Get your lathing gear round that!

28, 29 August

Working hard, we had a good bit of the west gable wall built when, all of a sudden, just as I was about to place a stone up to height next to the shower tray, I remembered that the plan included lathing and plastering behind where plasterboard will go.  One more stone and we'd never get a hammer in.  Wall production ground to a halt, and we swapped trades again. 

I nailed on batons and laths, Dave cut rope fibres (reusing old rope ends from the boat - apparently if you can't easily get animal hair, polypropylene fibres will do the job - and it's better than binning them) and mixed our first batch of lime plaster.  We both then had a go at lime plastering (this will be hidden inside the straw-clay wall, so it's a forgiving place to learn the techniques).

 Broody hen out for a quick turn - having a mouthful of clay slip for refreshment.

Plaster oozing through the inside - a good sign.

Spooky Chinese Proverb

26 August 2013

One of the few joys of high summer here is that the exotic restaurants open for the season.  It's a rare and wonderful thing to get a Chinese takeaway, so we indulged ourselves.  Opening the regulation fortune cookie at the end of the meal resulted in this frighteningly apt advice:

In case the photo's not too clear - it says 'Be patient!  The Great Wall didn't got build in one day.' (sic)  That's the universe giving us messages loud and clear (if not very grammatically).  Are we being watched?

Trading favours

26 August

Rowan asked us if he could buy some of the scrap wood left by the Winnebago, as he has his own patch of land and is building a tree house for himself and his girlfriend, Paris, to live in while rebuilding the stone cottage.  We are upset to find ourselves outclassed in robust nature-dwelling wackiness, but are keen to support all such projects.  Anyway, we suggested a trade, he could take whatever he needed, in exchange for making a temporary floor for the utility space / root cellar, which is a treacherous hole at the moment.

He liked the idea, and knocked up this great bit of decking, complete with trapdoor and little set of steps so we can use the storage, in a day.  So now we have a terrace on which to take tea in the mornings.

Back to Work

Weds - Sat 21 - 24 August 2013

We returned to find a scene of frenzied activity:

... which we felt we ought to emulate for a couple of days of clothes washing and settling back in, but then Dave got all determined and finished the loo installation job.  The pipe feeds into a soakaway, which is well down in the ground, but it needed an inspection hatch built up to ground level.  So on went the mixer, and once again we were making lime mortar.

 With the leftover lime, I seated the mosaic in the front step, just need to rustle up some grout, now.

 And after watching Rowan with the woodwork - he's fitting some hardwood thresholds for us at the moment - I made a robust little step out of offcuts to make it easier to get in and out from the music room back door.

But as of the 22 (George's birthday) we fired back up on full time wall building.  I had done a bale diagram for the four walls round the music room and behind the kitchen, worked out we needed 125 bales, give or take, and placed the order with Constantine.  A momentous decision - we thought, anyway - which inspired us to great efforts.  Getting up at 6,30 am was the least of it.  Dave made the mixes, and I set the stones.  About a metre and a half a day (until the sun gets round to the West about lunchtime, when it becomes impossible).

On our Holidays

Thurs 8 to Sunday 18 August 2013

With Jonathan and Isabella coming to visit us and go boating on Sunday 11th, we decided that we'd have a couple of days honeymoon to relax and check the boat.  There was no point just sitting around the building site fretting about how impossible it was to do anything in the heat, so we packed our bags and took off for two days in a bay, just swimming and reading and drawing.  Lots of relaxing.

Jonathan and Isabella arrived on schedule and we took off for the islands.

 Day one, and Dave managed to hook a seabird.  After a lot of excited flapping and many 'ouches' from Dave, it was liberated and left a wiser creature than before, we hope.

 Later that day, Dave's animal magnetism was still operating, as this butterfly insisted on sharing a tinny with him.

 Everyone chilling out on board ...

