Saint Anselme

Yesterday was a bit manic. Early start to finish the hedge trimming that we started yesterday. Unfortunately the heavens opened at about 17:30 and left us with an hours work to finish. So it's 95% done.

Even though I was dog tired we went to a friends house for an evening meal with some other ex-pats. Excellent evening but a few too many beers meant I've let myself be invited to a round of golf on Friday. I've got a set of clubs but haven't played for about 8 years. Hopefully it shouldn't be too embarassing.

Whilst we were digging out old items from storage that have not been used for years we got the tents out. We've decided we need a holiday and we are going to head south, staying in France, for a weeks camping. There is a empty week in our bookings soon so we'll take the opertunity to have a break. A much needed break from the gites and La Lohuas. The ridge tent for the kids was easy to put up, but the larger tent (one of these ones with bendy poles) was very complicated, especially since we it has not been erected for over 6 years. Lets hope they are both watertight.

Oh, the architect turned up today to take a photo of the barn that we are converting into two new gites for next year. 12 weeks ago we supplied our plans and was told that the drawing and planning permission would be done in “quinze jours” (15 days is a French fortnight). Planning has still not been submitted after many promises that it would be done “this week”. The latest promise is tomorrow. Lets hope cos he's starting to annoy us. I think this saga might be a good story.

Saint Emma

Paul and I spent all day (apart from the obligatory 2 hours French lunch) chopping the top 10 or 15 feet off a friends leylandii hedge. A bit of a monster job, the hedge must be about a 100 feet long. I spent most of the time hopping from tree top to tree top lopping the unwanted branches and Paul collected and burnt all the debris.

Tomorrow we need to run over it with the hedge trimmer and tidy it all up.

I'm the red blob halfway up the hedge. It's a big hedge.

Saint Parfait

A bit wet and windy today curtailed my list of outside jobs. Finished off some of the minor inside jobs but generally had a very quiet and lazy day with a late traditional roast lunch. In the last 3 weeks we have had relations and friends come to see us and it has taken it's toll on my metabolism. It was nice to see people and show them the huge improvements we have made over the last 12 months but I think I need a few days to recover from the excesses.

If the weather is fine tomorrow, Paul and I are going to trim a close neighbours leylandii hedge that has grown out of control.

Rossi stuns with debut win. World champion Valentino Rossi wins in South Africa in his first race for Yamaha. [BBC Sport | Motorsport | UK Edition]
Watched the race on the BBC and it was fantastic. Just goes to show what a good rider Rossi really is.

Saint Benoit-Joseph

Suberb weather today, not too hot (well warm enough to remove my shirt) but ideal to get some outdoor gardening jobs done. After wine shopping this morning (most important) Caroline has been mowing and planting lettuce and onions in the veg patch.

Split a few of the tree trunk slices from Wednesday. I just do a couple a day cos spliting oak logs by hand is hard work, but very economical.

Finished the soakaway and plumbed in the grey water supply. Turfed over the top and you'd never know I'd been there. I also took the opertunity to spread a load more gravel over the fosse and pipes to make it a little more 'attractive'. A friend advised me to place a tarpualin (with holes) over the tank so it makes it much easier to uncover in the future.
We had 15 tonnes of gravel delivered a week or so ago and I keep moving a few trailer loads using the ride-on tractor, but the pile doesn't seem to be getting any smaller. Hopefully one day it will just magically disappear.

We all went for lunch in Evran and had a very lazy and tasty meal. buffet starter, main course, cheese and desert all for 9 euros 50 including wine. The children ate for 5 euros each (again a three course meal). The children are more used to three courses at lunchtime than us because they do it everyday at school. The French seem to start educating the palate before they can read and write.

Started reading the 'Life of Pi' by Yann Martel last night.

Saint Paterne

Exhausted. I've just finished digging and filling a new soakaway for the washing machines and some grey waste water. We've got three septic tanks for the house and the gites and consequently 3 soakaways. However I recently discovered that one of the tanks is an old fashioned 'Fosse Septique' rather than a 'Fosse Toutes Eau'. The former only takes foul waste and the latter both foul and grey water. Therefore having the grey water plumbed into a fosse septique is not a great idea cos it can 'flood' the tank causing undigested water to flow into the soakaway making a bad smell and potentially damaging the soakaway. So today has been an excerise in building a soakaway. I made it approximately 1 cubic meter in size and filled it with some larger rocks and loads of gravel. It was back breaking work shifting all that mud and rock, especially after yesterdays tree felling. I wished I hired a mini-digger. Now I just need to connect it up the the grey water supply. Another job off the list.

