so tasty!

A stunning sunset

Sunday was super busy for me but there was some drama. I was working and Angela was cleaning when I heard a huge crashing sound and went running to find out what had happened. It turned out that Rosie was trying to put the hatch down and it slipped out of her hands and slammed down super hard, smashing and scattering glass everywhere. Rosie was, of course, distraught and had run off to hide on the balcony. It took Angela and I about 40 minutes to clean up all the glass and make it safe to let the puppies back in and for us to walk around again. We're now waiting for the window people to come quote for a replacement with safety glass. Later on I took Rosie to karate, had a very lovely meal (that I cannot remember what it was called) and then as I collected her the sky was stunning.

Halil gets started sorting the spoil pile

Pipe is now being bedded in

Loads of bricks to be skipped

Drain from the downpipes being re-attached

Breaking out for an access hatch

Cementing in to finish up

Boxing off done and dusted

And so to today. The men were in on time and got stuck in to the final jobs to finish the toilet install. They sorted through the spoil from their excavations (they had dug up loads and loads of stones and old bricks) and then secured and covered the pipe over. With that done Bekir reconnected the drainage pipe into the main feed down to our grey water system and then put in the inspection hatch over both the access points (so we can clean the pipe if we get a blockage) and finally boxed off the hole in the wall as well. It was a good and productive day and Halil's friend also came past to do the annual service on Mo the lawnmower, who was immediately put to work as the grass is growing so fast right now.

Balcony dinner time

I'll leave you with us having dinner on the balcony for the first time this year. We even got to watch some cycling, which Rosie really enjoyed. A great way to end the day.

So there it is. The men won't be back for a fair few weeks so I doubt I'll be updating soon but thanks for reading.

Winter is done

Wow it has been some time since the last update; I planned on doing regular updates through the winter however of course as you can tell I never started and so now I'm sat here the night before the men are due and I've got to do an update to catch up. With a combined 574 pictures and videos to go through. So I'm just not going to bother. This'll be quite a quick update and tomorrow I should be back to normal service...

Rosie

Princess Rosie and a jigsaw

Another jigsaw

More completed jigsaw

She's proud of this one

Dinosaurs!

In progress (this one still isn't finished)

The one she finished today

Rosie has been really getting into doing jigsaws and is getting really good at them. Just today we did another together and I'm having to buy more and more, and bigger and more complex, to keep her entertained. It is really good for her though so I don't mind at all.

Fish being buried

Awesome shapes on the trampoline

Bicycling

Rosie playing her keyboard she got for her birthday

Out to the new restaurant for dinner

Helping me mow the lawn

Going for a ride at the park

Rosie made these

Doing a puppet show

Our bulbs coming up

First camping of the year

Enjoying the sun and the breeze

So more stuff with Rosie before we go on with a few more subjects and wrap this up. We had one dead fish which Rosie was determined to bury so out we went and put it into a little hole by the cherry tree at the front. She has also had lots of fun with the trampoline, her bike, her keyboard (she's getting good at it already, learning some songs!) and doing things with me like going out for dinner and riding along on the mower as I've already started having to mow the lawn! We also took her to the park a couple of days in a row with her bike which went really well. She's also made some martenichkas and we hung them on some trees. She did a puppet shows in the puppet theatre we made together, enjoyed the spring flowers and last night we camped. Today was lovely and she got to enjoy the warmth on the patio.

Building Progress

Window people fitting tilt and turn

Halil helps lift in the new sofa

Bekir and Halil fitting more posters

More plugs required

We've had a few things happen, all of which almost prompted me to do an update but never quite did. Firstly while Angela and Rosie were away visiting her parents I had the window people in to refit all the remaining windows that we needed to have swapped over. Halil popped over to help the delivery of our new three seater sofa which is now being used every day. They also replaced the broken and missing fly screens. Bekir and Halil were also in for one day only where they put up my picture frames for the stairs and fitted some more plugs in the music room.

Right I'm going to wrap this up here. Thanks for reading and back tomorrow.

