December 2013

First of all - My apologies for not updating sooner...but here goes.

We have been keeping busy here finishing off things in the garden and fitting the gates to the main entrance - Well I'm using the 'royal we' Bryan has been busy. I am relegated to watching, passing tools and generally offering encouragement. I am under strict rest and recuperation, but the recuperation is not happening fast enough for me. I keep going backwards because I can't stop doing things. 
I have been back to see the specialist today for my 4th cortisone injection and a second shoulder manipulation - Not something I want to repeat, so I promise to behave (for now). 






The tiles for the terrace on Villa Picholine have been bought (quite stress free which makes a change). They have been laid and now are needing grouting - (note to self- stay away from this. Grouting tiles is what started my bad arm). When this is done we can get on with the publicity photos and get 'Picholine' advertised for the forthcoming season. We have planted all the hedging and made a start on the rest of the garden but there is still a lot to do.



The Olives have been picked and are now being processed at our local mill, into our own olive oil. The crop was smaller than last year but the quality is still as good.  I hope to collect and bottle this in the next couple of weeks.
We are still eating tomatoes from our veg garden but they are sadly coming to an end. I'm not sure I can go back to the tasteless shop bought ones now. They have been cropping since the end of June and my store cupboard is full of sauces and chutneys to keep us going throughout the winter months.

In my spare time (ha ha) I have been making christmas decorations for the family and many a night in the wee small hours I could be found knitting away. I hope they are liked and a place on the christmas tree can be found for them. I am now looking forward to a few days rest, maybe a little bit of christmas shopping with my girls and a lovely family christmas.
The New Year will hopefully bring another exciting building adventure.....Shhhh don't tell Bryan -I have started a new 'to do' list already.

Merry Christmas to one and all. 

September 2013

Wow, I can't believe that it is September already. The summer has just flown by. We have been working away on the bits that needed finishing off on Villa Picholine and also on the outside hard landscaping. The entrance gates have been chosen, delivered, painted and are ready to fit. Bryan is working on the electrics and the pillars at the moment and on the next cloudy day the cement mixer will be back to churning out concrete again.  Not something I am looking forward to - I am still struggling with a bad arm after doing the joints on the floor tiles - so shovelling sand and chippings into a mixer is way down on my list of things I would like to do !

The area manager of the holiday company we advertise with came to evaluate the villa for next years brochure and made a suggestion which has caused us to have a major rethink regarding the shared pool we were going to put in. After thinking things over it now seems that Villa Picholine will now have its own pool in its own land - good job we haven't finished the garden.
So another job has been added to 'my list' and work on this will start this autumn (weather & injuries permitting). There's never a dull moment here.....

The tomato crop has been a rather large one and I have been busy making tomato sauces and chutneys to preserve them for the winter months. Fig chutney is on the stove cooking away as I type this. We also kept the clientele in Villa Picholine supplied with not only tomatoes but home grown lettuce, cucumbers, aubergines and courgettes.

It hasn't all been hard work - we have had visits from 2 of our 3 children and their respective families over the last few weeks. We've spent lazy days by the river and in the pool, walks in the vineyards  and the long warm nights sat outside eating and drinking. A wonderful time was had by all and I think we may even have some camping converts in the family after a mini adventure into Spain for a few days.

Villa Picholine from the terrace of Villa Luques

D day came, and went and our first guest arrived (along with a years supply of baked beans in his boot) and has now gone. Were we ready ? Yes we were. But EDF electricity let us down by not coming to connect Villa Picholine until 3 days after our guest arrived !!!  Luckily he has been to stay in our other Gite (La Remise) before and we know him well - Otherwise we could have been in trouble. The weather wasn't too kind to him the first week but it got warmer and sunnier as his vacance progressed.

 This week we have been busy working on the borders round the villa getting them ready for planting but unfortunately it is too late this spring to plant because of the warm, dry weather so it will now have to wait until autumn. This means we can't take the publicity photos until then. So here are a few so you can see what we have achieved so far.

Lounge Area

Kitchen

Lounge/Dining Area

Shower Room

Double Room

Twin Room

We are still working our way through the photo shoots and did one a couple of weeks ago for a local estate agent - It was a fabulous 15th century wine domaine -What a gorgeous place to photograph. Sometimes a photographers assistants job is a pleasure to do.

