Fifth Annual Review : 2019/20
It is February 20 2020 so now five years since we took possession of The Old Rectory. Traditionally, this is the time to review the work of the last 12 months and discuss what is in store for the coming year. The thumbnails below are active : click on a picture to see a larger scale version. The larger pictures open in a new window so just close it when finished.
It was a difficult year as Mike went through chemo and was hampered by a less than perfect leg but we still made good progress even if nowhere near the previous rate.
The House
The objectives for the house, set twelve months ago, were : work on the bedroom 3 alcove [subject to LBC]; complete bedroom 4; finish the utility room; fit the oak doors to the garage; construct the porch at the secondary entrance; and construct a porch at the main entrance [subject to Planning Appeal]. Compared to previous years, this was a small amount of work on the house because everything else was finished [at least for the first pass - there are still minor things to do everywhere].
As in previous years, work in the garden robbed resources from work on the house during the better times of the year but, nonetheless, good progress was still made even if nothing happened with the bedroom 3 alcove as we still haven't decided what we want to do. In addition, one other objective was added and achieved and work was started on what had been expected to be part of the next period's work.
Work on bedroom 4 took place sporadically through the first six months and there was a change of plan when it was decided to sand the corridor floor rather than carpet it - which meant that the entrance of the bedroom would also need sanding. Structurally, the old head plate from the previous position of the eastern wall [you will recall that we enlarged the bedroom and shrank the bathroom] had to be clad in oak to hide it [left] and the water pipes needed cladding [right].
In addition, the small wardrobe needed building and most of the floor needed sheeting with ply in order to eliminate the different floor levels of the previous rooms.
Preparation for decoration ran in parallel with the structural work - and there was a lot to be done - but decorating proper only took place once everything else was finished.
In the end, it was early November before we could get Ben the flooring man back to sand the corridor floor. A week later Mark, the carpet man, came in to fit the bedroom carpet. We chose to sand and seal the floor of the original corridor extension / bathroom foyer to record the layout before we increased the size of the bedroom.
November 11th was therefore a very important date as that was the day that we finished the basic refurbishment work inside the house [and could start to think about all of the lesser work which was not finished while wanting to push on ...].
The floor of the utility room had been laid at the end of the previous period but that was before any decorating had taken place - not the normal method of working!
Work started in April. The room was tackled in two parts, the western side being decorated by Ian while the kitchen exhaust duct was being boxed in by Mike.
We had selected a pleasant blue colour for the walls, as can be seen on the test patch in the picture on the left.
Decorating was finished by the end of June.
However, we had promised ourselves that we would try and use a spare oak door [acquired when a supplier made a mistake while making the bespoke door for the family bathroom] to replace the door from the utility room to the garage. This was done at the end of August and is a good solution.
The saga of the garage doors was not a happy one. In the fourth annual review we noted that the doors had been ordered in early August from a small workshop but delivery had been delayed because the owner had suffered a stroke. This turned out to be a scam - there were no doors and the real owner had declared bankruptcy.
We started again with a new supplier so it was mid-July before the doors were delivered and set up in the garage for coating before installation.
On a lovely sunny day at the end of July we quickly removed the old doors and had the new ones in place by that lunchtime.
The finished doors somehow make the external appearance of the eastern elevation complete :
Work on the foundations for the secondary porch had been started more or less at the same time as the garage doors arrived.
They were completed the same day that the garage doors were installed so a very productive day!
However, it was early October before construction work started on the porch itself [gardening having got in the way of progress yet again]. By the end of that month the structure was starting to look like a porch and it had become clear that the incoming power cable fouled the new roof.
UK Power Networks was contacted to move the incoming cable ... when they could get round to it. At the price charged [a simple job costs the same as a complex one!] one would have thought they would be happy to get on with it - except that you have to pay up front!
Two weeks later [Rob only comes in to help once a week - supposedly 'in the garden' - so progress was decidedly resource limited] and the basic structure was finished but we didn't have a date for the cable move yet.
The cable didn't stop us putting the close boarding on to the south side of the porch and UK Power Networks made the change at the very end of November.
Over the following two weeks the roof was close boarded and the breathable membrane fitted which allowed the battening to be started. We concentrated on the south side of the roof so that we could learn while being able to work from the flat roof over the utility room.
The picture on the right was taken on December 9 when the basic tiling of the north side was complete. It shows what a close match the new tiles are to the existing.
By the middle of December, at the Christmas break, both sides of the roof were tiled and the ridge tiles were in place. That left the bedding-in of the ridge and the verge still to do, a job for the new year. Thereafter it was just a matter of finishing the gable and working out a gutter detail for the north side.
Bedding-in required a suitable weather window [in the middle of winter???] so we pressed ahead with the gable in early January, fitting the centre post and adding the barge boards. That somehow made the whole structure look closer to completed but the plan was to enclose the gable so still some way off complete in practice [and still the mortar work to do].
