What is this, two posts in one day?!?

So I had to cave in and buy a proper exspensive chicken coop, my lovely blue and white arched coop seems to shrink by the day as the chickens got bigger. It got to the point that they where sqeezing into the laying box, it also got slighlty fox attacked one night and although it stopped the fox the first time Im not sure it would have stopped a second attempt.

So I sprang for an Eglu...

Rich build a little stand for the house to keep it up out of the wet. Luckily we had tons of wood left over from the build so this little frame is made from off cuts.

They seem to like the new digs.

We are inching closer to being finished (as much as we are ever finished with any job) day by day. My god it feels like its taking forever and we are both now running pretty much on empty at this point and nursing bad backs. My apologies to friends and family who have been neglected this year!

We got the garage doors fitted a week or so ago, these where made by an brilliant father and son carpentry team who live just down the lane from us, we pretty much gave them free rein with the design (something we would normaly micromanage the hell out of) as we knew whatever they come up with would be good and we weren't disappointed! Rich spend several long days getting these painted and they look super smart now, it also means we can then work on fitting his workshop out over the winter.

We finally finished the studio floor (thank god as I've actually managed to also bugger up my hand scrapping all the tar off!), it was a lot faster to lay then clean but well worth the hassle and time.

And here is the new little Chilli Penguin stove Chilli Billi! Currently my favourite thing! This was supplied and fitted by the lovely people at The Fireplace Fitters Shop in Frome, they where our local supplied for the Chilli Billi which is specifically designed for yurts, garden studios and offices. These fantastic little stoves are all made in the UK in Wales, check our their website for their full range.

Its so cute!! The little enamel tea pot was from a car-boot sale and cost the princely sum for 50p.

Once the floor was down we filled all the joints with wood filler then several coats of varnish to made it more durable, Rich then got on with laying the tiles out in the little court yard. Again we somehow managed to pick a product that was really fiddly to lay, note to future self, diamond pavers look great but are total shit to grout into place as you have to clear the grooves so the rain water can run off to the drain. Im not going to lie, I chose these because they look nice and never once considered them from a practicality point of view (Sorry Rich!).

Rich then spent a day trying to sort out the lighting in the studio (which had been hook up slighly wrong meaning the one indoor light only came on when you flicked the switch for the outdoor light!).

We always wanted to use vintage industrial lights (some of which we've been collecting for years!) we teamed this with neon colouring wiring in different colours and we both have a thing about neon (can you tell we are children of the 80s?)

The first light is a soviet era Russian explosion proof lamp, the glass is nearly an inch thick and weights a bloody ton. As couldn't hang this from the apex of the ceiling due to the enormous steel beam holding the roof up I came up with the idea of buying a shop sign hanging bracket and using that, for a rather random idea I would say it worked out pretty well.

The second light is a British made bulk head light from a munitions factory, Rich brought this nearly 2 years ago because he thought it was cool and it been waiting for its moment ever since.

But I think this is my favourite...

This lamp came from a car-boot sale in Shropshire over 20 years ago, it was bought by my Dad and used in his shed for years. When he died my Mum gave me the lamp and we kept it to one day use in our finished studio. Rich rewired it with neon yellow flex then he added the giant green switch box you can see under it. This is an on/off switch from some factory machinery which again came from a junk shop for couple of quid, it makes to most amazingly satisfying 'CLUNK' sound when you hit the button to turn the light on. I think Dad would have loved that.

Heres the boy enjoying his desk in its new home! We've had this 1940s desk for over 10 years, its probably the only bit of furtiture that we've held on to, when you where orginally looking at houses to buy I used to walk around with the desk measurments written down, if the house didnt have a space for it it was off the list.

So there we have it for now, we haven't finished by a long stretch, we still need to move my desk into the space and put shelving up but for now at least its actually starting to feel like a proper graphics studio.

Im off for a cup of tea an a nap!

So we finally got rid of our builders which means we can thankfully stop making endless bacons sandwiches and tea, the garage/studio is built, now we just have to small task of decorating and landscaping to do....shouldn't take too long right?

It's taken about 6 weeks and several false starts but we finally have the studio doors on, these where a last minuet alterations to our plans as originally we didn't think we had the budget to do double glass doors but our builders happened to mention that they had some high spec grey doors that had be ordered for another job and then the client decided they didn't like them. So we managed to bag £3000 worth of doors for £1000 fully fitted!

