Including more tidying

Another three days has passed like a flash and I'm sat here again, Sunday afternoon, and while we wait for our guests to arrive I thought I'd make a start on this update. Undoubtedly I'll not get it finished before they get here so it'll end up being completed as a super duper crazy long post tomorrow evening. For this I apologise in advance. But onwards.

State of Sassy's Room floor on Thursday night/Friday morning

Bekir making up the leaf guards

Leaf guard fitted in place

Another very foggy start

Tea tree fully leafed

Friday and it was back with the men but sadly not the final day of having to go collect them and bring them back. Both of us are really ready to have a break from that journey but at the same time are chuffed to bits with the progress that has been made at the beginning of this year. In Sassy's Room the floor was over half complete from Thursday while Bekir was back onto the balcony fitting the custom leaf guards to all the drainage points. He was making these out of mesh and bending wire to fix it to the pipes. Very handy. It was a misty start once again and there had been a very bad accident at the bottom of the men's road which A had to drive past but which was thankfully gone when I got there later in the day. A guy on a motorbike was killed and that just demonstrates how dangerous that new road is. One benefit of spring is the tea trees have suddenly turned green and it seems like overnight they have gone from bare branches to full leaf. Stunning.

Lunch time and the floor is almost complete

Waiting for a space to park

A roofing beam, and string to keep the whole thing level

Bekir joins Sally on the roof

Big dark clouds overhead

Sally struggling with just the hammer

This is a much better tool

A showing off her agility

Byulhan and Trugay (the new guy; I found his name out) cracked on through the day on the floor in Sassy's Room and they were well on target to finish it up mid afternoon. I was really busy with my day job after a very good demo on Thursday so didn't get out to take pictures that much. I did have to go out with Bekir to the shop to pick up some more cement for them, nails for Sally and a few other bits and pieces and true to public holiday form it was packed and parking was a struggle. Sally was up on the roof all day putting the wood in place and in the afternoon Bekir joined him having finished the leaf guard work. It was threatening rain all afternoon and did drop a few spots but nothing very much which was good. Sally had been looking for the crowbar for days to help him with pulling the nails out of the wood but he couldn't find it and neither could I nor could Bekir however A went and found it straight away, for which she got applause and cheered Sally up no end. A had gone back onto the roof to check it out from up there and she showed off by walking down the ladder forwards, like Sally does. Scary stuff.

Melon seeds germinating

Sweetcorn and tomato seedlings

Our first strawberry flower

One of our tomato plants has a flower also

The gym, nice and welcoming

She had been busy during the day with gardening things and we now have several boxes of seeds germinating on the window sill as well as some tomatoes and more sweetcorn planted into compost. Our garden is slowly starting to get going and we have flowers on our strawberries (which are growing in the humanure bed) and our first one on a tomato. Inside I had decided to surprise A, who had gone shopping as usual in the morning, by lifting the running machine into the gym room. Fortunately Bekir helped me as it weighs a tonne and it was too wide to wheel through the door so we had to lift it in sideways. Later in the day A and I put rugs down in there and made it comfortable so we can use it without dust going everywhere. Now we just need to find the correct tiles. One of my tasks now is to run power in temporarily and get some lights and plugs on the walls.

Working in tandem to prime Sassy's Room

You have to make a mess to tidy up, sometimes

Stack of boards to be moved

Beautiful end to the day

Inside Byulhan and Trugay had completed the floor as expected and now moved on to priming the ceiling and walls in preparation for starting the plastering on Monday. Trugay was getting stuck in with the brush on the ceiling while Byulhan did the walls. They didn't quite manage to complete the whole room but were very close by the time it came to take them home. I had begun to clean out Room 13 and organise the drawers in there but I realised that I needed the corridor done first so I moved on to carrying the chipboard flooring boards into the roof space. I did another five after I got back from taking the men before collapsing as they are heavy. It was a bit of a gorgeous end to the day as well, sunset-wise, as the clouds didn't quite meet the horizon and the sun glimpsed through. It was a good day but both of us were pretty tired and ready for the weekend.

Twin room has been dressed

Tidy top corridor once more, and what a lovely thing it is

Two of the cakes A made

Saturday dawned lazily and with no alarm nor a rush to get out of bed and that was fantastic. I brought us a brew each to bed and we drank them there before getting up. Just what we needed. I don't have many pictures of the day as it was so busy for us but that'll make this quicker to type. First of all we carried the remainder (the majority, to be fair) of those boards up into the roof together and then I carried on tidying and cleaning and tidying until lunch time and afterwards. A was in the kitchen baking all day and made some superb cakes to use up some of our copious egg stash. We headed into town to pick up a few things and then it was back and I finished off my tidying while A continued baking. It was a great day and loads got done and we ended it by cuddling on the sofa watching 2001 A Space Odyssey before heading to bed exhausted.

A beautiful sunrise this morning

Not long after, and the sun continues to rise

Cleaning out the muck from the duck pond

Good stuff for the garden, that

Watering the orchard

Weeded bed

Kitchen cleaning

And so to today. I was a little lazy starting and A got up and made brews for us today. It was a lovely sunrise though and that dragged me out of bed at least. The day began very busily with me doing the humanure, cleaning out Sassy, getting into the pond to scrape the scum out and then spreading it near the trees in the orchard. I then watered it in and finally got into the garden and dug out the bed near the vines. A was inside tidying and cleaning and she got the kitchen, dining room, nook, living room, our bedroom and the guest suite hoovered out and spik and span. For my part I went into Room 13 and did some painting and also got some work done to help my boss out.

Happy Thelma with her ring

Louise having a good sniff about

Rambo in the sun

A beautiful flower bed once again 

Gorgeous flower

We were expecting our guests mid afternoon however they have been delayed which gave me the chance to get onto the back bank with the puppies to play for a bit and then get some lovely pictures of the flowers in A's flower bed. A has just been out watering, we're all set for our guests to arrive in about half an hour, and I've managed to get this update done before they get here (I spoke to soon - they're here while I'm putting the last pictures in... GAH!) which keeps it to a very reasonable length.

Success. Thanks for reading.