By the middle of January the gable had been filled in and was awaiting its render-coat.
That work was undertaken sporadically in the second half of January and into February as the opportunities arose. In the end it was right at the end of the reporting period that the gable was finished [the picture on the right is dated February 18!].
However, the weather was not suitable for mortaring the roof ridge and verge so that work will have to be done once the weather is both dry and not frosty, hopefully early in the next period. Adding the guttering will wait until the main porch also reaches the guttering stage.
The story of the main entrance porch is a happy one, even if no work took place.
In the fourth annual review we explained that we had appealed to the national planning inspectorate against the refusal of the local Authority to allow a porch. In the end it was mid-June before the inspector visited and he was only on-site for about 10 minutes. However, within a week we had his decision and he had approved our application.
It will be 2020/21 before we have finalised the detailed design and are able to start work.
One other aspect of outside work worth noting was the painting of the windows and remaining white pipework.
However, to do that, we had to first reduce the height of the main breather pipe and fit a breather valve in order to comply with building regulations.
The picture on the left was taken back in 2015 [when the shingles were new]. That on the right was taken in May, just after the pipe had been reduced in height.
The 'Pink Painters' [the lovely girls who did the painting of the eaves back in 2015] came towards the end of July and were soon swarming all over the house.
Black windows seem much more suitable than white.
In terms of inside work, for the last two months of the reporting period we were working on all of those irritating lesser works mentioned above.
The picture on the left, for instance, shows the oak trim now installed on the ceiling trapdoor and the new blind, both in the ensuite. [It also shows the post-it note on the tiles to the right of the window : the list of items still to do in that room!]
Not so easy to show is the considerable amount of making good on oak trims throughout the house where every pinhole had to be over-filled with wax filler which then had to be buffed back to flush in order to create a more or less invisible finish. The picture on the right shows more substantial fill treatment to some of the hall skirting mitre joints under way. The vertical gapes were filled with a filler made from oak wood 'flour'.
The Garden
The objectives that we set ourselves for the garden, recorded in the fourth review, were : establish the 'main road'; start again with River Pond; complete the well-head; complete the grey pebble path; finish planting in the formal beds; finish planting the deck bed; finish clearing the remainder of North Glebe; clear the last of Eastern Border; and [of course] carry on weeding, weeding, weeding ... One unstated objective but very much in our minds was to finish Top Pond which had been left 'as was' from when Mike's femur collapsed the day that the pond was re-lined.
In the event, some of the objectives were achieved and several additional ones were added and achieved too. The well head was not and is now a 2020 project.
Work on the establishment of Main Road [the wide path from the drive right down to the oak where yellow brick road starts] was commenced at Easter.
There had always been a thought that we should have a garden tap down at the Deck so an additional objective was created : to do just that before Main Road was finalised. In order to do that, we had to find the water main which entered the house under the orangery.
By the end of June the sub-base of the road section between The Jungle and the formal garden was finished and the garden tap at the deck was operational [the picture on the right having been taken just before the tap was fitted].
The edging of the road along The Jungle side was wood but to cope with the bends in the rest of the road it was decided to line with 'Corten' steel, a steel which rusts to a uniform extent and then stops corroding any further.
That meant a lot of tedious metalworking as it is only available in 2.5 metre lengths so one length was cut up to make 'fishplates' used to join lengths together. [Each fishplate had six holes so each joint had twelve holes to be drilled with some precision. Nylon nuts and bolts were used for the connections to avoid differential corrosion as Corten nuts and bolts are not available.]
The picture on the right was taken at the end of September when the final section of lining was installed.
In October the decision was taken to delay the top layer [of golden self-binding gravel] until the early spring. Because deliveries are only made from March onwards that means that the road will only be completed in the 2020/21 period.
In the fourth report we noted the demise of the dam at what will become River Pond and the need for 2019 to be 'Robert the Bruce Year'. We decided that the new system would involve buttresses for the original dam and a weir under Chinese Bridge to get the full height / backward reach desired.
Early in the gardening year we found that the original dam could be righted easily, albeit not square on the foundation, but work did not really start until early September once the work on Main Road was easing off.
The dam was soon manhandled back into its final position with the help of some levers [thank you Archimedes] and then we started to excavate for the foundations. The buttress foundations were just holes in the ground but the weir foundation required a bit of shuttering.
The foundations were all cast on September 16 in a morning of frenetic concrete mixing. Thank goodness that we have a mixer! [the original dam foundation was mixed by hand back in September 2016].
Two weeks later and the weir had been brought up to two courses in order to see the effect. The mortar left over had also been used to start the buttresses on the dam itself.
By mid-October it had rained sufficiently to fill behind the weir and it became clear that a third course was needed to get the depth and backward reach that we wanted.
By mid-November the buttress of the dam had been cast, the torrent of Winter Stream being diverted around either side of the dam.
