Dining room - Pilgrim's parlour

After much deliberation, the dining room is done. This was a fairly easy task in the grand scheme of it all and the cost was extremely low. All of which made a very welcome change!

When I bought this place this was one of the rooms that really swung it for me. Before I'd even looked around the house, Mum & I peered through the window, saw the stone window seat and the massive fireplace and pretty much knew whatever state the house was in, I was going to take a risk and buy it! Annoyingly I don't have many photos of us doing this room, as life was hugely busy whilst we were doing it, but some of the damp snaps will give you an idea of what we were against.

The floor was just plain concrete, so we carried the large patio slabs we used in for the kitchen on through this room. Whilst it was a biggish and fairly tedious task, Dean got this put down quickly. I found a lovely tulip wood and iron shoe lasts step made by a local craftsman, which solved the problem of the massive step up into the sitting room. The end wall was really damp, as is standard with this house, the outside is rendered, the inside was part render, part blobs of concrete and part plaster, just slapped onto the stone on the inside walls. A recipe for damp disaster! The edges of the ceiling all needed re boarding and plastering, this included scribing the board to the stone, and the external/internal wall needed re plastering. This may or may not last, as I have an old downpipe which I suspect may be causing a problem. I need to think about taking that down and rerendering the place where it has come down at some point.

Before Christmas last year I patch plastered the end walls and painted over them a beautiful dark blue. Just to last until we got round to properly sorting them. I did think I was going to replaster these walls properly, but again as I seem to have a habit of doing, once we'd ripped the plaster off I fell in love with the stone walls! So here we go again with a stone cleaning, repointing exercise...hell, but so worth it and with the added bonus of sorting out a massive area of damp, and enhancing the huge fireplace. We had to take the burner out sadly as it was very broken, leaking smoke and had no liner. Thankfully being summer (albeit a British one) we're not missing it too much at the moment. I will save up and get another one at some point and have it installed properly ,but that's for another day. In an ideal world this will happen before Christmas, but we'll have to see how finances and other priorities pan out first. The bonus is with a better roof, an insulated kitchen, new front door and less damp it may be far less chilly this winter.

I now have three large shelves across the back wall - I think you can never have too much storage to display 'bits', when you are obsessed with dead people's tat - think of the stories these things could tell! Two of the shelves are rough sanded, stained scaffold planks, the other one across the top of the fireplace ,is a lovely piece of planed wood (not sure what type) that I was given by a friend. It had been in her shed for years, but she's never got round to using it. It has a large not hole in it, which I like...and fits a wine glass in it perfectly if you're tall enough to reach it...or drink standing on a chair!

I was obsessed with my dark blue walls, as the colour was just so rich and beautiful and a bit rock, so instead the large back wall is now a deep velvety matt blue..mmmm xx At the risk of sounding terribly middle aged it also sets off my collection of charity shop blue and white china and 50's pressed glass cake stands. All stacked on my Nanny's dresser, which I painted with Annie Sloan chalk paints. Haha I did actually just say that didn't I!?

The house can be quite dark, and as I'm an avid painter I had to think carefully about lights. As we have a dining room table (another find I painted up, from the Forest of Dean furniture recycling place), I thought pendant lights might be nice. I found the lights on a site on the internet, at a much reduced price. They're the metal, industrial, skeleton cage type, so give of loads of light, although they do leave you a bit snow blind if you look right at them!! Dave shortened them to a good height. Winner.

I have put some of my pictures back up, but not quite finished that yet. I will also make a door curtain from some stunning Sanderson fabric I have, so that should help with keeping the place a bit more toasty.

So, apart from a few bits that take cash and time (neither of which I have much of right now), the dining room is as good as done...oh...one day I'll  blank off the radiator and put a new window in, but not yet!! However, it looks blooming gorgeous and is a pretty relaxed space, with the usual sprinkling of taxidermy and quirk. Being open plan leading on from the kitchen, it also puts to rest the blue and green should never be seen...they look great together!!!

Finished - my gorgeous dining room!

Tulip and shoe last step - great place to shove the kids school shoes under too!

Monty the barbers chair from Jess and Clive - spot how bad the damp walls were

When the room was still very damp and a makeshift kitchen

My delicious blue wall

Lovely light giving lights and my blue and white crockery

Room of Doom, ongoing small time renovation - or could it be almost finished??

