New Year

Hi.

As many of you have pointed out, I haven’t blogged in a long time. I haven’t worked in a long time, so you’re not missing much. If truth be told, this is all so much harder than I anticipated that I have been barely able to face it some days. December was my month off, which bled into January a bit. I burnt out pretty seriously during the building of the frame, so a month of holing up next to a warm fire and NOT THINKING ABOUT IT AT ALL was very theraputic.

However, I do need to get on with it, as walls are scheduled to be built in late March and they need a roof to cover them. Ben has returned and is, as before, an absolute blessing: pleasant to work with, knowledgeable and skilled. But we are still taking it a bit slow, not working in the wind and rain, etc. I am dying for spring. Earlier this week we had a beautiful, sunny, windless day. It was so lovely.

So thanks for all messages of support and “when are you going to blog?!” and soforth. Please do come visit me if you can. Meanwhile here are a few pictures of the last few days.

St. Antony, who has done more than any other single person to help me with this project, once again took the prize by donating all the old double-glazed units from the house he tore down.

We popped them out, stacked them in his van, and now I just need to audit them and design frames for them.

Helene came back for a visit, on her way north to graduate with an MA in Building Conservation from York. It was lovely to see her and have her help nailing in joist hangers.

We’re mainly intalling floors right now, some permanent and some temporary so that we have someplace to walk while we’re putting up rafters, stacked in the foreground below.

Tomorrow Bob is going to help us rig up some ropes and harnesses to help us not fall to our deaths at any point during the roofing. Thanks Bob.

And Jack had his first wander upstairs. He liked it fine until something got dropped, and then panicked because he couldn’t find a way down. I rescued him and carried him down a ladder on my shoulder like a fireman.