How quickly time flies - Less then 2 weeks to go until our first guest arrives for his holiday in La Picholine. Fingers crossed it will be ready in time. This morning Bryan finished the plumbing then we had to break off for a photoshoot.  There are a few jobs left to do in the bathroom and the kitchen is awaiting the cupboard doors and shelves. The list of things to do grows longer every day and panic is beginning to set in.  At the moment we are waiting for the certificate from the consuel - we need this to pass on to EDF (the electric company) who will then (hopefully) before the 25th come and switch on our electrics at the main box - otherwise it will be candles and a BBQ.

We never know what to do next. It changes from working on the villa, working in the garden or photoshoots. Never a dull day here......

May is the busiest time for photoshoots and we have had a bit of a problem fitting them all in, and with the weather being changeable they seem to be all stacking up for the end of the month. Today was not a problem with beautiful blue skies and lots of warm sunshine.

We spent Sunday afternoon planting the tomatoes out in our little kitchen garden along with peppers and cucumbers. We also picked some of our new potatoes for our evening meal and the first of the strawberries for our dessert. Mmmmmmm.

No photo's this time - We just haven't had time.You will have to wait until we have done the finishing touches......

Both villas are looking like they should with the outsides finished. I'm glad to see the back of the red blocks.  Now we need some nice weather so that we can get on with the planting outside. The weather this spring has been disappointing but we are hoping that it will improve soon. we have had an extremely busy few weeks tiling the bathroom and floors but we are on the last bit now - Just the hallway to finish & the main floor to grout.
All the 2nd fix electrics are bought and Bryan is hoping to start on these on Monday morning while I grout the bathroom. The next shopping trip will be for the kitchen, hopefully next week. That's if I can find one I like in stock and in budget !!  If not we're in trouble.......

We have spent the last couple of days preparing our other little gité ( La Remise) for our first guests of the season- who arrive this evening. Its always nice welcoming new clients and introducing them to the wonderful places around here.  Bookings are doing very well and we have very few weeks free. I hope we can replicate this with La Picholine - Our first booking is the 25th May,  7 weeks today. I hope we can make it, It's getting a bit scary now.

Last week saw our first visit of the year from part of our family, so we had a little bit of play time with walks in the vineyards, a visit to Carcassone and a lovely day at the beach. Also because it was Easter we had to have an egg hunt for the little ones. We now have to live on our 'memories' until the next bunch arrive in summer.

At last... Visible progress

Pas- de- la- Casa

Picnic Lunch

We arrived back from our Skiing trip, to Font Romeu, with bruises, aches and pains, and sunburn and  thankfully no broken bones.  But what a great weekend we had. The weather was fabulous and there was lots of snow. We just need a holiday to get over it....... Bryan managed to progress to the green runs but I stuck to the nursery slopes.  We hope to return next year for another session -it's very addictive and great fun.

The facadiers arrived - late - but better late than never! They have finished the outside of La Picholine but we are still waiting for them to finish our house.  The undercoat is on but the top coat is still to do. So at the moment we are living with scaffolding all around the house and the windows masked up, well they were until today when the wind did a good job and blew the plastic off. The facadiers will have to do it all again when they (hopefully) return to finish off next week.

Inside La Picholine we have finished plastering all the joints in the plasterboard. Bryan has sanded everything and I have decorated 2 bedrooms. The floor tiles are bought, (I won't bore you with the fiasco), and laid in the 2 bedrooms. We start grouting them tomorrow - now there's a job to make you want to jump out of bed and seize the day - NOT.  

The bathroom is also ready for tiling, but we just haven't plucked up enough courage to try another tile shopping trip just yet - maybe later this week.

I have planted my tomato seeds a couple of weeks ago and they have sprouted and are sat on the windowsill in the bathroom where it is nice and warm. Bryan has dug over the vegetable plot and with a little bit of luck and some sunshine we will be spending a couple of hours in the garden this weekend. The potatoes are ready to be planted and when I checked earlier this week the strawberry plants have flowers on them - Spring is in the air - at last.

“To achieve great things, two things are needed; a plan, and not quite enough time.” – Leonard Bernstein

The plaster boarding was finished before the end of January and all the floors prepped and ready to skim and last Friday we started to lay the sand and cement screed to cover all the plumbing and electrics that went across the floor.  I can now say that the floors are all finished (just) and ready for tiling, ( if I ever find time to go and buy the tiles).  It has been a very hard week supplying Bryan with the sand & cement mix and I think every muscle in my body knows it....  Still its another stage in the building process finished and now everything we do will make it look more like a house and less like a building site.  The 1st fix plumbing is finished and we even have a shower tray down in the bathroom, all in all it's looking good - which is more than I can say for our bad backs.  We will have to nurture them this next week in preparation for our first ever skiing trip. Hopefully we won't return with any broken bones......