Weekend, snow and blowing up pumps

It's been a wild ride since the last update so let's get to it.

Happy Rosie in the tent

First of all, Friday night of course Rosie and I camped and had a lovely time. It was fun. I was even super organised and got the tent all packed away first thing in the morning. That was a good thing, as you'll see in a bit.

This plant needed a trim

This plant received a trim

Sad day when an old cup dies

Helping daddy in the workshop

Cuphead, apparently

Saturday morning Rosie and I got stuck in to tidying the lounge, and I also cleaned and tidied the balcony. I had to run in and hold my breath while opening the doors as the fumes from the smoke bomb were awful. By the end of this process both rooms were looking amazing which was such a nice feeling. Later on Rosie and I went together into the workshop to work on the base for her model railway and while tidying up I found that one of the original cups for the men has broken. It looks like it just fell apart and wasn't dropped. Ah well. It was a fun hobbying session with Rosie. Later on I was "partying" with Rosie in her play room which we've now done regularly every evening. Fun times.

Woke to some snow, but not much

Lighting the fire, sorting out Christmas decorations

Hanging curtains

Thelma and Xena playing hard

Fire guard up for Christmas

Rosie playing with a friend

A little snow (to be thrown at me)

Stunning moon rise

The burst pump spraying water everywhere

When we woke on Sunday we found that we had had a small amount of snow. It was cold, but not deep and we avoided the chaos most of the country has suffered. I'm not that happy about that - a huge dump of snow would be welcomed. We had friends coming over lit the fire in the lounge and also I brought all the Christmas stuff down from the roof to get sorted and organised before this coming week when Angela and Rosie will do the decorating. I hung curtains while Rosie played nicely on her own on the (now clean) balcony. I also quickly put the fire guard up just in case the two kids played in the lounge. Rosie and her friend had a great time, it was fun. Later on Rosie and I went out into the garden to throw snow and watched the beautiful moonrise. The major excitement of the day, however, was just as I was about to wash up I heard a hissing sound and found the pump for our water had burst and water was spraying everywhere in our washroom. The water was turned off and washing up and baths were postponed until the men could fix that in the morning.

Beautiful sunrise on a cold morning

Bekir checking the broken handle

Cars looking sweet in their new display

Icy morning; careful footing

It was a glorious morning this morning with such a lovely sunrise I grabbed a picture. I was waiting for the men to arrive to tell them early about the pump problem and prevent them getting involved in their regular work. Over the weekend the handle on one of the front doors had broken so Bekir took it out to check what was broken. With this done I went with him to go get new pump and left Halil to put up a display rack I had bought for my model cars. When I got back he had done this and I spent a few minutes putting the cars out on display and it looks amazing. It was a cold night last night and there was quite a lot of ice on the patio.

Bekir getting ready to remove the broken pump

Final position for the new pump

And finally we're done

Totally blown reservoir

Bekir fixes the handles on the door

The fitting of the new pump turned into quite a saga and was a lot of faff and fiddling for the men. They had to go down to the shops in town three times for various reasons. Initially they started trying to replace the old with the new in the same position but they are different sizes so then they tried to adjust the plumbing, still in the same place and that didn't work so finally they moved it to down beside the washing machine and got that finished up. We actually prefer that location as it is much tidier and neater there. The old reservoir is totally wrecked so there's not going to be an opportunity to repair it, sadly. There was time for Bekir to fit the new handle onto the door before they left. An unexpected day of repairs rather than true progress but it's a good thing the men were able to get stuck in to fix the pump so quickly.

Rosie playing with a car

Puppies playing hard

The moon rises; so stunning

Nearly finished making the new frame

When Rosie got home I showed her the new car display and she immediately got them out and started playing with them. We then went to play outside for a bit, and Xena and Dutch had a great time playing and fighting. It was pretty chilly but beautiful! The moon-rise was stunning. We also spent some time together in the workshop building more of the framework for her new base for her model railway. That's really fun time!

So there it is; a long update but a fun one. Thanks for reading and back tomorrow.