Kitchen being fitted.

With the kitchen floor being completed just in time the kitchen arrived ready to be fitted. There were a few grumbles from the team as they lugged the kitchen over the footbridge and into the cottage. I think the 140Kg range cooker was the most testing.

They team left the fitter to get on with the job and what a great job he's doing.
This morning the tiling took place and it is starting to come together.

Still some work to do yet but below is a reminder of what this looked like around this time last year.

Kitchen Floor just in time

The kitchen is due to be fitted and cannot be put off anymore now. Before it can be done the floor needs to be sorted out.

The picture above is the floor with the leveling compound down, there is a slight slope from south to north but this is the best we could get it. They started to lay the tiles and it became very apparent that the walls are not square!

It was a messy job but the larger tiles really worked.

Just a short update but watch this space as the kitchen is now being fitted.

Fireplaces almost there now.

There has been a lot of work going over the past 2 weeks but not a lot to show for it. The fireplaces have come on lots this week so I thought I should update you all. Remember the old fireplace.

The stove was removed and sold on eBay. We chipped away plaster and found the old arch and that was shown in an earlier blog. I lifted the marble insets and this is how it looked.

The bricks were blackened and chipped so needed to be replaced. The front room was the same so the centre wall was removed and propped to stop the breasts falling.....I know sounds a bit rude!

This is looking from the front room, you can see why we considered having a double fronted stove.

They now look like this and are ready for the york stone hearths to be put in.

Stoves are ordered and we're looking forward to seeing them in place.

The hedge from hell

The hedge has been a something we have been putting off for a while now. It was about 12 tall and over 20 feet tall in places where trees were growing in it.

This is an old picture but it shows the hedge height.  My dad offered to come over and help with the job as various people have been overheard complaining about the state of the hedge.

So boy's toys at the ready (chainsaw and hedge trimmer). I started to hack at the branches with the loppers to start with and then the hedge trimmer, larger branches required the chainsaw. With most of the branches falling onto the path we had to make sure we didn't fell anything as people walked past......and it must be the busiest path in Northwich. As I hacked my dad dragged the branches into the garden.

The garden was almost full of branches after 2 days of cutting. Then Dave, one of the neighbours, said "throw some over to fill the gaps in my hedge" so we did. Thanks Dave, you saved us quite a bit of work.

After 3 days we have got it under control from the gate to the bridge, still more to go though. And this is all that is left of the branches:

New Fangled Thermal Store Thing!

Today the Thermal Store has arrived, these are relatively new and hopefully will provide the hot water and heating soultion all in one.  It is about 6 feet tall and will hold 250 litres of water. This will weigh about 300Kg when full which is why we needed the double beams.

As you can see the stairs have been removed now so Ben the plumber had to get it up the ladder to fit it into place.  It has coils where the hot water from the wood burner will heat the store. This then transfers heat to the hot water and heating coils. There is another coil that can be connected to a solar thermal unit (we hope to fit next year).  The back up is an electric immersion heater which we hope to connect to solar PV to power next year.

Here it is sat in the cupboard next to where the shower enclosure will be.

Stairs!!!

Today started very well with me helping the joiner to fit the staircase. It started off with the first winder going in.

This was then adjusted, propped and leveled before the bottom section was fitted.

All looking good we took a lunch break and then fitted the second flight onto the winder.  This was quite fiddly but we propped it and glued it into place.

We then lifted the second winder into place and ......IT DID NOT FIT! They had not taken the corballed brick course into account.  We called the joinery company and left a very curt message.  So all this wait for stairs and they don't fit!  We did laugh about it, well as we said no-one died.

Bathroom space now complete

With the floor now in the next job was to get the stud wall in place. Without the stairs everything had to be carried up the ladder.

It was all looking good until Phil (the project manager) noticed it was 20mm out of place as the joiner had forgotten to take the plaster board into account.  So it had to be moved.

The small plinth is where the hot water store will sit, it will weigh around 300 Kg when full so needs to be strong. This was what the delay was all about.

We can now measure up the floor and decide what will fit into the bathroom.

A bathroom floor at last

Not much has been going on over the past couple of weeks, but we now have a bathroom floor in place. The bathroom is going to be where the stairwell used to be.

All the beams apart from the 3 shown in the photo above were taken out as these were sound there was no point in removing them. We were left like this for a few weeks as the floor layout was quite complicated due to getting the position of the thermal store correct.

Further beams were put in including a double joist to cope with the 300Kg weight of the store and for the stairs to hang off it.

There was then a conversation about floor boards or plywood, and as you can see we went for ply.

Hopefully we will have stairs soon.

Carbon neutral fuel!

I know it's the height of summer and tempertures are touching 30C but it's time to start thinking about the winter and how we are going to heat the house. Hopefully by the end of October we will have the wood burner and multifuel burner installed and connected to the central heating and hot water.

The garden has needed quite serious pruning including trees like this one in the hedge between our's and next door's garden.

Working with Steve from next door, he attached a rope and I pulled as he got to work with the chainsaw. After dodging the falling tree it fell into the garden.

Julian popped into the garden this morning to ask how things were going as he'd heard the chainsaws whining away for most of the day. Nila and Jake had a good run around the garden as Julian and I put the world to right. Then back to Gill chopping and me sawing and before long we began to build a log pile, with the help of Tom and a wheelbarrow. All the smaller branches will have to be burned on the bonfire. On probably the hottest day so far Gill and I worked through the heat and got it done.