The room of doom, has been something of a long drawn out process, and continues to be. Its a room that's an indulgence rather than a necessity, which means its way down the list. Now that sounds really decadent, the kids and I have always lived a little bit squished, but managed really well. I've never been in the position of having more than enough room, now I am lucky enough to have an 'extra' room....it's very surreal.

Saying that, it was the worst room in the house, so has been quite a lot of work just getting it to a position that water wasn't running down the walls when it rained! I look at like my DIY practice room I suppose...it couldn't get any worse. I've not written about this room since last November, not too much more has happened, but I thought a little up date was due.

*Edit* this may be a bigger update as we've actually cracked on with this room now, I'm currently sat in it, after an insane week in the hospice where I work. Lots of visitors, lots of very poorly people, and ending in me making a lifesize galvanised wire ballerina for a patient! The fire is lit (yes, I know it's June) and I have a cold prosecco with strawberries in it, on the go!

You may remember, this room was my first lesson in repointing. I absolutely detest getting to the point where you are ready to repoint, but I actually quite like the repointing part. So that part is done, Dave rebuilt the hole in the fireplace, so I repointed that. Dean sorted the knackered ceiling and built me a pretty louvre doored cupboard under the stairs. That is a fabulous addition as it gives me somewhere to squirrel away crap like the hoover. The plug sockets were moved off the stone walls over to the plastered walls and the skirting boards were reattached. I spent hours then painting it. 3 white walls and one warm grey wall. We then put up a little floating shelf and Razmus, my beautiful taxidermy crow, along with a golden pineapple, a vintage egg timer and a collection of vintage ebony mirrors...the necessary things in any room!

There are still a few things that need doing, I'd like to change the light at some point. The floor needs doing, that will be floorboards, but that's on the 'do it before Christmas if I have any money' list, the final broken red bricks around the fireplace need addressing. I'm not sure what to do with those just yet though. I also have to think what to do with my hundreds of books. I have lots of really beautiful and interesting books, they may go into the red shed when that's done, however I like to have them to hand. I use lots of them for my artist job, so I need them close by, but I'm desperately trying to avoid cluttering every single available space in my house...something that really goes against my eclectic/ hoarding/curious nature.

So all in all, it's a pretty cute, livable room, cosy and very chilled. Oh, and the long Chesterfield sofa folds out to a double bed, so it's an awesome guest room for when my adorable friend Kate comes over and we get over excited and drink too much! xx

Terribly damp walls and odd bastardized headless dragon lampshade!

More damp, before stripping off the shot plaster

Repointing midway through 

Rebuilt wall section

Little french Rosieres burner in

Right side of room

Left side of room

Kitchen renovation done - I'm cooking on gas!!

The kitchen is 99.9% complete, and this time we are ahead of our predicted time scale. After the bathroom took 18 months, I was a bit stressed that living without a kitchen for the same length of time would make me crack. Don't get me wrong, I've managed before, but that was without the kids. There is only so far a microwave, toaster and camping stove can take you, before you want to explode and let me tell you, that wont be from over eating!!

Dave, Dean and I have worked hard on this room, pretty much every weekend and Dean has been doing bits of the hard building work in the week also. After a false start with damp proofing (and me panicking), we got to it again and it came together quickly. Like all of the projects in this house, I am trying to do them well, so there isn't any false economy long term, however I am skint, so it's about, recycling, reusing and being a bit inventive sometimes! The whole kitchen has been around £4k, that includes a new window and flooring (I bought a job lot of end of range patio slabs - they have also done the dining room and will do the red shed too), which I have saved long and hard for. So that's me stony broke now!

I got cabinets and doors from eBay, and the couple I bought them from were also selling a dishwasher (that's a bloody revelation) and the posh Smeg fridge, so I bought the lot for £450. That saved a fortune, and meant I could buy a new window. I had loads of things like plumbing bits, a tap and was given an old butlers sink - mind you sorting the plumbing for that was a bit of a task. I also had some old school science lab tables that Mum found on eBay, which we used for the worktops. The bits that really cost the money was the wood - it's bloody extortionate(!), and the extra kitchen cabinet bits and pieces. I wanted to use every bit of space I could, as well as I could.....and Oh My God...I have a built in larder, with a light that comes on when I open the door and everything...Ive come of age! I have loads of lovely kitchenalia, that Ive hoarded from brocantes and charity shops over the years, so thankfully I didn't need any new stuff there. None of it matches, but I love that, it also meant I could go for basic kitchen colours and funky it us with all my important and beautiful tat! This post is more of an overview to show how the kitchen has turned out, I wont bore you with the minutiae, but suffice to say, I blooming love it...I've even baked some dust free cakes!

