in daylight

at last!

After a dreadfully long gestation period, the bookshelf was there; the sheer pleasure of placing the books is almost too much. The resident carpenter designed and built a magnificent structure, perfectly fitting against the wall.
And DO notice the floor! Two handy Dutch brothers performed wonders on the chestnut flooring. I almost lost it completely during the process: living through the chaos is not what I consider pleasant.
But, it was well worth the wait!

new views

too much to do yet

The books are still on the floor, the floorboards remain stacked against the wall. Steps are being built into the garden, a toilet is in progress. Things are happening, yet...yet...

work in progress

While we work on installing the new back-of-the-wineshop, we have a special niece visit us from the Nederlands. Lotte agrees that the skateboard installation has a charismatic godlike presence. This evening we could once again enjoy our skemerkelkie (my translation from Afrikaans is evening chalice) in the bright new back of the shop. All this while the last days of the school holidays are upon us.

The kitchenette needs work but to mark territory we have moved in with kettles and coffee machines.  The resident plumber has installed the dishwasher and  basin and things are functioning. I have to be positive so I shall admit that now the list is indeed getting shorter: install toilet and basin in guest washroom, build book shelf in living room upstairs, place hardwood floor upstairs, create courtyard terrace, build stairs to this terrace, install heatpump before winter, paint walls up-and downstairs, fix and finish unplastered door openings etc etc etc...  Summer has been a whirlwind balance of visitors, frantic work, management of tools, clearing living spaces and if there is a flower to symbolize such dedication, it has to be love-lies-bleeding. Janet, your amaranthus caudatus is still flowering!

book in hand, tool in hand

A blogging friend of mine wonders if the end of the (physical) book has arrived. He thinks not and I think not. It reminded me of Rushkoff saying we have a choice: to programme or to be programmed. I want to programme me. I want to read a book in bed at night, lie in a hot bath holding a book. I want the book to remember where I read it. I want to remember the book, the very page where I read those words. I want to own the book if I can, re-read it when I want, re-examine the pages I liked. Reading an e-book will not be good enough.
The new bookshelf is still in the form of a pile of wood, a stack of planks on the floor beside the very books that will eventually furnish the shelves. But once the books go onto the shelves, I want to arrange them according to colour: all the black spines together, lined up on a shelf. The white spines together, the reddish spines together. I know my books by their colour. I know them as objects. Beloved objects.

it is as if....

Sometimes it helps to look at someone else's renovation trials and tribulations.... Marilyn and Bruce, you are as determined as we are! http://dooverdog.blogspot.com/ 
I loved your Waiting for Godot comparison. So here is mine for this day: Sisyphus!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRJ-RsxVvuA

saturday afternoon

Hanging a candlelabra and a tapestry against the wall takes all Saturday afternoon. All the tools are out again, electrical wires and connections once again worked on. When when oh when will it all be done? For tomorrow we had plans to paint walls, but the consensus is that we will need a day of rest. Either that, or we wake up with renewed energy in the morning and build the bookshelves! The books have been lying about on the floor upstairs for months.

surfaces

Soft and hard, old and new, finished and unfinished --  interesting surfaces to look at, to touch. Armed with a loaded staple-gun, visiting friend Janet leapt onto a ladder to create a theatrical ambience; an unplastered dooorway became an Italian archway. The wine-shop had atmosphere as we enjoyed our first supper (and gallons of wine of course) with friends in the newly created space. 

let's play "spot the ladder"

We have made progress; there is light at the end of the wine-cave. Ladders and tool boxes can now be easily removed when friends come over for dinner; unfinished doorways clad with fabric to hide the unplastered surfaces.... the fun we are having. Now to get the rest of the groundfloor job done: the garden, the courtyard, the kitchenette, the small WC. The resident plumber has done the invisible work inside the walls:  we have plumbing, electrical sockets, vacuum and ventilation pipes.
 

always a balancing act

manu lays tiles

Manu is the man with all the tricks; he lays Italian carrelages with smooth suavité and precision. This area at the back of the wineshop will not only extend the wineshop towards the new courtyard, but also house a kitchenette and a corner private toilet.
The next stage? Grouting the tiles, painting the walls and ceiling and then the fun starts. Again. Installing yet another kitchen means I will be in my element once more.

of ceilings and things

There comes a time when you think what on earth have we started? It has not stopped:  the work goes on and on relentlessly.  But friends remind me to stop and look back. See what has already been achieved! How wonderful! What an achievement it is! You lucky people!

Luck? It has nothing to do with luck! Only with hard labour. Sure, the list of tasks is getting shorter, but it still stretches and is at least a meter long. The projected opening of the new wine-garden has been moved up to September!

mulligitawny soup and balcony floor

New balcony flooring...we are making progress, one day at a time. The mulligitawny soup was delicious. Still enjoying the new white walls and playing with paintings. Changing styles every day, painting over old paintings. Waiting for the agapanthas to flower.

ever so slow

Rather than place pictures of the many unfinished areas, I am posting a jolly corner in the open kitchen. My resident electrician thought the fragrance of my exotic stargazing oriental hybrid lilies was bakelite plastic!


