The Big Adventure

Karmacat

Oh Goldie! You poor things! What a complete pain

Watty1

I'm sure you will but do make sure they use some kind of coating first to cover up the damp stain ...use google to check the facts as I'm only hazy on this. Our shower leaked for a while and no amount of paint fixed the signs of that until proper techniques applied. Heck I'm sure someone who actually knows what I'm mumbling about will be along soon ...or ask google. Best to be sure of the facts before they turn up to paint the ceiling

Goldiegirl

Hello again!

Well I'm feeling a bit more chipper than I was the other day.

The bathroom was finished on Friday, and it looks great. I'm really pleased with it, and can't quite believe its mine!

The work on the cloakroom is now ongoing. The plasterer was in yesterday, but there wasn't much for him to do, so he was gone by lunchtime. What with the weekend, it seems like we've had a 3 day break from it, which has been nice.

The fitter is now back to do the rest of the work on the cloakroom, and it's scheduled to be finished on Friday.

They've also arranged for the decorator to come in on Friday to repaint the ceiling. Good point from Watty about the right techniques. As they are professionals, I'm hoping they'll know what to do, but I'm going to read up, so it'll be mentioned in discussion with them.

The tree surgeon gave us a quote for the works we wanted doing. It was £100 less than that other tree surgeon, so we rapidly accepted. Believe it or not, the work has been done today, and the garden looks so much better.

Things seem to have progressed a lot in the last few days, I'm pleased to say.

Karmacat

Fantastic! Things must look so different, in such a good way

Goldiegirl

Cloak room now very, very nearly finished. It was due to be finished today, but he'll need to come back and finish off some grouting on Monday.

However, really pleased with it and I have the 'end of term' feeling that it's nearly over with.

The kitchen ceiling was repainted this morning, and the decorator used the coating for the stained patches, as per Watty, so all well and good there.

Tomorrow, we'll reclaim the downstairs, and we are out visiting friends on Sunday, so it'll be a nice break from everything.

No doubt we'll start decorating the hall soon, but I'm hopeful we'll have a day out next week, as we haven't had much time for outings recently.

Karmacat

Have a day out, absolutely! Great to hear things have moved on so well.

Watty1

Lovely to read all going well

Goldiegirl

Well our bathroom and cloakroom are officially finished - and I'm delighted with the end result - as promised, the fitter came back yesterday and did the final touches.

However, since my last post, we've had a small bit of drama.

We had our boiler serviced last month, and they identified that a part in the hot water cylinder needed replacement (diverter valve?), and an appointment was made for 6th August for the work to be done.

On Friday night, Mr Goldie noticed that the water seemed cooler than usual, and the pump in the airing cupboard was going all the time.


Yesterday, he phoned to ask if the appointment on 6th August could be brought forward, so that the planned works could be done and this new problem investigated. A new date was set for 22nd July.

Last night, about 7.15pm, there was a knock at the door, and it was a heating engineer. Apparently it was a quiet night, so he thought he'd have a look.

It turned out that the problem was with the part due to be replaced. The system had been drained a few times due to the bathroom refit, and all the messing around had put it under stress and it seized up!

So it was replaced, and touch wood, now seems better than ever.

Plus, something ticked off the to do list a few weeks early!

Karmacat

Oh my word! How wonderful :rotfl: give me drama like that any day of the week :rotfl: I absolutely dread later visits, but calling out of the blue (assuming I managed to let somebody see the bathroom ) would sort it. Hope it all holds up.

Goldiegirl

Well, time to dust off the old diary, in readiness for the traditional annual review and plans for the New Year. Currently, I'm thinking about what I've done and what I want to do next year.

Also, I've noticed that MSE are moving platform in February, and I was a bit concerned that my diary might not be migrated if they thought it was dormant, so I will do a bit more posting between now and February.

At one point, I was going to copy my diary into a word document, just in case it got deleted, but it was time consuming so I stopped. However, I intend copying my previous years reviews and plans, as it's a good way to monitor progress over an extended term.

I can't quite believe that I have now been retired for 5 years. The time has gone very quickly, and, looking back, I think I have learned gradually to be more relaxed and even a bit spontaneous!

We had a nice day out on the actual 5th Anniversary. We went to Rochester. Rochester isn't too far from us, and it is a very nice place to walk round. We were so spontaneous, that we decided to go at about 15 minutes notice.

Last night, I went to Bluewater with a couple of friends and we had a meal. This has become a pre-Christmas tradition, that I really enjoy.

Apart from that, things have been a little quiet, as the weather has been so wet, it's not always pleasant to go out for the day.

However, we haven't been bored. About 10 years ago, I did a lot of work on my family tree, and we decided it was time to look at Mr Goldie's family tree. I had used Ancestry, but Mr Goldie decided to use Find My Past. Both are similar, although, I think Ancestry was slightly easier to use. At some point, I will subscribe to Ancestry again, as I've found a few bits of info from Find My Past which have answered questions and unlocked dead ends.

Mr Goldie's lot are very interesting. He's originally from London, and it looks as if his ancestors moved from various parts of the country to London, probably for work. He's got people from the Midlands, Bristol, Oxfordshire, Essex, plus places like Eton and Teddington. We've found some interesting co-incidences, for example, one set of great grandparents were living next door to a completely different set of great, great grand parents in 1881. Not to mention a great great aunt who was in service a couple of doors down the road from a property where Mr Goldie worked for 10 years.

We have got back to the 1690's on a couple of lines, so it's been very interesting. In the new year, we'll get a couple of marriage certificates and birth certificates that we need, to see how we get on with some other lines.

We've also done one of those DNA tests to find out more about our roots. We've been talking about this for ages. There was a Black Friday offer, and Mr Goldie got his winter fuel allowance, so we decided to go ahead and do it, before we put it off yet again.