The porch apears!!! We have an exciting bonus drawbridge too.

Also in the news...with the brickwork almost done, Kev has moved on (hurrah!) to be replaced with freindly, considerate Rob the builder, who doesn't smoke and thinks that it is important to keep the site neat and tidy.

As we enter into the final month for the extension shell, the most difficult parts are about to start, the roof, the co-ordination with the window fitters and the knocking down of the back walls. It is not going to be pretty...

It is nearly time for the brickies to leave us... Apart from the porch, the front garden wall and a few small sections on the house, they are pretty much finished. So it will be roofers next and we will be getting the window people in, hopefully very soon; the extra draft proofing will be appreciating as the nights draw in....

We've been getting peas and french beans for the past week, yum, here's a picture of M picking some peas...

And another, beautifully showing the new greenhouse in it's rightful place!!

So now for the greenhouse... a greenhouse has been in the planned scheme for the garden from the begining, looking into it, we decided to go for a timber framed, and rather large one. The greenhouse has been a source of concern for a while. Worrying about the delivery of the green house... how will we get it past the scaffolding? Worrying about creating the base....so much stuff to clear out of the way and lots of hardcore to move to the back of the garden (again via the scaffolding). Worrying about putting it up...it might save us money but would we end up wrecking it? And then worrying about wether it is too big and so on....









Well it was delivered on Wednesday, the delivery people were kind enough to help move it through to the back of the house, so first worry dealt with. We had already created the base earlier in the week. The third worry was slightly justified, we had M's dad here to help, which was great, but the instructions sent by the greenhouse company weren't. We called for clarification and was told by the fitter "first thing you should do is throw away those instructions"...mmm great. But by the end of the day, as it was getting dark, we had finally got it put up...

M's dad came by earlier this week to help us put up the new greenhouse (more of that later), so have some up to date pictures from his digital camera. In the picture you can see the roof going on the utility room and tool room, the walls are up to window level on the 1st floor and on Friday they put up scaffolding on next doors drive to enable them to start on the roof. Our neighbours have been brilliant and put up with a lot, at little notice and requests to the builders to give us notice of events that will impact on our neighbours (such as knocking down walls, creating large holes or putting up scaffolding that prevents them getting into their garage and covering their car in cement splashes) have fallen on deaf (and cauliflower) ears. Insurance covers some things, but common courtesy makes the best start.

Looking forward to when we can invite them back for a slap up thank you meal.

How about a few pictures from Jamfest-06?! In August we went up to my parents place nr Hull, with my brother, to pick the fruit and make jam, we did the same last year, so were hoping for good results.





It was a great sucess, we picked lots of fruit, mainly greengages and "yella fella" a small yellow plum, that we have yet to identify but know that it makes good jam.









We ended up making 3 rounds of greengage jam and 4 of the yella fella, 53 jars made on the day, not including the 10 jars of plum jam Mum and John had made earlier. Hopefully that should last the year!

things are happening quickly now, as per usual, the pictures here are way behind reality. The downstairs space is now completely defined, all walls in, door openings complete and with the beams for the 1st floor in. They have even got up to the bedroom windows.