 ,,, and ashore

 In Fiskardo, Jono and Isabella had an introductory dive arranged, so Dave and I explored a bit.  This is the ruins of the Norman castle on the headland, reputed to have been built by one de Guiscard on the way back from the Crusades, thereby giving the town its name.

 And this is the old Venetian lighthouse further along the coast path.

 Bella looking fabulous overlooking Fiskardo bay.   

And on the last day, a quick visit to view the works at Goat Bottom.

Our first Bale

Monday 5 August 2013

Our first straw bale arrives on site in the back of the Punto.  This is the sample bale.  In order to build a straw bale wall we need very robustly constructed bales, or they will splurge (a technical term) outward under the weight of the ones above.  Constantine the Architect has traced a farmer near Agrinion in central Greece who is willing to un-bale and re-bale good quality straw by hand.  The sample has taken several weeks to reach us.  If we'd known, we would have made the trip to collect it, but nobody told us.  Various plans to send it by cousins and aunts and assorted connections of the farmer having failed, we were asked if we'd pay for it to be couriered.  So we paid 35 euros for our first bale - quite likely the mose expensive straw bale in Greece if not all Europe.  We collected it from Lefkas.  It is actually very good, very dense and nice golden straw, with no signs of mould.

We had just decided that bales weren't going to happen and agreed between ourselves that we would go with Straw-clay (a German technique that uses loose straw tossed in clay slip tamped into formers) but the bale changed our minds.  We now think we will still straw-clay the tall gable walls, but we will bale the north wall and the two sides to the music room on the north side.

When the toilet was to be installed, we realised we couldn't bale the walls around the bathroom if we were going to plasterboard the inside first, because the bales only become fire and rodent proof when they have a thick coat of plaster on both sides.  Straw-clay, however, starts out with a coating of slip.  So if we straw-clay, we can lath behind the plasterboard, and put a coat of lime plaster on, then when we tamp in the clay-slip coated straw on the outside it will press up against the inner plaster.  Clever, hey?  It is a method we can use on the relevant walls to build the house from the inside.

The Bale, enjoying a position in the sun!

Creature Discomforts

Thurs to Sat 1 - 3 August 2013

Hallelujah!  We have a flushing loo.  Thursday 1 August - an auspicious day in the annals of Goat Bottom (take that as a pun or two if you like!).  The loo was installed by lunchtime, Dave had the basin up by teatime, and before supper I'd rustled up a temporary partition and curtain for a bit of privacy.

Time for a bit of a look round, I've been focusing on the details a lot recently, so here are some views of our current living spaces:

 The field kitchen - now we have a sink, the kettle can move in, and as the compost toilet has been decommissioned, we have the electricity to run a second fridge in the building site.

 

 The 'lounge' - where we lounge, between projects and all afternoon in August when temperatures exceed 35 centigrade and the sweat pours off you just sitting still.

 The area to the North East - which will be kitchen/eating space.

 Our magnificent stairs and balcony in the centre of the house.

Once the loo was installed, we got all excited and laid some old carpet and bought a couple of lights, so we could easily slip to the loo in the night (no need for shoes and outdoor, thistle-avoiding clothing),  but fate had a new torment for us.  The first evening we lit the place up - wantonly spending electricity for the sheer fun of sitting up after it was dark - horrors!  Invasion of the inch-long hornets.  Unlike wasps, it seems they are attracted to lights at night.  We must have a nest quite close.  Eugh.  Six or seven of these buzzing round the lights as we try to do teeth and scuttle under cover of the mosquito net.   But they followed the lights, up the stairs and to the bedside, where we fought a last ditch battle with the insect spray.  It was unpleasantly freaky.  We won, thanks to chemical warfare, but something has to be done.

One of the victims

Meanwhile, one of our hens has gone all hormonal and become broody.  This means she stops laying, and sits on any eggs the other one lays, despite there being no hope of a hatching, inside the little chicken hut, in August, without food or water.  We poke her out at intervals to get a drink, but she clucks and ruffles her feathers at us and is clearly disappointed by our attitude.