Three Posts in One

In Search of Narnia

Cave houses often throw up the odd surprise now and then, especially if they are quite old, and have not been fully reformed; our cave house is no exception. Early in our renovation scheme, when we were digging the channels for the new electrics we found two alcoves in two different rooms. I had hoped that we might find more rooms; I guess that is the kid in me. However the two alcoves that we found were of reasonable size so we opened them up, and cleared out the rubble that lay behind them. I have been told that it was common practise to close up rooms that were no longer needed and therefore not used. I can imagine that once the family had flown the nest, the parents would have had no need for the extra rooms, and from a practical point of view, it would have cut down on the cleaning.

The alcove that we found in the room which is going to become our bar, will house the cooler for the beer pumps, and a fridge for ice and mixers, not forgetting the lovely terracotta beakers that I have found. Placed in the ice box they are nice for beer and cold drinks, and seem to have the ability to keep drinks far cooler than glasses, which have been placed in the ice box.

The alcove that we opened up in my mother’s room is a useful addition to he walk in wardrobe, which we have now finished, although I was gutted when the alcove did not in fact go to Narnia. I have rummaged around behind the clothes hanging in the wardrobe to no avail. We have decided not to tile the floor and mother asked that we paint it green, like grass. We were originally going to put a curtain across the doorway to the wardrobe, but mother decided that a roller plain blind would be nice. She has a light coloured roller blind in place, and she intends to cut out four window sections and stitch in clear vinyl so that it looks like a window and hang drapes at either side. I think she misses a window in her room, not one to look out of just to look at.

A Terrace to Die For

The terrace had become a bit of a bone of contention for us, and we envisaged that it was going to take far more work than we had expected. The main problem being that it was now on more than one level, partly because of the building work that had taken place and partly because we changed our mind about the tiles. The original tiles, although lovely were just not man enough for the job, and we really should have seen this from the start, however these are the mistakes that we were supposed to make in order for us to become wiser !

Our young group of musicians actually helped to lay the first section, albeit not dead flat, but hey this is rustic. ‘Im indoors’ has battled on with the rest of the terrace and the little problems that it has thrown up, and I have to announce it is nearly finished……whoo hoo. We just have the edge tiles to lay, which should be happening this evening when it is cooler, they are all cut an ready to go in place.

I am quite impressed with my other half, as he has shown a certain level of determination with the terrace project, staying out in all sorts of weather to complete a row. However the effects on his body have been grave. Scuffed knees that would make coarse grade sandpaper look smooth, fat fingers and fat toes where they have been hit by mallets and paving slabs, premature grey hair which was the combination of dust from the grinder and stress, and last but not least, the inability to stand upright due to tilers back syndrome.

This is most certainly going to be ‘A Terrace to Die For’……almost

Going on the Rails

Kitchens can never be too big and can never have too much storage areas. My kitchen was designed to be big, and the heart of the home. It is big and airy and just has base units. I did not want wall mounted units, firstly I am somewhat vertically challenged, so reaching wall cupboards, has always been the bane of my existence. Wall cupboards always collect dust and grime on the top which constantly has to be cleaned, again for some of my stature this is not desirable. I do have lots of base units, 6 doubles, 1 single and two drawer units, but I also have a lot of kitchen bits and bobs. I have a lot of hanging things, like kitchen implements and it is always a pain having to trot back and forth to find things when in the middle of some culinary masterpiece.

I decided that rails with s shaped hooks would be perfect, allowing me to hang my precious bits and bobs where I needed them and could reach them. I found a rack unit in Lidl which was reasonably priced, this had two rails and stainless steel racks for kitchen roll, cooking foil, coffee filters and another random shelf. Sadly I managed to pick the only rack set that did not have the rail mountings or the hooks, and I frankly could not be arsed to drive for 2 hours to exchange it. Looking around the local furry terrier I found brackets to mount the rails, more rails, and the s shaped hooks. In all now I have 6 rails in various locations in my kitchen. All of my kitchen tools are right at hand and my little coffee cups are displayed above my coffee machine. So I am now a happy little bunny, and nothing is going off the rails, most definitely going on the rails !

Next Up.....The finished terrace, Maybe a roof!! And Pan Hanging........