Bonnes fêtes

Time to log in again. Unbelievably it's nearly Xmas - this year has literally whizzed by in a bit of a blur! We are off to Toulouse tomorrow to get Chelsea from the airport. Her university holidays aren't very long unfortunately so she is only coming for a couple of weeks, but it will be great to see her again. Also a bit excited to catch up with Gabbi for Xmas - it's been a few months since we have seen her and she ventured off on her London adventure. I think she is enjoying it, although at the moment she is doing some very long hours at the bar she works in so I don't think she is able to do anything much other then work. We are spending xmas all together in London - I have rented an apartment for a few days so hopefully we can throw together a big traditional English roast Xmas lunch. Can't wait!

The days are so short here this time of year. The trade off for the extremely long days in summer I guess. Sometimes it feels the sun has only just come up and its gone again. We have had some pretty cold weather too - last week we had a day where it was still minus 7 at lunch time!

Paul has been cracking on with the house. A few weeks back we had the underfloor heating pipes in and the screed laid. We had a friend in to help who had done it before and our good friend Yves who owes Paul some time came along to help too. We were going to hire a big cement mixer but it was going to be 70 euros a day so Paul had a look on Leboncoin and found an ancient petrol powered one for 250 - so that worked out pretty good. It did the job with no problems and now we have our own for the bigger concreting jobs we still have to do.
Here are some pics from the couple of days doing the floor. It rained lightly the whole time - I did cop Paul and Yves having a cheeky beer quite early in the day - the photo kind of says it all! In fact they thought they were going to be loading the mixer flat out but since it was so big they had plenty of time between loads to take it easy!

We have left the screed to dry out, which could take a while with the very rainy miserable weather we have been having and have now gone back to work on the second floor.
We have laid the oak in the spare bedroom and Paul has rebuilt the fireplace for it. And only today he finished the tiling in our ensuite - although it still needs grouting. It looks awesome - he has done such a great job.

So - no other news really. We are going to have a few quick days checking out the ski fields in Andorra next week - there has been some good snow and more due tomorrow so hopefully will be nice and soft for the inevitable big wipe outs that are on the cards!!

Au boulot!!

Ok - so I am a little in shock. I knew it had been a while since I had blogged but I have just realised it has been nearly 2 months!! Whoops... ok well I have a bit to catch up on now..
So starting with Oct. We had visitors from Australia for most of Oct so tools definitely were put down for a while. It was fun playing tour guides and luckily during their stay the weather was for the most part pretty warm and clear. We had a gorgeous day on the river Dordogne with Pete and Kath - it was 27 degrees and no wind - perfect. And this time I could canoe too as last time I had just got out of hospital so wasn't allowed. Mind you - I have to admit it was hard work so Paul did a lot of it!

We also went with our friends for a few days to Crete in Greece. We chose Crete as it is the most southern of the Greek islands so figured it should be the warmest as we were risking it a bit being the middle of Oct. This turned out to be correct as the weather was pretty much perfect the whole time. We had unsuspectingly booked an all inclusive resort for the week - for the princely sum of $500 for each couple - crazy cheap. The food was great too - very traditional Greek which we all love. The resort was lovely but loaded with young families - screaming kids everywhere - not ideal for couples - oh well never mind, we still managed to relax and have a good time. We also managed to do a dive too - not much to look at as far as sea life went - the Greeks have pretty much fished it out apparently - but we did an amazing cave dive which was a new experience for all of us. It has at least two fossilised mammoths in it - complete with tusks and jawbones - so fifteen metres down the cliff face you go through a hole in the cliff face and swim along the cave a few hundred metres before you can actually surface in an air pocket and see all the stalagnites etc, so cool. Of course it is pitch black so we all had torches to see. Swimming back towards the cave entrance we all turned off our lights so you get this amazing sight of the blue entrance coming up - was one of the best dives I have been on I think. The fact that there are no white pointers in Greece also helped us all relax a bit too! Diving in our home town Perth has become a bit of a gamble with 6 deadly shark attacks in the past year alone - two of which were on divers! eek.
Here are some pics of our time in Crete.