He called me at school to ask what was burning as he could smell bakelite!
More jolly pictures coming this way soon as I have to lift my spirits again: the weather is not summery any more. But at least the two skylight windows lighten things up even when it is Belgian grey.

of guests, chaos and bread

Guests have been visiting from afar, from downunder, outwest and from Paris. So even if the place resembles a chaotic tool bazaar, we seem to be reasonably gracious hosts. Well, either that or the friends are more than diplomatic. One false step on the top landing caused a huge leaping crash, guest and laptop both went flying.
Yesterday on Father's Day, the resident father cut through an old 16 cm concrete wall to start creating the new layout for the courtyard.This reinvention of the courtyard will need at least another 20 weeks at this rate.
When I think of the new guests arriving in a few weeks' time; I find my  teeth gripping my tongue and sweat beading my forehead. SO I bake herb bread and guzzle thick slices with Leccino Olive Oil from the foot of Africa.
Today, Whit Monday, the hound needs a walk and the slow-cooker will do the necessary. Black-eyed peas, chillies, tomatoes, onion, garlic, green peppers and celery.... By the time I get back from the walk, another 15 cm of the courtyard may have been designed.

unfinished business

I create quiet corners so that calm can return. I spend time planning and preparing dinner, as that is all I have in my control. Last night we had grilled aubergine with steamed fennel and african bean stew. Tonight it will be butternut and chicken curry.

The hound prefers turning a blind eye; she sleeps in her basket which is surrounded by tools, supplies, building materials and folders with lists to tell us what the priorities are. Deadlines are constantly pushed into the future. What was to be done for the end of May is now to be done for the end of September. Who cares? We have all the time in the world.

the dog cannot fall down anymore

see balcony, see tented courtyard below

The balcony railing is finally up after several weeks of planning, discussing, measuring, fitting and thinking about it. There are tools everywhere; in fact, we can start a hardware shop. We visit the hardware shop every day for more tools and materials. We have every drill-bit in the book, every screw imaginable, every hammer and chisel and electric hand-held wood-cutting device. On Saturday afternoon two good wine-drinking buddies helped us to paint the ceiling in the kitchen-dining area so that we can now fit the light fittings there. (Ha! That the ceiling is not painted is no longer an excuse!) We had so much fun painting and then making dinner, we forgot to take a photo of the two painters perched on ladders. As you can imagine, they refused to pose for photos on ladders (or off ladders for that matter) after dinner of wine and food...

what next you ask?

Too much to do, where to start, what comes first?

the good life

safe now for friends to drop in

No light fittings yet... eat in the dark.

No balcony railings yet... stay indoors.

not done yet

dizzy wields roller and brush

With dizzying speed, she wielded brushes and rollers and before we could say sauvignon blanc, two walls were done. Not only have I enriched my British vocabulary, but learnt how to say it the Sussex way. We both looked good (for our respective ages) even before the chardonnay and even better afterwards.

cloning the husband

If only I had the man energetic enough today to install the rest of the electrical outlets, fix the lightfittings, put up the balcony railings, move some furniture up, move some furniture down, build the bookshelf, fix the foot of my granny's wooden antique chest, fix the railing on the circular staircase, place the hardwood floor in the new living area, paint the ceilings, fix the plastering on the old walls, finish the ceiling and walls downstairs in the wine shop, place the new tile floor, place the new kitchenette in the wineshop, finish the toilet downstairs, place the washbasin, lay out the new garden arrangement, place the courtyard tiles and get me some hot water in the new kictchen.
If only I could clone him. I reckon if I had about 15 Jopies running around doing these odd jobs, the work could be done within a month.
This morning after freshly squosen juice (I made up this word as there is no word in English to describe the kind of juice I make; the word squeezed does not float my boat) of celery stalks, oranges, carrots, apples and root ginger, we each made a list of what jobs could and should be done today, this very day.
Of course the lists were completely different. His list was all about ventilation and visiting hardware stores, whereas my list made demands for fixing the broken foot of the chest, the desperate need for the bookshelf and the light fixtures....
We compromised -- he dropped me off to shop at Ikea, he went shopping for a 4 cm. piece of ventilation equipment, then he looked at the broken foot of the chest, I went off to the hairdesser and we sat in the sun just to relax and dream of a time when the job is done.

birth of a living space

 

This morning I can finally report the birth of a living space. It has a subfloor and walls, ceiling in need of patching and painting. Too much unnecessary stuff lurking around yet,  but, a castle it is! We shall be sitting in sheer luxury this morning to enjoy our croissants and coffee. It is all relative, isn't it? Another thought stikes me: when all else fails, you lower your standards!

building bridges

How do you join the old sagging slanted antique floor to the new level straight floor? A pertinent question, especially when you're creating an open plan area. You simply start knocking things out with a pneumatic hammer to strip three layers of flooring. You leave the wattling and daubing that is still attached to the many layers of ceilings below (now the wine-shop). You remove 300 year-old oak joisting. You do all this when the wife is at work. When she comes home, you explain there are now bridges to walk on between kitchen and living areas. You justify the thick layers of fine dust covering the new kitchen by explaining it was the only way to go. You do want a strong base for your hardwood floor, don't you?

wining and whining: are we winning?

Pressure at home and in the business... what are the priorities? We put on our best public faces to promote our range of wines this past weekend at the cloisters of Nivelles where the commune hosted their Vins Passion event, allowing the public to taste and buy from a wide range of vintners.
When we had a free moment, we talked floors, walls, light fittings and "is there light at the end of the tunnel?" The wine shop on the groundfloor has no floortiles in its extension yet, nor a ceiling, nor its kitchen corner, nor the WC. When do we do all that?
Upstairs we eat and move furniture as we come to grips with the old floor that needs levelling; old and new floors have to meet. All the furniture is packed against the back wall while we enjoy a sundowner and some leftover chicken-in-beer stew. Cooked in beer? Enough of the coq au vin for the moment...

Putting our feet up for a few moment's rest before we dig into chicken-in-beer