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So the beautiful summer weather ended,on saturday and five days of windy weather followed stopping most of the outdoor activity but plenty to do inside and today, christmas day, has sparkled in with some perfect sunny and calm weather.Its so clear you can see 80 miles in ether direction and its just warm enough to eat outside.The days are longer than in the UK so it doesnt feel like winter at all the flowers are blooming and the birds singing. but i think the next week will be the greek equivilent of winter but there should be spring type weather again after new year. >Inside the house it is coming together and the esse woodburner i brought from the uk is heating the house nicely its burning olive,almond and plum wood and although small seems adequate for the large living room/kitchen. the roof is 4 meters high at the apex so its a big volume. there have been some small uninvited guests and basil seemed oblivious to them but having caught one in the trap and introduced them he has now made it his mission to seek out any others ,he caught one yesterday and was very pleased with himself,bit of a come down from norfolk rats and rabbits but its work!

facevolos  so after a journey through europe taking in all the well known weather conditions the van with most of the furniture for the house plus tom and suzies stuff and rosie and james’s kitchen roled into skopelos on the ferry to be greeted by beautifull weather. autumn is just started here but the days have been jsut like summer is (in he uk only better) .got a good view of the house from the ferry in fact the only time you get to see the front of the house is from the boat as the rest of the time you cant see the roof from the front.which is something to remember if you are building on a slope!you dont get a sense  of the shape a volume of the front and i think i would treat it differently if i were to do it again. the back view is more important as the initial impact of shape and size but from the front its closer shapes and texture that are more important…although of coure we could just buy a boat when we want to see the house with its beautiful roofs! but still getting the house together as a living space takes time and slowly nearing complete but it is a joy to have a proper bed at last to enjoy sunrise and of course the sunsets are great too. and the clear and lovely weather gives many opportunities to see the distant mount athos in all its fuji style glory.

so after the slight hiatus caused by me dropping my car off the road (which rather bent my laptop) at last i am back on line on the blog again. just been in skopelos for a week getting the outside preparations under way the electrician has been waiting for the channel to be dug so he can put the power on. so i got vangelis and little apostolos to dig out the outdoor kitchen area and the seating area and use the resulting soil to push back around the house .So at last the house sits nuch better into the land and the 3 truckloads of rubbish we have taken away makes it a lot nicer place too! its extraordinary how much rubbish they can make and how messy they are.The drive/parking is now huge and it will take some time to work out where and how we will fix it upthis is to be the outdoor kitchen its about 3×3 meters and 3 meters high so there was about 27 cubic meters of soil and rock to dig out and unfortunately most of it was rock which of course caused a delay…. I didn’t think we could put mains electric on until we had had the building signed off and produced all the receipts for the tax authority but i have found that we can have mains but at a higher tariff than normal even though we haven’t had sign off! you live and learn….took down a very splendid esse woodburner which is reasonably small but puts out 8btu and weighs 120kilos so that should keep the living room warm! and i managed to get some winter rugs from athens. A very heavy weight flokati and two small eastern rugs and a beautiful black and white rug which may not survive the dog so may have to end up on the wall! back next week in a van to start the gardens and finish off inside .waiting for delivery of special lime paint for the outside will be interesting!and i have found some treatment for the cement bathrooms which should leave them looking exactly as they are but waterproof and stainproof. it comes from texas and is expensive so hope it works…

time to go home .2 months since i left home to drive down i have to go back for a job.the house is now lockable only the last fit of the electrics to do,finish the balcony .then painting finishing etc etc… 1 year 1 month and 2 weeks since we started.!

