Jackdaws in the fireplace

We came back from the night in Northampton and found that we had 3 Jackdaw chicks in our fireplace!! We knew that there were chicks in the back chimney they had obviously come out of the chimney and thought about flying, they then decided that they weren't quite ready and went back down a chimney assuming they would land on their nice soft nest and found that they were falling down a deep hole as they had picked the wrong hole. Chris and the girls got them out and Chris took the two live fledglings up the scaffolding and they flew away.

Kennilworth Castle

On the way back from Northampton we called in at Kenilworth castle just to see what it's like and have a drink in the shade.

Introducing Caroline and John Truss

Caroline and John's wedding day was lovely a beautiful day with a great service and lovely reception to follow. Chris decided he should have something in his hair as well as me!!! Not sure it really suits him.


Towards the end of the meal Dad walked into the reception!!!! We didn't realise but Mum and Dad were staying at the same hotel for the weekend. It was lovely to be able to have a drink and chat with them during the evening.

Zoo trip

Beth and I went to the zoo to try out some photography 'stuff' Beth borrowed my camera and took most of the photos!! There were 156 photos to sort through by the time we got home. These are some of my favourites. As I said most of these were taken by Beth.

Progress report week 11

Well another bank holiday week means only 4 days available by Thursday the building regs drawings were ready so work could start up again. Firstly more scaffolding. The scaffolding is now up to the level of the roof. The builders spent Friday removing all the tiles from the roof. Chris had a great time up there with them! Then they cut a hole in the roof to get in and out. A steel went in to support the dormer. By the time I came back from a bit of shopping I found out we had hit a major problem. The structural engineer had assumed that one of our walls was a supporting wall when it isn't. This meant the engineer had to spend the weekend redrawing the drawings for us and making everything run at 90 degrees to the original plan!! It looks like we could easily have a 2 week delay due to changes in the steels, and other things. - Complete nightmare!

Farleigh Hungerford Castle

Soli's birthday with a cake at a castle.

Progress report week 10

Again another quiet week while all the building regs are sorted for the loft conversion. The weather hasn't been conducive to doing much work on the roof for much of the week anyway until the weekend. This week the builders have blocked up the windows in the bathroom completely as the main bathroom window will be in the back wall not the side wall (or the study wall as it now is) so we now have no natural light in the bathroom or the kitchen.
They have moved the soil pipe so it is now inside rather than out. And we have a mole hole! For those who don't know a mole hole is defined as

mole hole -noun a cupboard, usually under the stairs which holds a large amount of "stuff" often including vacuum cleaner, torch, hot water bottles and random things needed at unexpected but regular intervals. It is unusual but not impossible for a house to have two mole holes, this is not advised however due to the extreme confusion which usually results when "stuff" is returned to the wrong mole hole.

This means our kitchen is now back to the size it was when we bought the house and we remember why we wouldn't buy the house unless we found a way to make it a little larger (just as a temporary measure, one which lasted 8 1/2 years!!)

We had a few icecreams on the roof today as the sun is out!!