Bryan has been in contact with the facadiers and they are (allegedly) going to be here next Monday. At last !!! we have only been waiting a year. Once the facade is finished on both houses we can start on the landscaping. We also need some photo's for publicity. We can't advertise without photo's and we can't take photo's until the facade is done.We have missed the deadline to advertise it with the company who have our other gite - so this year we will have to let it (at a reduced price) to friends, family and anyone else who wants to come and see this wonderful part of France.

This week the postman brought us a lovely letter along with a gold award for our little gite. It seems that they are awarded to the top 5% of their properties for getting 100% good feedback  - so we are very proud to have received it.

We did our first photo shoot of the year last week and what a lovely day we picked. It was 18 degrees with beautiful blue skies.  A cherry picker was even organised for us to get the best angled shots.....I'm glad Bryan was the camera man - and he was glad that it wasn't windy.

Stop Press:-  The facadiers have just been and they are coming next Tuesday to do the facade on  LaPicholine......eeeeeek - excited.   :0)

Premier Snowfall

Well we have had our first snowfall of the winter this week and it was pretty spectacular. It snowed all day on Wednesday - quite heavily here, which is quite unusual.  We carried on with the work in La Picholine but it was freezing in the house with no heating and a bit too dark without the sunshine.We had an early finish and prepared a list of things we need to carry on. We decided to go and collect these on Thursday morning.

Thursday morning arrived and with it a change of plan - There was still lots of snow and still quite cold at  - 2 degrees - so Bryan decided to steal the car and have a  morning with his camera, around the area to record the event. The afternoon was spent editing.  Back to work tomorrow - I think a shopping trip is on the cards.

We are still plaster boarding and doing 1st fix electrics. Hopefully we can finish this by the end of the weekend. It takes a lot of thinking and planning to make sure we have all the wires in place for plugs, light,oven, hob, dishwasher etc before we cover them all up. There is no room for errors.

Still at least with all this snow we have somewhere to keep our beers cold -

 Cheers........

2013

I can't believe that over a month has gone by (and the year ended) since my last post....My New Years resolution will be - Must do better !!!!

Midwinter Sunrise in Cebazan

The Bathroom window has finally arrived and is fit - so all is secure and watertight now - another job crossed off the list.

We spoke to the guys who were supposed to be coming to do the rendering on the outside of the villas at the end of November and they said that they were behind with their work and it would be January before they would get to us, so we had a change of plan and decided to spend Christmas with our family (and friends) in England.  We had a wonderful 2 weeks catching up with people and watching little ones in their school plays, doing the school run and no DiY.  The only downside was I have now brought the flu back to France with me...... Today is the first day since we got back that I have found a little bit of energy to do something. Homemade/homegrown celery soup is on the stove top and I have even made a start on the weeding outside.

Bryan has been plodding on in La Picholine tout seul and the framework for all the interior walls are in place and he is now finishing the electrics and plumbing that need to run across the floors so that we can then finish the plaster boarding.  Our next big job is to put a topping of sand and cement on the floor area to cover the pipes and make the floor ready for tiling. Not a job I am looking forward to but someone has to do it -  I hope he waits until I am fully recovered before scheduling this.

We collected our Olive Oil from the mill early in December and bottled some of it to take back to England for gifts.  Because we bottled it straight away I had to filter it first but the results were excellent and it looks good enough to eat, hopefully with some fresh Cebazan bread dipped in it....Mmmmmmmm.

The weather has been fantastic since  New Years Day - we have eaten lunch outdoors a few times and yesterday the temperature was 16 Degrees in the shade.  Much better then the weather in UK- out of 15 days we only managed 1 without the rain....... I know which I prefer.
The wild birds were happy to see us back and they are very busy filling themselves with the peanuts and seeds on offer on the bird table. Its nice to sit eating lunch and watch them squabbling over the offerings. They get a little more used to us every day and don't seem to worry about us being close by.

My new list is now finished and tomorrow morning will see us back at the builders merchants buying the shower tray, shower fittings hot water cylinder and lots more pipe and wiring....... Happy New Year everyone.