Saint Maxime

A comedy of errors today. After putting the third (and last) coat of varnish on the shutters I went to help a friend the other side of the village to fell a dead oak tree. The deal is a bit of labour for a bit of wood. Very nice, especially oak. Great Christmas fire for 2005.
Anyway the tree had been pollarded several years ago but the ivy had got hold and killed the tree. It was about 80 cm (2 1/2 feet) across and 10m (30 foot) tall. No branches, just the trunk. Piece of cake . The tree was on the bank of a small gully/culvert. The inital felling was relatively easy, even considering the tree was growing out of a thick laurel hedge and restricted movement, and more importantly the escape route once it started to fall. Once felled it lay in the field with approx one quarter hanging over the gully at right angles. One slight problem was our chainsaws where not long enough to cut all the way though the trunk, so it was a matter of cutting from both sides and rolling the trunk with a small tractor to cut the other side.
The top half logged we proceded to try to pull the tree into the field to finished the job. However, slight misjudment and one end slipped into the gully. Stuck. Tried pulling the trunk out but snapped the rope and it was way too heavy for the mini tractor. So we set to work chopping the top off that stuck out above the gully. Major hassle because the chainsaws where too small and we could get all the way around. After alot of phafing about we got the top third off and tried again with the tractor. Opps, too much beer and bad planning, SPLOSH. The 10 foot length of tree was now lying in the gully.
OK, no problem, more rope, some levers, more pulling and we can shift it. One thing I hadn't noticed was the water upstream was rising. The tree made a superb dam. I jumped in to lever the trunk out but my boots where not quite long enough any more. Yuch. Eventually we hauled the trunk vertical and after much head scratching chopped a little more tree of to lighten the load. Finally we managed to pull the tree clear and log it into sensibly sized pieces. What a job,  half-a-day turned into a day and I'm whacked out.
All this just to save a couple of euros on electric heating. I expect my chainsaw is going to need a service and sharpen after the abuse of today.

Staint Ida

A few more hours bike training and voila, both the children can start off, peddle and stop without assistance. Whoaa the freedom of it (for all of us ) Typical Lizzie concentrating like crazy and Hugh just laughing his way through it.

Rubbed down the door to the washing machine room at the back of the house ready for Caroline to paint it today. The guttering over the door was unfinished and consequently there has been several years of rain dripping and splashing against the door. Generally the door was in a bad state but with a good clean-up and a fresh coat of paint it looks alot more respectable and should last a few more years. I also fixed/finished the guttering and added a downpipe to move the water away.

Schumi admits Senna doubts. Michael Schumacher reveals Ayrton Senna's death 10 years ago made him doubt whether to continue racing. [BBC Sport | Motorsport | UK Edition]
I remember this very well, a sad and black day.

St Jules

We now have two potential Tour de France winners in the Family. Well it's most probably a bit optimistic but both Elizabeth (6) and Hugh (4) can now ride their bikes without stabilisers. A bit wobbly but they are very excited about it. Caroline and I spent several hours yesterday and today taking it in turns to 'guide' each of them up and down. My back is aching after running round bent double but it's worth it.

In between bike training sessions we managed to get some serious painting on the house finished. I completed the second coats of lassure on the three new shutters for the upstairs windows and Caroline painted the veranda. The veranda faces south and started to look very shabby with the faded chocolate brown weather beaten paint peeling off. It's now a shiny new conker colour. Still not the most attractive veranda in the world but a vast improvement. First impressions etc.

Vegtable patch out the back is coming along nicely. Caroline planted potatoes yesterday and I finished turning the compost bins. Another large trailer load of muck spread into the soil. The muck mainly consists of grass, straw, and poultry waste, so it should help the veg. along nicely.

Saint Stanislas

This is the first day since October 2002 that I haven't done any work. No painting, digging, plumbing, paperwork, anything. Just a great day with superb weather. This morning was spent with Elizabeth and Hugh at the swings and slides in Evran, next to the canal locks. You know the Rance canal runs for 166km from St Malo down to the south cost of Brittany to join the Atlantic. The sign did say how many locks but I forgot that bit. Before lunch I went for a solitary walk around the grounds taking in the primroses, daffodils by the river, the birds singing the arrival of Spring. Most relaxing.

This afternoon Caroline cooked a fab roast lamb lunch for Easter Sunday with all the trimmings. We had some friends over and had a very pleasant afternoon.

This is what the dream of moving to France is about. Lazy days with the family. However the last 18 months have not quite been like that. Starting a new business is always hard work, but I'm not sure we realised quite how hard. However, I now think things are starting to pay off. Three gites renovated with good bookings, planning permission in the pipeline for 2 more gites next year, and things generally ticking over. We are on top of most of the French paperwork/bureaucracy and even though there are a 1001 things still to do, the dream is in sight.