Kitchen before - after the ceiling collapsed, the final straw!

Kitchen after - just beautiful!

Old worktop, cupboard and electrics

New (second hand) cupboards being painted

Old window and walls

New window and new sink (and Osiris)

Indoor patio laid!

Indoor patio grouted

Graffiti on the science lab worktops - the Devil is in the detail!

Outside of my beautiful larder

Inside my beautiful larder

Warning to the kids!!!

Dishwasher curtain I made from vintage French fabric I had

American tin tile knife rack we made

Posh fridge

Scaffold plank shelves

Laden scaffold plank shelves!

Kitchen fireplace - It's so hot!

You'll have to forgive if the next two posts are repetitive. I havn't posted for over a month, as every spare minute (which isn't many), has been taken up with either work or renovations!

The kitchen fireplace as you may remember turned into a much bigger task than I could have envisaged, however it was completely worth it. I never did find any witch marks, shoes or dead cats up there, but I did manage to get a cooker in there (well the boys did)!

By all accounts, moving the original lintel back in to place was a nightmare ...I was thrown out while they did this. Dean and Dave both were both walking like old men due to groin strain (hahaha) and the air was blue, but it was in and they both survived thankfully! The large stone lintel would now only be cosmetic as we had to use two concrete lintels behind to add reinforcement and structure to the new space. However, as Ive said previously, I think using original features as much as possible is important in old properties to maintain their character. I kept changing my mind about the brick pillars Dave built to put it on.  I bought bricks I thought I liked, then decided I didn't, so ended up painted them. It actually looks great as it lightens up the fireplace and really shows off the stone. I also found out how amazing priming the brick properly before painting them is. As they are internal brick pillars I didn't have to worry about damp or any of the things I have to do with the old Forest stone (or st'n, as they say in the Varrrest) so it can breath. Meaning the paint went on like a dream.

The kitchen chimney unfortunately was blocked off many years ago. Clive found all sorts of rubble jammed down there when he did the roof. So whilst cosmetically it is beautiful, I would never have functioned (not without £1000's being spent). So we blocked it off, but left some breathing holes, so we didn't get dust falling down into the cooking. I cleaned the stones off and gave them a dose of breathable sealant (doesn't sound like it should work as it cancels each other out but it does)!

The gas pipe had to be moved and the electrics re sited, so that was a little costly, however it gave us the advantage of being able to put the cooker further back and gain some space.

Due to all of the building work, and despite being covered, when it came to moving the cooker back I unwrapped it and it was fetid! I'm not a clean freak, but after all that work, I was NOT putting a rancid cooker back in place. The only other time Ive properly cleaned a cooker was 12 years ago, when I was nesting, just before having my twins....it's a vile job and should only be tackled in extreme circumstances in my opinion. This was extreme! I was very kindly given the range cooker - a Smeg - something I could only dream of, by my friend Nicky, after the cooker I had turned out to be a death trap. So I'm looking after it very carefully!It took four hours of scrubbing to give it a deep clean, so it looked all lovely and sparkly ready for its new home.

I think you'll agree, it was absolutely worth every step of this nightmare!!!

Fire place before - original lintel was painted black

Drilled right back and lintel removed

Acro propped with reinforcing concrete lintel

Brick pillars and lintel back in place

Painted bricks and treated stone

Tadaaaaah.....Finished fireplace space with sparkly Smeg in place!

Kitchen stud work and key features progress

The past week has been slower with the kitchen, but that was after 3 days solid work on it. There was much more basic structural work that needed doing than we anticipated. Four lintels and two acro props later we were ready to add the stud work to the walls.

Now, I love exposed stonework, but it's not for the fainthearted. Cleaning it off is hell, repointing it is hell, then using a breathable resin to 'seal' the stones is awful AND expensive. The pay-off is stunning brickwork. However, too much in my humble opinion can feel oppressive, so offsetting it with light airy painted damp proofed walls works very well. As I've said before, I want to renovate the house sympathetically. Its stood for 150+ years and I hope will stand for a lot longer. It has history, so I want to work with the beautiful features it offers. Hence the stud work.

