this weather is crazy

This photo was taken an hour ago - the apple tree behind the house is coming into blossom. The weather has been so warm and sunny this october that the whole garden thinks it's spring. The trouble is, of course, that now we won't get many apples from this tree next year. And it produces such good cooking apples! As well as this, the grass continues to grow quite fast and we have to cut it fairly regularly still and the trees have barely started to change colour.

Winter seems to start later and later each year, and spring earlier and earlier - makes for a short winter but lots of the plants can't cope with such sudden changes.

more plans for the future

We are going to put a porch onto the back of the house. The photos are a 'before' and 'after' that we are using for the Declaration de Travaux (planning application). We will use stone that we have available from various building projects for the low walls, and the biggest bits of green oak we can afford for the posts. It will only need single glazing, but will give us somewhere to store firewood, grow plants and keep muddy boots. It will also help to keep the back of the house warm when the winter north winds blow! There will, of course, have to be a cat-flap in the door. Hope the planners don't notice!

The pantry is nearly finished

We have been trying to get the pantry finished this autumn. It was the last bit of the house that had no insulation, so the wind whistled in under the eaves in winter and straight into the rest of the house.



The above photos show the start of the process. You can see the new ceiling, hiding 200mm of insulation. We have put in a big slate shelf to the left of the door as you go in. The slate was lying around in the garden when we moved in. The walls are ready to be rendered.


This photo above shows the rendered walls, the slate shelves and the newly installed wine rack - not full yet!


The 'boat' shape is the old chimney space. We have dry-lined it, and have converted the original tatty wooden shelves into a smart cupboard (painted white). One day we will add doors to this, with a mesh to allow air but not mice to circulate.


The wall against the house now has the last of the teak we rescued from Salford Uni chemistry labs as a wide shelf right across it, with the freezer underneath, plus storage space and the gas bottles. Doors will need to be made for these bits too some time in the distant future....


The middle shelf contains 4 x 70cl bocals and 4 x 1.5 litre bocals of sloe gin in the making. Gin over here is ridiculously cheap - about 9 euros a litre, but I got some funny looks when I bought enough for this lot the other day - ah! les anglais! Said sloe gin should be just about drinkable around New Year. Won't keep long though....

lots of stuff...

This photo of the back garden is from the roof of the side barn. Having had the roof re-done, we had a series of leaks where it butted against the side wall of the house. We had to do something about it this summer, hence the photo opportunity. This little courtyard is quite an improvement on the old piggery that was there when we bought the house.

We eventually found a home for Ma's last two kittens. The grey one, that we called Tarzan (picture above) and the black fluffy one we called Teddy both went to a lady a few miles north of us, who's cat had recently died.


These photos show a 'before' and 'after' the big conifers on our boundary were cut down recently. We now have lots more light, and when the sun decides to show its face again, we will get sunlight across the back garden in the morning again. They had to be chopped anyway, as they were too close to the overhead power lines to next door. During the felling process, they knocked the lines with a branch, and they got hooked together, one over the other. All the electricity to the hamlet immediately went off, and EDF had to be called in to sort it out. Evidently it is a common enough occurrence, as they had a special insulated stick for unhooking lines...

What a week.

My best friend in France, Anne Waterson, died last thursday night.

She had breast cancer, but only found out about it after the secondary tumor in her cervical spine was diagnosed. She has had a terrible summer, with surgery and chemotherapy but I dont think she ever complained more than to regret missing the nice weather.

She died unexpectedly, at home - her heart just packed up with the strain of the treatment. It was very quick, and she and her husband, John, were spared the nightmare of a long, drawn-out final illness. But it has been such a shock to us all. John is devastated, of course.

Ann & were planning a trip to Guingamp next week to get her a wig - that would have been a retail therapy trip with a tale to tell! It still makes me smile to think about it - should she get a dolly parton beehive? a punk crest? blonde or redhead? We had fun just discussing it. In fact thinking back over my all-too-brief friendship with Ann, joking, smiling & laughing are part the overwhelming majority of my memories. That is something to hold on to.

So it has not been the best of weeks. One to get through.