Some news & pics on the build

Last time I wrote we couldn't make a decision about the way to heat our house and hot water and that was delaying us massively. We finally made a decision on a Solar Hot Water system that would use a minimal amount of electricity to run and Underfloor Heating to warm our cockles in the winter. We ordered all the kit, which came from the UK and had a 3-4 week delay on it and finally after a lot of waiting we are starting to lay the Underfloor Heating in the morning, this should mean that we'll be laying screed and thinking about an Oak floor in our Kitchen within the next 2-3 weeks.

We've also had our plasterer back so the Kitchen walls are looking more presentable. Stu has been spending his time putting new floors in the bedrooms, upstairs bathroom and landing. This was a mammoth task as the worst floor had a 5 inch difference in it's level from one side of the room to the other! He spent many hours and days levelling the beams and applying wood treatment to every bit of wood in sight! We now have 2 large bedrooms ready for carpet, our bathroom has a beautiful softwood floor and the landing has an Oak floor. Stu's brother came and helped for a couple of weeks, which was fantastic - he's a Carpenter and Stu turned into his labourer for the time that he was here. They worked brilliantly together and all I had to do was keep the food and beer (mainly the beer) flowing!

Stu has also started fitting our beautiful bathroom upstairs, which has been a complicated job with beams dictating where the plumbing and waste can & can't go. The Solar Hot Water system is going in at the beginning of November, so a bath may be possible before December - woo hoo!

We have a very tight schedule between now and Christmas, we're going to New York for 5 days at the end of November and then home to the UK for Christmas on the 20th of December so in terms of actual number of days left to work - there aren't many!