The fireplace space will be open, the old stone lintel being a feature, I bought some lovely Cotswold rustic coloured bricks yesterday to reinforce the old columns that the lintel sat on. They're a light yellow ochre colour, I chose those rather than a standard red brick and we'll use white cement. I hope it will add to the light in the kitchen and lift the colours rather than dulling it down as the flooring will be darker flagstones. Dave has concreted the bottom of the fireplace so it's now level, in preparation for the flooring and building of the new lintel columns. The gas man has moved and refitted the gas pipe for the cooker (we still don't have that up and running - feeding a family with no cooker has just ground to a halt). I'm debating whether to bother repointing the fireplace stones behind as I will be painting the space white anyway to add light. I might just give it all a really good clean instead, then paint on top.

Dean spent three days working solidly, measuring planning, damp proofing and studding out the walls. This proved easier said than done as I keep changing my mind about the finished design of the kitchen. Truthfully, I don't have one. I have a vague idea, but finances and practicality will ultimately win over. I know I want a rustic look and have some beautiful things to put in, but Christ knows, where or how it will all fit together!

So, that's where we are up to now. I'll leave you with some progress pictures.

stud work and fireplace space

Right side of room stud work

Gas pipe refitted and floor concreted

Make shift sink, and left side of room stud work 

When things go wrong....

Measure twice and cut once...that's the DIYers mantra. Simple enough you'd think? Problem is you have to get the places where you take your measurements from right, otherwise no matter how many times you measure it will be wrong!
Sadly I discovered this not too long ago.

I'm a doer, we've established that. I'm also fairly impatient, and sometimes a bit crap at taking advice. Generally I'm fairly logical too, but sometimes this all goes out of the window!

In the room of doom we still haven't finished installing the flue pipes for the little French burner. I'd bought all of the parts by now to convert the flue from a 90 degree 4 inch, way up to a 6 inch and Clive had dropped the liner in. So I figured it couldn't be too hard to just slot it all together, cement it up and hey presto, c'mon babey light my fire! How wrong I was!

Firstly the fits were ok, except for one piece which was a little tight. Dave sorted that one. The rest slotted in nicely, but were very heavy so wouldn't cement adequately (I have ordered some adjustable stove wall brackets and more cement for this now). I also had to cut the liner to get the adaptor on at the right, as measured, height. Or what I thought was the right height....

After much ado and having to remove a cosmetic lintel, I had only gone and angle ground it nearly 2 whole inches out!! The liner wouldn't reach even with the adaptor, noooooooooooooo! To say I was annoyed with myself would be a massive understatement. I'd not allowed for the depth of the liner collar when I cut. School boy error to say the least.

Anyway, I had two choices, hope I could find a smaller adaptor, or build up the hearth. Thankfully after a little trawling the internet I found a 75 mm x 5 inch collar adaptor and ordered that. I'm hoping that will give me more than enough length. As soon as the wall brackets arrive I will psyche myself up to have another go and most importantly, learn from my mistakes!!

"Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes." Oscar Wilde. 

Lime mortar and snot

Whilst the boys were busy doing the heavy stonework in the kitchen, I decided I would get on with doing the new lime mortar in the room of doom. Having finished my nemesis of mortar raking out the old lime at the end of the week and cleaned the stone up, this was the next step for the exposed stone wall.
I cant pretend using lime didn't mildly bother me, I had visions of the lime turning my flesh into a seething, fizzing mess of decomposition. It didn't, but I have had a spot outbreak (so unfair aged 40 something), split my nails , dried my hair out and gave me an itchy rash on my back. The other joyous side effect seems to be that I may have an allergy to it. My nose was running constantly and my tongue swelled up, despite wearing a mask! Two days on and my nostrils are peeling and I'm still very snotty. It's brutal bloody stuff...or have I just got a cold...who knows!

Jenks used to be a builder by trade, so after me watching several YouTube videos on how to apply mortar, he also gave me a quick lesson. The lime mortar we used was a ready mix version, so was dryer than expected, however it was pretty easy to do once I got started and had the right tools for the job:
A decent bucket.
Gloves (loads of pairs of the disposable ones)
A stiff brush
A softer brush
6 inch pointing trowel.

