Ever since the horses arrived here, and through all the terrible weather, the lack of stables has really bothered me, and Sherafey, who dashed into hers as soon as it was finished. It also means poor Mel here can eat his dinner in peace without being monstered by the tiny tornado. The stables were old pig sheds, and with a bit of rebuilding, and the creative use of the old roof from the house extension, are just the job, being below the huge beech tree beside the house –

I’ve been leaving the doors open, and when I came out this morning they were in there again, so I am assuming that the accommodation has their approval.

The result of all the stable building is that we have less extension, which can only be a good thing. I finally got to find out what the figure is above the bedroom window, which until today had a block wall 6 inches from it

and it appears to be a small dog, which is quite appropriate for us. The old ladies that lived here went round and put everything from bits of glass to toothpaste tops (and a small dog figurine) into the new render.
The old window looked like this  –

Now instead of the block wall, here’s the view (nothing that a little tidying up won’t improve further).

It also means that it was finally possible to lower the ground level outside – the first thing you should do in the fight against damp. I took nearly two feet of rubble, concrete and soil to get down to solid ground.  To give you some idea just how close the extension was to the house –

So here it is – the south side of our house finally unearthed. Its the only bit with the original lime render on it –

At the time the ‘modernisations’ were being undertaken, the builders very helpfully used newspaper to fill gaps around the windows before plastering, and to line the floors before they put the new lino down. Here’s a page that was still in place when we got the place.

May 4, 1959. It was in this year that the old small sash windows were replaced with the ones we have, the roof was replaced, and that the extension was built.