Anyway after we got back from Greece I headed back to the US to be at Chelsea's senior game so she didn't have to walk out all by herself - I also had hoped they would make it to the national finals as at the time they had only lost two games. Of course that didn't happen - unfortunately they lost their two last games which ended up being crucial to the final selection to the finals - pretty much didn't make it by one spot. So sad for Chels as it is what she has been training for for the past three and a half years. However it was the best season they had by far and I was there for Chelsea's one hundredth goal - something only 6 people have managed to do in NCAA field hockey history so a great achievement for her. It's a shame as if she stays in the US she possibly won't be playing at a competitive level any more. Seems a waste of talent but that is how the US system works - lots of very talented girls finish playing in their early twenties. Not like in Aus where you just keep dropping grades until the body gives out ha. Here is me and Chels on her senior day.

Well I have been back for two weeks now and we have been hard at getting materials organised to continue on with the renovation. We have also laid the insulation and pipes for the underfloor heating - the screed is due to be laid next Monday so that will be fantastic to have done. Paul has also fitted a door to the spare bedroom and today has begun to tile our bathroom. We had planned to lay all the oak to the second floor but decided it would be best to wait until we had finished all the concrete work to avoid bringing in more moisture for the floor boards to contend with.

I have also been busy doing some schooling with my horse. I generally ride an hour or two a day and he is really coming on. I have also been doing the dressage lessons once a week and think I am starting to get the hang of it now. It is a real challenge that's for sure.

Not looking forward to winter - we have been lucky so far - normally November can be grey and miserable but we have had lots of sunny days and not too cold - even had 22 degrees last week! It won't last though - that's a given!

Voyage a Etas Unis!

I'm back - literally and figuratively! I have been trying to find the energy to write a blog entry for the past week but jet lag and catching up on everything has just taken precedence. Paul and I have been away visiting our daughter in the US for a few weeks. We had a great trip - saw some parts of the US that we hadn't been to before including San Francisco and North Carolina - watched 6 games of hockey for 6 good wins by Chels and her team and spent some nice time with her and her boyfriend in Chicago.

Other then a minor issue of realising whilst in the line to checkin for our flight from London to Toulouse that we were meant to be on the flight the day before - everything went very smoothly. And everything was fine back at home - the horses had been well fed and looked after by Goldy's mum although it did take me a couple of days to pick up all the poo they had created in three weeks!

Paul has been sanding and painting all the plasterwork in our bedroom and ensuite this past week. Makes such a mess so lots of cleaning up has followed. But it's all looking good - we have the oak flooring for the bedroom already but Paul wants to tile the bathroom first so it will have to wait. We also have some visitors for the next few weeks so not sure how much will be achieved in the immediate future but that's ok. It will happen - I am convinced of it!

We have finally had some rain since coming home. Unfortunately whilst we were away there was little to none and had been very hot still so everything is rather dry and dusty. There is rain forecast for nearly every day this week though so hopefully that kick starts the grass before it starts being too cold for it to grow.

In other general news Gabi has finally got herself settled in London - she has a job in a trendy nightspot in the centre of London and found a share room in a house not too far out on the tube - living with about 6 other people from all over the world including a couple of Australian boys. It sounds messy and rather unhygienic but lots of fun for her.

I have been suffering this week from what looked like big red insect bites on my torso which I have now found out are from something minuscule that lives in the autumn grass and gets into your clothes - apparently after about 10 years you can build up an immunity to them! I guess in the meantime I will just have to put up with them - or stay out of the paddocks - which is a bit difficult with three horses to feed and pick up after..

C'est trop chaud!!!!

Yes - it is way too hot here at the minute and has been for what seems like weeks! Luckily a while back Paul had a little brain wave that perhaps we should look at getting a jacuzzi instead of having a pool a lot further down the renovation. So I did my job and went searching and found what seemed like a great deal with some English people returning to the UK who wanted to sell theirs. And what a great idea it was too - we have been spending a lot of time in there - particularly since the weather has been just so hot and dry. This time last year we were trying to get our hands on lawnmowers so we could sort out all the grass - not a problem now - the horses have eaten anything remotely green and are having to be fed hay. Anyway here's some pics of getting the jacuzzi and the great job Paul has done of landscaping for it.