We also had to have the steps going down rebuilt as the hights where slightly off and I kept tripping going up them!

We have the walls of the little courtyard at the back now painted white, it was going to be rendered but again money constrains stopped this so we just painted it to match the inside of the studio.

We've also made a start on laying the reclaimed parquet flooring, I managed to score this of eBay for just £10! The slight down side is its taking bloody ages to clean off each piece ready to lay but we are really happy with how it looking...

We decided to lay it at a slight angle across the room, although the room is square (not something we are used to with our 300 year old cottage!) we just felt it would add a more modern edge to have it run at 30 degrees.

We have the stove guys booked for the end of this month which is why this corner got done first, Im soooo excited about getting the stove in, cant wait to play with it!

The sexy german gutting has also gone up which lead to this whatsapp conversation with The Mothership and Sis...

...shes very proud!

Despite how complicated looking all the parts where when in the box this was surprisingly easy to fit and look 100 times better than plastic. We have used plastic on the other side but as you cant really see it as it butts up to next door so closely we though we'd save some pennies.

We have also finally got the trench that we dug for all the electric and cat 6 cables filled in, thank god! We both kept falling in it repeatedly, I actually though Rich had broken his leg at one point but no just really bad bruising from hip to knee!

Unfortunately 3 months of soil piled high has killed quite a few plants and pretty much all the grass, as we cant now afford turf rolls we are falling back on grass seed and time. It does make the place seem a bit bleak however.

Despite everything else happening I have managed to get some veg in, Victoriana Nursery once again coming to my rescue and sending lots of parcels of lovely plants.

Im experimenting with growing beans up the fence of the chicken coop as Im not a bit pushed for space, so far so good.

So thats it for not, just a few jobs to be geeting on with...lots more scraping of parquet blocks, pouring the courtyard floor to get the correct hight, lay the pavers, steps and capping stomes, digout the garden at the top of the studio steps to make a seating area, fit out the garage, fit garage doors, wire up lighting in both garage and studio then move office in...just one or two things to do then!

By the end of this week we should (hopefully) have finished the major building work, theres still a ton of work to do, decoration, fitting lights, fitting out work benches not to mention the huge amount of re-landscaping we now have to do to get the garden back. But in all if feels like a huge achievement, this time last year we were still doodling plans on old envelopes!

Heres where we are at...

  We are super happy with the roof, the whole garage has been build to house standards so its probably way over spec for just a garage but seeing as how we will be spending a huge amount of time in the building it makes sense. We have some cool galvanised guttering going on end of the week which should look great next to the grey soffit boards.

The studio is a great space, I so glad we went for a larger door way opening though, with a normal sized door it would have felt like a cell! It was really hard to get a good pic of the space before we painted it will all the scaffolding plus it looked super dark!

As we weren't plaster boarding the walls but painting the breeze blocks we had to paint before the electrics went in as they were all surfaced mounted, this led to a few late night painting sessions as we raced the electricians!

The electrical truncking is all factory grade, so super tough which is great for the garage/workshop plus looks cool as hell! Who knew we would get so hung up on things like switches and plug sockets!

Since then it just been enless painting, if I never have to paint another breeze block wall again it will be too soon!

I managed to pick up these galvanised outdoor lights from eBay for a bargain, they will go on each end of the building.

Also from eBay is this amazingly cool Russian military lamp which we hope will go in the studio. Unlike the aluminium outdoor lamps this bastard has quarter of an inch thick explosion proof glass so it weighs a ton.

And lastly heres the stove we are hoping to have fitted, its handmade by a little firm in Wales called Chilli Penguin, these mini 2kw models are designed for yurts and garden offices so its perfect for what we need it for....plus its called a Chilli Billy, how cute is that!!

Its taken two and half weeks but the block work is finally done, there was one or two little hold up including us changing our mind at the last minuet about the hight of the courtyard wall which is the main access down to the studio/office at the back of the building. Our brickies have been superb, they done an incredibly neat job and we couldn't be more happy with it.

It looks a little bit massive and overbaring right now but Im sure will look better once all the small details are added like a roof and garage doors! Work on the roof begins tomorrow.