so the doors arrive day after day and the house at last changes shape and colour as the frames fill in the blanks.The other two carpenters havent been yet the balcony now should be today later and i caught the other( kitchen) carpenter i caught down in loutraki earlier and he promised avrio(tomorrow) again but i will believe it when it happens. The pool men arrived and i took them to the house where they instantly strted making a feta salad so i have left them to get on with it install the filters and the machinery -pump and sand filter- and then dimitri the engineer will come after the august holidays to run the test and start it working. The very nice switches and plugs are now ordered and payed for so will pick them up at the wekend then we can finish the electrics the shower works beautifully and the water is very hpt so everything is in place….almost(again)

well dawn is certainly beautiful here if  a little early to wake up! the climataria or pergola is built in front of the living room. i have it as bare wood until i decide on the finish i will take home some pieces of the wood to england and try various stains etc to see what is best before deciding. but it is very nicely made and simple as requested.The balcony should be going on tomorrow and the kitchen worktop too which i saw today and is lovely light oak.And eventually about 12 o clock the windows and doors arrived-at least some of them! I was hoping for a complete room full but of course they have done a random selection so no room is complete apart from the kitchen which is open plan so makes no difference. still its happening,Yaniis and spiros today changed the beautiful mortar in the living room its such as shame they really did a lovely job but the colour was wrong as it dried it had a blue grey tinge which wasn’t right still its better already. everything is now nearly there ordering the plugs and sockets today and now yannis has finished i can get vangelis back to dig the channel for the electric cable to come to the house the plumbing is all there and by the middle/end of next week i can have a holiday in england!

the swimming pool terrace is now complete and the boys start plastering the pool this afternoon.the terrace looks great and  when the infinity pool is operational it should be spectacular. inside all the plumbing is working and connected still waiting for  a reply from plugs and sockets they may be on holiday! balcony should be up after the weekend and hopefully hopefully will actually get some doors and windows on monday. georgos  sklavos (his name means slave irony being a greek word) the carpenter has been in athens for some minor operation on his wife so i cant even shout at him! so little to do now its very frustrating want to be finished. Just the worksurface in the kitchen and the 2nd fix electrics,the balcony and then connect up the pool and then i can get back to england see if its still there!The swallows have hatched and are flying round eating all the bugs so thats good they seem to have had 6 swallowets dont know whether to paint round the nest and pretend its art! Got the furniture in today most of which needs restoring the bench is extraordinary it 9’1″ about 2.87 metric give me something to do ! so i will be camping out in the house in the hope of receiving windows and doors soon cant wait! wont be on the internet until after the weekend now though and the phone only works sporadically until i get the booster on so will be hermit like for a bit…

too hot to plaster the pool so the boys are laying the stone around the pool terrace after the weekend its cooler so hopefully.. meanwhile we are fitting the bathrooms out and its going well apart from some pipes we need metal ones for under the sinks and there is a 3 meter piece missing betwwen the house and the sceptic tank(vothros) so all connected up nearly!and the water is steaming hot fromthe solar panel. this week should see us finished but.?…

kitchen tap is in! waiting for oven then we can get the oak top started

things moving quickly now yannis finished inside today and starts the swimming pool and terrace tomorrow so they were filling in the holes left by the concrete guys(sloppy) ready for the rough plaster which will then be topped by cementacornia.Looking forward to seeing the infinity pool at work! if it does of course…meanwhile the other team (mavronides by name are starting to build the stone wall which leads off the pool  vangelis and his mate are realy lovely boys but they brought a labourer with them today who was a bit of a case so i had to tell them that if he didnt behave not to bring him tomorrow.and i have banned them all from drinking coffee inside got coffee splashes on my untreated floor arrrgh.floor treatment arrives tomorrow i hope and will paint it straight on. Meanwhile plumbers have come and i have made the big decision to have solar powered water heating. Originally the bathroom roof was supposed to be a tiled extension of the bedroom roof but it somehow got lost in the final plan stage so we have  a flat roof facing south above the bathrooms so i cant think of an excuse not to have one! And of course environmentaly(and financialy) it would be crazy not to so although not keen on seeing plumbing outside its there! You can only see it from the road and you have no view of it at all from the terraces around the house. …So the two brothers christos and nicos turned up today in high winds to instance unfortunately the boys were plastering the staircase so they couldnt go up and rather than come back tomorrow they decided to take it up two sets of home made ladders…great idea but of course we got here by turning the ladders to face the wall and using the reverse side as a slide.. ingenuity beats technology-often!