First-time house renovation

TomsMom

lisal0u wrote: »

Right what have I been upto...

I promise to update my blog this evening!

Oh you've been very busy Lisa, and how exciting that the kitchen wont be long! Looking forward to your update.

Its so rewarding growing your own! How are your fruit and veggies doing TomsMom?

Very true! I'm so proud of my first attempt at gardening and growing my own. We've had a few strawberries from inherited plants and the flavour is wonderful, compare well to Ava strawberries (the expensive ones from the supermarket) which are the only ones I'll buy as the others don't seem to taste of anything.

My potatoes are doing well, flowering nicely and the foliage is about chest high now. It's getting hard to find the bags underneath all the foliage so that I can water the soil! I admit to scraping a bit of soil from around one of the carrots, I couldn't wait to see what they were like and I was thrilled to see the top of a carrot about the size of my little finger at the moment. Doesn't take much to keep me happy . I didn't thin them out much to start with so I intend to pick them when they're quite small anyway. The leeks are also doing well.

My red peppers don't seem to have grown up much, the biggest of the four plants is about 6" tall, but they all have lots of buds on and I have two peppers, green at the moment and a bit bigger than my thumb nail - they're so cute!

The cherry tomato plant my neighbour gave me is coming along nicely, no fruit yet but some flowers, there are flowers on my dwarf runner beans and I've seven butternut squash plants grown from seed doing quite well (and seven never came up) - I really must find out what to do with those (as in growing/harvesting, not eating :rotfl: ).

The inherited rhubarb's not been much good, all the sticks up to now felt quite hollow so I've pulled them off. I now have two sticks growing nice and firm. I hope they're ready for when OH comes home (hopefully end of week) so I can make him a rhubarb crumble, has to be crumble as I've never mastered pastry, he likes crumble anyway. If not my neighbour has got plenty and I'm sure she'll let me have a couple of her fat sticks .

It's been too hot here today to go in the garden (it gets the sun from first thing to sundown) so I started on painting the rendering on the porch which is on the shady side of the house, and there was a nice breeze to keep me cool too. The builders couldn't do it as it was very damp. Son created a little concrete rainwater gulley to take the water away and now, a few weeks later, the porch has dried out nicely. I sprayed the moss and it has now died and gone brown. I was out there this morning brushing the rendering, trying to get the dead moss off was quite hard as the roots seemed well stuck into the sand that had blown between the little stones of the rendering. Anyway, after asking on another thread about what to do I've managed to scrape it off, losing a few stones on the way, and I think I got most of it. I've managed to get the first coat of Weathershield on and it looks better already! Quite hard work that was, hopefully the second/third coats will be easier. I dare say it's dry enough to do the second coat now but I washed the brush and I'm too pooped to do any more today. Fingers crossed for another dry day tomorrow.

typeractive

cheers - thanks for that

lisal0u

As promised the blog is updated! http://stuartandlisashouse.blogspot.com/

TomsMom

Lisa, I LOVE your red accent wall. It's something I thought about but we ended up with a quite bold wallpaper (brown and metallic pinky red flowers) instead on the short end wall in the dining end. I have to choose a blind for the window now (opposite the feature wall) and I'm struggling. That end of the kitchen has ash units, beige tiles and black accents. Sounds awful now I've written it down but it's not near the wallpaper so doesn't clash.

Is it the same red on both the end walls? What colour are the other walls? I really do love that red.

lisal0u

Thanks TomsMom! Have you got a piccy of it on your blog, I cant remember if Ive seen it or not!

It is the same red on both walls, should have had the flash on really. If I remember rightly I think the colour is crimson kiss by crown. We tried a few testers but they came out too orangy so Stuart just went and bought a full tub of this colour! Im glad it looked nice ha ha! The other walls are a whitish cream (snowdrop, crown). We decided we needed it to be really light with the red being quite dark! I think it will look really nice when we get the white gloss kitchen in and dark wood floors, fingers crossed anyway!

Its so hard choosing colours because there are sooooo many! It took us ages looking through every catalogue but we have bought all the paint now thank goodnes!

TomsMom

lisal0u wrote: »

Thanks TomsMom! Have you got a piccy of it on your blog, I cant remember if Ive seen it or not!

Lisa - this is the window (kitchen) end , 3rd & 4th pictures and this is the dining end with the wallpaper, 3rd & 4th pictures again.

lisal0u

That looks lovely! You could maybe try and get a blind with a similar pattern to the small brown leaves in the wallpaper then it would tie the room together! I havent thought as far as blinds yet but I guess I should!

I quite like these panel curtains that you attach from a track for the french doors: http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/categories/range/10374/13289/ not sure which I would pick though! Far too many decisions to make in this renovating lark!

TomsMom

lisal0u wrote: »

You could maybe try and get a blind with a similar pattern to the small brown leaves in the wallpaper then it would tie the room together!

Now that's a good idea, it would tie it together and still go with the units and tiles. Clever girl :T .

I quite like these panel curtains that you attach from a track for the french doors: http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/categories/range/10374/13289/ not sure which I would pick though! Far too many decisions to make in this renovating lark!

Absolutely agree with that. I've said so many times that the joy went out of choosing items purely because it became a chore with a whole house to do. We've only ever done one room at a time before and that's a doddle in comparison.

Those panel curtains are nice. I really must try and get to Ikea one day, I think I'm missing a lot!

BB1984

Just a flying visit to say I've updated my blog!

Lots going on at the moment, we've been very hard at work landscaping the garden and getting ready for the fence man to come! He's been here the past two days and hopefully will finish tomorrow - hooray!

I'll also join in the home-grown conversation to say that I've got 4 tomato plants on the go - two of which are just starting to flower, and one of which is looking decidedly unhealthy...! I've got 12 green (french) bean plants in pots, the highest one is about 1m high now and most of them are starting to flower now too. I've got 3 courgette plants in a big pot, they're not growing very quickly though In fact I think two of them are going to die but hopefully the biggest one will survive. My inherited rhubarb, after going through an unproductive phase, is going mad - I picked lots on Sunday and made a crumble, yum yum! TomsMom maybe I should send you some?!

Right I've got to go - I meant to have an early night last night but ended up watching the tennis til late, and I'm so tired!

I'll update my blog again soon with (hopefully) a finished fence photo!

BB

jimbugalee

Aaaah for some reason it's stopped emailing me to say when this post is replied to so lots to catch up on.

We've moved in!!! who hooooo. Although there is so much to do and you feel guilty for not working i.e. watching Eastenders for half an hour, it does feel more relaxed having everything here.

Updated blog http://seatonroad.blogspot.com/ New bedroom piccies on there!

Just about caught up on everyone elses blogs. All looking good! The weather is really helping ... oh apart from the sauna like loft ... phew!

We're having real trouble getting a gas cooker. Even the second hand ones are SO expensive. Anyone else had this? Atm I'm cooking on BBQ and electric table top cooker.

One more question. We might get someone in to tile the bathroom. Any idea how much we're looking? Room is about 3x2m

Must dash and put the garden furniture away (gosh that's a chore every night Zzzz). Painting the front door tomorrow!!