While this has been happening Richard I are trying to source stuff to finished the studio off, I managed to bag a bargin on ebay and got us 25 meters of parquet flooring for just £10! Just the small task of sorting it all and giving it a quick clean up. This will hopefully be the new office floor, we dont need anything like the full 25 meters so Im hoping to sell off what we dont use.

This is currently living in our kitchen while I clean it all, so no sitting at the table for a meal for us for a while!

We have being going to car boot sales and rec yards looking for lights since the start of the build, of course now I need them all the cool old lighting seems to have disappeared or shot up in price so not much luck lately. During this weeks sunday morning boot sale hunt I did pick up this coffee sack with the coolest designs on I ever seen, Im now think of making this part of a door curtain for the new studio.

I also scored some new pans, my old ones where fine (Ive had them for 11 years) but just very devode of 70s flower patterns so they are being rehomed at the local charity shop.

Its been an exciting/frustrating/pressured few weeks and I'm looking forward to everything no longer being covered in brick dust.

The last 10 day have been a bit of a blur, suddenly we have walls, lots of walls...

We decided to have both the office and the garage double skin insulated, our Brickies think this is very posh! Its apparently not something you normally do with a garage but as Rich plans to spend quite a bit of time working in there and our brilliant buildlers quoted the same for double skins as other guys quoted for single it seemed like it was worth investing in.

My easter holiday has been spend scouring ebay and the local Rec yards for lights, flooring, patio pavers and a log burning for the office. Why is it as soon as you need this stuff you cant find anything you like! Heres the light collection so far...

So all in all its going well, hopefully they will be starting the roof end of next week! Fingers crossed!

Garage progress has been somewhat slow, we ended up waiting a week for the structural engineer to come back with his calulations for reinforcing the walls to cope with the pressure of the ground on them. But things are moving again this week, the steps down to the back of the building which will be the office are being put in.

Hopefully with the good weather the concrete will dry out quickly. We need to go shopping for flag stones for the little court yard and the steps going into it next, also fencing, capping stones and parquet flooring!

So our entire world is revolving around this 9 meters of garden, I literally have no other topic of conversation at the moment!

Oh god its everywhere, everywhere! We are drowning in mud, I cant keep anything clean as the minuet you go outside to check the chickens for eggs or get wood from the log store your covered again.

It started a few weeks ago with our builders digging a big hole, which steadily got deeper and deeper, currently the hole is around 8 feet deep which was slightly more than we had accounted for, turns out they had to go down deeper to find solid ground and then get it level.

That was day one when it wasnt too deep, then day two they really went nuts...

Then much to our neighbours delight came the concrete lorries.

This was the first layer with the damp proof membrane in, they where then all set to pour the second layer when everyone realised that the retaining wall to keep all that hill (the one with the houses on) back might need to be slightly more of a serious structural affair then original anticipated. This has left us waiting for most of last week for the very nice structural engineer to come out and advise on how me make everything strong enough to stop the hill sliding down and ending up inside the garage!

While the experts where head scratching Rich and I got on with digging the trench for the electrical cable, as yet another cost saving exercise we decided to dig this ourselves as we couldn't afford the cost of a labourer to spend a week doing it. The trench has to be 60cm deep to pass regs which makes is about mid thigh height on me...never, ever again.

Of all the many shitty jobs I've had to do on houses over the years this has to have been one of the most rubbish (Rich disagrees, he thinks rewiring the house was worse...I couldn't possibly comment as I ran away to a beach in Turkey with my Mum that time!). The builders of this 300 year old cottages just dumped all the spoil and stone off cuts in what would become the gardens, so we had endless fun digging through 60 cm of compacted stone and clay, we found tones of broken pottery, animal bones and old sewers, general in the rain and wind.

So my lovely garden no longer exists, I how just have a variety of mud mounds. The added thrill of a 60 cm drop next to our pretty narrow path had Rich slightly worried about the postie and milkman so we had to go buy site safety tape as hes worried someone will fall in, break an ankle and sue us. The cat has repeatably fallen in but so far not taken legal action...I can only assume because of the tape!

Hopefully work will commence again this week with the second layer of concrete and the electrician laying the cables in the trench so we can fill it all back in.