Paul has been doing his good impression of a stone mason at the minute although most days it just gets too hot to do too much outside. He has built some new walls for the outdoor eating area and joined them in to the old existing ones. Someone asked him if he was building a fortress the other day. I am sure it will look a little less imposing once the reducing pile of stones has finally gone and we can do some more paving and gardening.

I have been having a lot of fun with Tolsan. I even did a fantastic four day trek to Rocamadour on him with the equestrian centre. I was a bit worried it was going to be really hot but thankfully most of the route we were following forest paths so apart from a few hours it was shaded and lovely. Tolsan started right at the back and the first couple of days really dawdled along and we had to keep trotting to keep up, but by the third day his fitness kicked in and he started to annoy the horse in front of him so was moved up the line a bit. He was very well behaved - even when we had to cross the big freeway and we went on a fly over - the look on his face as huge trucks went flying along underneath us was priceless! It was great fun as there was three other Dutchies and a young French girl and me. We stayed in Gites along the route and had lovely meals and loads of laughs. And even better - no accidents! Since then he has even been for a swim in the lake that is only about a kilometre from us which is huge since he wouldn't even put his foot into muddy holes before! Peer pressure works well with horses - I think seeing the others do it made him wonder what all the fun was about..

Paul has also added something to his barn collection. He has bought a very little tractor for the princely sum of two hundred euros - it needs some work as it has been sitting in a barn for about forty years. Something else to tinker with in his down time.

Last week it was our village's turn to have its annual three day fete. Basically a party that goes on a bit long ha. We went to the meal on the final night and had a nice time with all the local expats. We would like to associate with more of the French locals - but it just ends up being too awkward with our awful (in my case) and non existent (in Pauls) French. Maybe in a few years - here's hoping! Here's hoping for some rain soon too!

Au revoir juillet

I should have written my blog yesterday but I am finding it very difficult to make the time - what with looking after the horses - occasionally trying to help Paul - do all the usual housework stuff and now not watching copious amounts of Olympic hockey games on the dedicated BBC channel! Oh well as long as it gets done once a month ha - it will be up to every two months soon... but anyway we have had a good few weeks. Building wise Paul has finished the super deluxe horse shelter and thankfully it was just in time for some blisteringly hot weather and they do use it. We have finished the oak floor in one of the bedrooms which looks good. I also located some more oak parquet direct from a sawmill for a lot less money for the other bedroom which we will put in soon.

Paul has spent the last week or so doing lots of stonework out the front of the house - it now looks like we have a walls everywhere - some I have just uncovered that had been under the ivy. They all need to be jointed now which will be a good job for me and Gabs who we picked up from the train last Thursday night. She arrived with a bad head cold which it now appears she has shared with me as I have a very sore throat tonight. Not happy Jan!

Paul has also uncovered some old footings in the front yard along with lots of old bits and pieces. He has rebuilt part of the walls on top of the them. Would be so interesting to have more information about the building history.

A couple of weeks back we spent the day or some of it with Yves and some of his Belgian guests watching the Tour de France go past. It had a leg between Toulouse and Brive which passed only about 15km away from us so we couldn't not go and experience it. Most of the time it is just sitting around waiting but then the fun begins about an hour before the cyclists go through as lots of sponsors cars go past throwing out crap freebies/samples which we all had a lot of fun fighting over. Here is Paul and Yves in their free green lycra shirts and a couple of shots of the cyclists.

I have still been riding lots and have had a couple more dressage lessons - most recently this morning. I am starting to think I can't ride at all as I find it very difficult - there is just too many things to think about and Tolsan can be a bit on the lazy side so most of the time I have to be pushing him on at the same time as trying to adjust my seat and the reins - maintain my balance etc. I think I will be feeling the effects of attempting a rising trot without stirrups for weeks!! We went to the Cazal market on Sunday to pick up some fruit and vegies. I have to admit I feel so much more comfortable asking for things in French then I did even a few months back so hopefully the french lessons are starting to pay off. Here's Paul and Gabs wandering around.

It has been very warm here the last few weeks - and it is starting to really dry out. Some rain would be very welcome. We have had some hay delivered by one of our farmer neighbors ready for when our pastures have all been fed off which is getting to be very soon by the looks of it. The farmers are getting pretty desperate as a lot of their crops are mid season. We have a lovely field of sunflowers directly opposite our house. Harry decided to come with me when I walked down to photograph it.