Clay

With spring just around the corner, and with two days of wall to wall blue sky, we thought this weekend was finally time to tackle the steps up from the courtyard up into Hillside's elevated garden that sits a full storey height above our courtyard. Whilst the builder had left us with a muddy slope we are understandably keen to turn this into something more practical and aesthetically pleasing - the photo below was taken last November when we'd just completed laying the courtyard slabs and when the slope was at it's mudiest and most lethal!


Several hours of digging in the sun we now have and some seriously aching muscles and the rough shape of two thirds of the steps. So far it seems that we've been digging out clay that dug out and then backfilled when the builder built the retaining wall. Whilst it's been hard work it's not been as bad as it would've been had it been the clay rock that Hillside is built on. I have a slight concern that the top three steps are far enough away from the retaining wall to be in ground that hasn't previoulsy been disturbed so we may well find rock. Time will tell.

At least it means we'll get another good workout as we certainly don't have time for other forms of exercise!

Warming up

At last, after the long winter, there is some heat in the sun and we're seeing more of it. Several sunny days in the last week have meant that the solarhot water system is already doing some useful work, topping up the hot water cylinder with 'free' heat.

Technical guidance from solar thermal suppliers and designers says you should only expect to get useful heat out of these systems from April to October in the UK. Okay, so our system isn't yet seeing enough quality light/sun to mean we can switch off the boiler supply to the hot water cylinder, but our first full season of using the solar thermal system is definitely underway.

Hopefully I'll be able to advise on how long the system will pay for itself later this year, so come back then to find out more. With fuel prices going upwards thanks to the Middle East and Japan situations we could be looking at shorter payback than expected.

February?

Where did that last month go?! Apologies to regular readers but the shortest month of the year has flown by without any blog posts. I'll endeavour to rectify this in the coming weeks and months as we awake from the cold of winter. I hope.

Our first load of visitors since last autumn enjoyed the hospitality of Hillside at the end of last month. Before they arrived we'd set ourselves the target of completing the bathroom and ensuite. Whilst both rooms have been functional for over a year now we'd not completed the tiling in either room as there have always been more important things to do. So the cold and dark of February seemed a good time to get this work done. And with the exception of a few minor finishing touches the work is complete, complete with a bath panel made from T&G that we found in the old brick shed when we first moved in 4 years ago.

Hopefully this now means that we can start to focus our attention outside once more, and just as spring arrives. With the landscaping of the 'front garden' to be done, along with extending of the veg plot, not to mention sowing the seeds etc that we need to plant up the plot, there's plenty to be done out there.

Needless to say we can still find a few jobs to do indoors if spring isn't quite here yet.