So not much else has happened as I now only have enough space in my brain for this but I did get a lovely parcel of fabric from Rich's auntie Lesley in Australia which should help me get my massive patchwork door curtain finally finished off.

Also I got these plates in our local charity shop a few weeks ago, they are my new favourite, every meal taste better eaten off a psychedelic cow.

I also signed up with Abel and Cole for their British Veg Box, I figured as we have concreted a third of our property I might struggle to find enough space to grow potatoes so now they will instead be delivery every few weeks in a nice box by a very cheerful delivery driver who is apparently 'looking forward to seeing your project develop', yep me too!

So I've been a bit quiet on here for a few months, mostly because Rich and I have been tied up with planning and organising our next big house project. We had up until last week an old 1950s garage at the bottom of our garden nearest our access lane, it been slowly falling apart since we bought the house over 6 years ago, the plan has always been to knock it down and try to replace it with something. End of last summer we submitted planning and after an agonising wait finally got it! So heres the render we submitted...

Its a simple long building pretty much like our neighbour has, is going to contain a large workshop for Rich and an art studio in the back for us to use, meaning we can move our office out of the house but still be able to work from home.

So last week was spent 3 days taking the old garage down, which meant fun with a kango hammer!

Our builders are due to start tomorrow and hoping to get the base finished by next week. We are really excited to finally get this project started, it feels like it been a really long time coming, Rich in particular has put in a huge number of hours so far, he did all the plans himself which saved us a lot but was quite a big learning curve!

So most of this year will revolve around getting this building up and fitted out, as ever we are on a tight budget so will be look at how we can fit both spaces out for as little as possible but still keeping them looking good. We will also be trying to make as much use as possible of any waste, we saved three quarters of the concrete blocks from the old garage to reuse as a retaining wall which Rich will build. We saved all the old wood that came from the old garage, the door frame, lintel and roof timbers, these have all been cut up for our log burner, we'll also be saving any waste wood including pallets from landfill once the build starts. In the long term we have some ideas about fitting this building out with solar panels but that might have to wait a few years!

As part of hooking the garage up to the house electrics we also have the pleasure of having to dig a deep trench for the cable all the way from the house down to the garage, all 50 meters of it! Part of the prep for this has meant removing part of our box hedge up by the house something I've been considering for a while anyway as it will gives us more room on our little patio.

Once the plants are moved we can open up the trench, although our local badger has already made a start by digging some pretty big holes in this since this pic was taken!

So some more back breaking days ahead but hopefully it will all be worth it in the end! Exciting times!

Wow it's been a weird year... on the one hand at a personal level we have managed to get most of the things done that we wanted do and on the other hand the world at large seems to be doing its best to try to rip itself apart. Frankly the last 6 months simply switching on the news has left us both exhausted and pretty depressed, however we have gone on with things same as everyone else and tried hard to find hope where we can.

So here's my happy list for the last year, mostly just to prove to myself that it hasn't been all crap!

We finally switched to a 100% green energy supplied for our gas and electric and when EDF rang to ask us the reason why we switched and would we consider coming back, telling the nice girl on the phone that I didn't want my hard earned cash funding something as stupid as Hinkly Point C nuclear power plant that they are building down  the road when they should be investing in renewables ( to which she replied 'ok fair point').

Finally after years of waiting getting some chickens, apart from the occasional escape and having to build a better fence to keep them out of the neighbours veg garden they turned out to be pretty easy and a lot of fun to look after. I'm now considering expanding the flock.

Getting long running jobs finally finished, such as a new bath panel and sorting the lighting in the kitchen out, small but annoying jobs that needed finishing up.

We have managed to stick with the vegetarian thing since May, we even had a veggie Christmas! This has saved money and been much healthier for us both.

After months of hard work on Richs part we managed to get planning permission for our new workshop/studio we hope to be building in 2017, this will totally change the way we will be able to work and give us much needed space in our cottage back. Rich worked for months on the plans which were signed off  a few months ago, now we just need to fine a builder who doesn't pull out at the 11th hour!

Also a friend posted a link to this list of 99 reasons that 2016 was a good year, so if you need a little lift this evening take a look, it definitely made me feel a bit better about the world we live in.

I hope you all have a peaceful and happy New Year, lets all work together to make 2017 a nicer place to be!