More stairs building and unpointing walls

I'm still struggling with the whole technicalities of mixing photos with the blog, and it takes a certain mood to brave it. Since I last wrote Felix and Ben have steadily been plodding on with the stairs. I "unpointed" the end wall of bedroom number one during the wild winds that swept through the south west of France. I think we got off quite lightly, luckily, but it still seemed very violent. We had over 4 inches of rain this week.
I spent the last couple of days sweeping up the "bogs" and leaves from under the sweet chestnut trees, a huge job which should have been done ages ago. Lola (the labradoodle) has managed to find a lot of ticks so that's been keeping me busy too (you find one, then she moves and you have to rummage about for ages to find it again... oooh they're so gross...)

I've taken some photos to show where we're at today...Click on the picture to see the rest...

From Creating a Gite for self catered holidays in the Limousin, France

Background

This is the house and Porcherie (pigsty) as it was when we arrived, and summer 08..

Hi, let me introduce myself... I'm Mary, married to Felix and mother of Laurence (8) and Lenni (6). We upped sticks and left Gloucester two and a half years ago, having found a derelict house with various outbuildings, 1100 square metres of land and hopes of creating a dream home (with a lovely gite to rent out and a workshop from which to create a small business making furniture or doing general carpentry....) in the Correze.

So two years down the line, where are we up to...?

Well, we're still living in a mobile home inside the big barn.

We have a fully functioning workshop in one end of what was a cattle shed and a huge generator with which to run the machines.

We have a porcherie with sound roof and walls and even windows, doors and a concrete floor and one of the two beautiful oak staircases it will have.

A great friend, Ben, who came to live with us almost two years ago, is helping us with the work (and to drink the copious amounts of beer I just can't stop buying...) He and Felix have rebuilt the front and side of the breadoven and chicken house entirely from materials that were lying around the property (apart from a few bits of wood on the roof and the sand and cement and lime).

They have removed and repared three sides of the roof and built four new dormer windows (lucarnes), one side left to do and then the slating and tiling can commence... The roof is on hold at the moment - it's too cold/wet/slippery just now....

We even have a flushing toilet now (waited more than two years for that!)

I'll try and put some photos up to give you a bit of an idea of the project....

The porcherie as it was.

So, there you have it - I will try and keep you up to date with where we're at, I'm a total novice at blogging so I hope you'll bear with me as I learn how it works...