We reckon we have about a month's worth of wood, just 6 more months worth to go now!

Recycling and Reclamation

One of the problems with renovating an older house is trying to get the right period materials. The challenge was to find bricks for the extra window we are having put in; we needed the sill and plinth bricks (Staffordshire Blue), the edging and normal bricks (Cheshires). This is what we are trying to achieve:

This is what you are faced with at a Reclimation Yard:

We found the bricks in 3 different yards and bought around 200 in total....we also saw some wonderful oak internal doors that used to belong to Mark Hughes (ex footballer and now Stoke City Manager) so we had those too.

My poor old car has been taking the strain for a lot of these bricks.....no problems with traction here.

Every trip from the car to the cottage and back works out at a quarter of a mile! At the weekend it worked out at  3 and a half miles carrying glass from a greenhouse bought on eBay.

Taming the jungle.

With the work progressing nicely inside the cottage we are turning our attention to the garden. We started bright and early with a bow saw and some loppers and this is what faced us.

We found a plum tree that had so much ivy on it that it had uprooted and fallen down crushing the bbq you can see in the picture. As hard as we tried we could not move the plum tree. After a few hours the building inspector turned up to give us the all clear on the steelwork and drainage so we won't be seeing him until the end of the work now! We took a break then cracked on......as you can see we invested in a new 'boy's toy' which put a huge smile on my face.

The tree trunk in the foreground will be logged and used in the wood burner when it turns cold. After ensuring next door had their washing in we started the bonfire and all smell of smoke now...even Nila. He's been tubbed, which he hates, and smells lovely now...well for a dog.

Steel is in and drains are being cut.

Today we finally started to see the size of the main room as the steelwork is now in and the wall is part down. It will be a fantastic space!

The nibbs have been rebuilt and the old timber lintels taken out. It's amazing how good the 130 year old wood looked.....the Victorians really knew how to build houses that last.

As we are moving the kitchen the drain has to be rebuilt. So, the yard has been dug up and we found part of the old water storage tank from the time when these cottages didn't have running water!. As you can see this has confused poor Nila and he took ages to find a way into the cottage. Getting out was even worse....he's no mountain goat that dog.

Over the past few weeks the hens have been quite entertaining and follow me around the garden, maybe it's the corn I keep treating them to. They are real characters and if you have the space we recommend you get some. Here's a picture of them taking a bath, the dust was really flying.

Pad Stones in now.

A busy day at the cottage with the window guys still there sanding and priming the sash windows....although they were often found on the river bank with the float rods.  They are having a bit of a working holiday; not that we mind as we are paying for the job, not by the hour! Oliver did have a very large eel (about a metre long) that he couldn't land that looked a bit scary.

Earlier Phil from Massey's had done a site visit with a view to putting the pad stones in for the the steelwork.

As you can see it will need 2 beams of 3.5 metres to bridge the span. The hens were very curious to look at the beams.  We had taken the steel calculations to the building controllers in Winsford on the way to dropping Nila off for his haircut......It was like taking a child to the dentist, we had to drag him in there.

The beams will sit on pad stones and hold up the ceiling timbers and most of the house. After a discussion about the height of the beam we settled on 2.3 metres so the stairs line will be level with it.

We also noticed the entrance porch doorway was being progressed too.

Back on the river bank we found this little fellow. I think it's a house mouse, but if anyone knows better please let me know.

Finally with storm clouds brewing, or as we say in Yorkshire "it's looking a bit black over Bill's mother's" we called it a day.

Gone fishing.

What a perfect way to spend a Saturday, the house is now in a state where there is nothing that we can do inside until the builders progress. We decided to have a lazy day in the garden and do a bit of fishing. Imagine the scene greeting those who were walking by the rowing club and looking across the river; all of us on the opposite bank....I mean all of us...Gill and Gem, Nila and all three chickens and me sat with the fishing rod.  The chickens have become much friendlier and love free ranging the garden.

We had some very majestic and curious visitors to the bank as well.

We started a BBQ going and Gill's parents (Sheila and Peter) came over for some homemade burgers and sausages. Steve and Irene then popped into the garden and asked if we wanted to use one of their tables, we are so lucky to have great neighbours. As the evening went on I started a bonfire to burn what was left of the staircase. The heat from it was welcome as the sun dropped behind the viaduct and it became a bit chilly.

Highlight of the evening was Gem catching a decent sized perch using cheese as bait.

By the way you are welcome to follow on twitter @therivercottage

And walls came tumbling down!

This morning this was the view looking in from the back door....

This was the view that met me a few hours later! No it's not a scene from the Blitz....just 2 lads and a sledgehammer.

Not only was the wall gone but the stairs have been replaced by an aluminium ladder!

I took my dad to Stockport to catch the train to Sheffield, this was the view of the house from the viaduct.

Work has started!

This morning Phil, from Masseys turned up to look at the job and then Jack and Donald (Gem's dad) to start the work. We had been worried about the state of the old bathroom floor as it looked pretty bad and rotten. A few hits with a sledgehammer confirmed it was bad.

This will become the entrance porch.

Meanwhile Oliver and Matty from Cheshire Sash Windows arrived to start the windows. They had come along yesterday but this was the result of their efforts...

A large bream....they were looking for carp....anyway today they started on the windows.

They also caught 6 more large bream in their lunch hour.

Upstairs the demolition was beginning with the airing cupboard and partition wall coming down to make way for the stairs and new bathroom.

All in all an exciting day with work starting.