“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)