I managed to do the entire wall in two days! It looks lovely and has lightened the room right up. I still have to install the flue for the fireplace after my mini disaster, then I can rebuild the bits that need repairing. I will also need to clean off the red bricks on the surround, they have concrete on then so are a much harder job. Then I need to give the stones a quick clean and seal them with a breathable sealant (which is REALLY expensive)!! One step closer, and one of the worst jobs Ive had to do so far done!

Mortar raking done. It really is THE worst job ever!

Dusty as a dusty thing.

The stone wall before mortar raking

After mortar raking

Repointed

The wall is repointed, but the flue still needs to be joined up.

Fireplace and floor reinforcements!

After discovering the fireplace went further back than I first thought and subsequently pulling all of the stone out, we had another quandary. If we could get the cooker further back it would buy us more kitchen space, 5 inches all round, which when you consider how much will be in the kitchen plus the 3 inches we are losing all round to add stud walls, is quite a lot of space. The problem was, there was no lintel holding up the sides of the fireplace, and the end beam needed reinforcing. Risking at worst, a collapse at best the bathroom sagging. We could afford neither of these issues and the trusty acro prop couldn't be there forever.

The other reinforcement we needed was a lintel across the internal kitchen to room of doom door, the original beams only had about three millimeters to sit on, which, when you consider the weight of the bath upstairs was a bit of a worry!

Last Saturday Dean came over with three new lintels ready to start building these in. I was terrified it may all collapse, but with some gentle but brutal drilling out, chocking and logic, he got them all in without too much drama. Dave mixed concrete, Jenks placed bets, and I got on with lime mortaring the wall in the room of doom...keeping out of the way. All this to a backdrop of Motorhead and Zion Train, billions of cups of tea and pasties from the Crusty Loaf in town. We're a good team when we get going, and despite knowing each other for over 25 years we are all still very good mates. It also gives Clive a rest as he has grafted on the house for the last 18 months and has his own new exciting projects on. Although, it doesn't get him off the hook as this is a lifetime project!!

Ultimately we will reinstate the beautiful old lintel that was in the kitchen as a statement, but first we have to rebuild up the sides of the new (old) fireplace. Dean has reinforced the top of the fireplace. This part will be covered so we recycled the strongest bricks we had for this. Dave has prepped the space up, but is taking a well earned rest for a few days to let his back, arms, and hands recover from drilling out some of the remaining stones so the gas man could get in and re site the cookers gas pipe. I need to take a trip to Hales, the local builders merchants to get some sand and frame ties before the weekend. Never a dull moment!

Today is Shrove Tuesday, we don't have a cooker the cooker back in yet, so I've left pancake supplies at Mum and Dad's for tonight. They make much nicer pancakes than I do anyway according to the kids! xx

New lintel and reinforced wall above the fireplace.

Ceilings and wires

After the weekend of destroying the kitchen, the next step was to start at the top. This meant insulation, checking upstairs plumbing, electric cables, and boarding out the ceiling. As you can imagine, the ceiling was not level and if we attempted to get it so, we'd be here forever. So Dave and Dean added wood to the joists, this gave some extra support as well as getting the ceiling as flat as possible to avoid bending or splitting the plasterboard.

Some of the plumbing from the bathroom needed lifting up so that the ceiling could be made level, so that took more time than anticipated, especially as it meant widening a hole in the wall.

Dave and Dean then pulled the multitude of messy wiring through. They unraveled, capped off and generally made sense of what was up there, so that it would be ready when we add in sockets and lights. Dave set to work with adding the insulation and did a fab job with batons to keep it in place (it has made a difference already). Dean made a massive jigsaw puzzle from plasterboard ready to get the ceiling up. I made tea....until it came to using the auto-feed screwdriver. Ooooh, now thats a nice bit of kit. I did get over excited and pulled the trigger too early once or twice, but it was fun and when I messed it up we just pulled the screw out put in another! It made drilling the plasterboard up SO much easier. By the end of the day I had 2 kitchen lights and an insulated plasterboard ceiling up. Dave and I were also £20 down, we all decided to have a couple of bets, but won nothing. Jenks won £300, Dean also won nothing, and made us all laugh by walking off proclaiming it a mugs game!!

We worked till quite late that day as we all wanted this job finished. It's tough going sometimes, but working with old friends makes it so much more fun!

Wires and reinforcement

Adding insulation

The start of the old chimney, to give you an idea of the scale

Two lights and plasterboard up!!