After 6 months of hard work in all types of weather we can now report that the work on the roof is at last completed!!!! It’s been a long hard slog and we had to stop work for a while recently when we returned to the UK, my aunt, lost her battle against cancer and we returned for the funeral. I’d also spent a few weeks on and off traveling back to the UK to spend some time with her just before she went into LOROS and again whilst she was in there for her last few weeks. It’s not been easy for us and I really miss her – not being able to phone her in the evenings and update her on what we’ve been doing each day and just having a general natter. At least she is now at peace and I hope looking down on us and supervising our work from above.
We’ve now started on the work inside of the old mill above what is now the garage. We’ve installed 4 new windows and rendered and put the finishing white render on the upper part of the external walls at the back of the house (the old mill section). Over the last 2 days we’ve been knocking through from the mill to the main house and now we are able to walk through to our new section (much easier than climbing a ladder and crawling in through a gap which will eventually be filled with glass blocks!).
We are now building internal walls in our new section of the house and installing new doorways. It seems to be coming on quite well now and we are thankful that the work has moved indoors as the weather has been a little on the hot side (40 – 44 degrees C!). We had a bit of a thunderstorm the other night which helped to cool the air down a little. Luckily we get a nice fresh breeze most evenings which helps to cool things down a little but we have been seeing temperatures of 30 degrees in the house! Thankfully we’ve fitted ceiling fans which certainly help us sleep at night (also reminds us of our years living in sunny South Africa!). There’s still a long way to go before we can move our lounge and bedroom furniture into the new section but fingers crossed we’ll be in there before Christmas and the cold weather arrives. We are going to install a log burner in our new lounge and the heat from that should keep us nice and toastie over the winter period – having new windows that actually close and seal properly will also be a big help! We’ll keep you posted on progress.
We’ve been keeping track of the recent bad weather in the UK (and experiencing it first hand whilst we were visiting a few weeks back) and can’t believe the amount of flooding that has occurred – especially at this time of the year. Just hope the sun comes out for everyone in the UK during August so you can enjoy some Summer! Failing that there are always the cheap flights out to sunny Spain!
It’s fiesta time here in Pinos del Valle in a couple of weeks time (14 – 17 August) and we’re looking forward to all the action! Hopefully this year we’ll be more adjusted to staying up later and will manage to get along to some of the late night festivities. We’re looking forward to the firework display again this year – last years was very impressive.
Well that’s about all for now – hope you all manage to enjoy whatever Summer you manage to get.
Hasta luego