However, it was then early January before the weather was dry enough to tackle the first of the abutments, the northern one. Before the southern abutment could be started it would be necessary for the tile topping of the dam to be added [easier than trying to remove a course of bricks and re-laying them frog-down to avoid frost damage] and for another dry period to happen.
In early February the weather was good enough one day for the tiles to be laid but the land was so wet and the rain so persistent that the flow of Winter Stream never did ease off enough for us to contemplate building the south abutment. That has therefore been delayed until the 2020/21 reporting period.
At the very end of the reporting period we had two heavy rain events in quick succession. The picture on the right shows that the flow of Winter Stream was so fast and brought down such debris that the future River Pond was nearly full so at least we know that the new buttress behind the dam is up to the job!
The Icelandic pebble path to the west of the house had not been worked on since mid-2018 when the section from the patio around to the corner of the lounge had been installed. It only took two hours one afternoon in late August to get the next section from there to the concrete slope installed and effectively filled. Another hour the next day finished the job.
It was then decided that the final section [from the bottom of the slope to the north end of the building] should really be delayed until after the main structure of the secondary porch was completed.
Work started again in the North Glebe in March, the section closest to Winter Stream having already been planted and the lowest part across the proposed stream path had been carpet mulched previously. The rest of the area was dug over to start the process of controlling the bindweed / brambles / bracken and the carpets were dragged one section upwards so that the line of the path could be defined.
After that initial effort little time was devoted to the area for quite a while as other projects had priority and, of course, the weeds - particularly the bracken - grew back despite several weedkiller spraying sessions. Nonetheless, three Betula utilis 'Jacquemontii' [white barked birch], three magnolias, two ornamental brambles and an Acer palmatum 'Shaina' were planted in pockets hacked out of the bracken.
It was actually early October before work picked up again here. By the this time the stream path had been well defined [in the picture on the left it is green with moss growth]. The lowest section immediately north of it was rotavated and then generously dressed with compost which was, in turn, rotavated in. At the same time the path was dressed with wood chips.
By the end of October planting of this section was under way, something which continued through November.
November also saw the start of the second assault on the bracken in the upper sections of the area. The carpets will be left on the second section over winter and then we will move them yet further up and prepare the second section for planting.
That is work for 2020.
In the Eastern Border, we had previously cleared past the yellow privet but that still left the last section before black pond. By the end of May that had been cleared of the many suckered cornus shrubs and most of the pernicious weeds. It was then left fallow for the rest of the year to give the weeds a chance to regrow and be weeded out. Some of the cornus were replanted in South Glebe to give winter colour, others were given away and a lot were just burnt.
In the autumn the area was considered adequately clear so the edge of the grass was trimmed and some additional top soil was placed to try and raise the bed because it was close to waterlogged.
Some of the shrub planting was then undertaken but most will have to wait until 2020 [when there will also be a need to keep weeding!].
At Top Pond, it was early March when the work started again to tidy up the liner and reinstate the edging stones. The picture on the left was taken when only rough trimming was complete although some of the fine trimming had been done furthest from the camera.
By the end of May, fine trimming long complete, new plantings both on the edge [a dwarf bamboo] and in the pond [various] were starting to develop along with the original plants.
The other objectives, added to the list and achieved, were the establishment of some compost enclosures under School Oak and the building of a log store alongside the garage.
The compost enclosures were built in late March / early April using fencing posts and arris rails together with the original boundary fence. There are two, very large 'bins'.
The log store was built in May. It is not attached to the garage, it merely leans against it. The roof is made from featheredge fencing boards.
So, with a lot more hard work and despite the health issues, we are close to complete with respect to the first round of work on the house and the amount achieved in the garden is pleasing to see. It is therefore time to establish a 'road map' for the sixth year [2020/21]. As we go through the year the progress bars will indicate how we are doing.
The house has two outstanding projects but most of the work is 'snagging' [finalising small details which were deliberately skipped in the first round] and touching up decoration work, for instance where timber has moved to create small plaster cracks or finishes were damaged with subsequent work. Because, as discussed above, we managed to start the latter work in the last two months of the 2019/20 period it starts here showing 20% complete :
- mortar the tiles and add guttering to the secondary porch roof;complete
- decide what to do with the bedroom 3 alcove and do it [subject to LBC];complete [becausewe decided not to do anything!]
- construct the porch at the main entrance;complete
- work through room by room finishing items not fully complete;complete for all intents and purposes
Surely this year will see the house fully complete?
The garden should include some architectural gardening but with a lot of maintenance too :
- finish main road with self binding gravel [driveway to yellow brick road];complete
- at River Pond, build the south abutment and lay final bricks of the weir;original task complete but leaks are unacceptably high : both ponds to be lined in 2021
- complete the well-head at the patio;complete
- complete the pebble path along the west side of the house;complete
- finish clearing the remainder of North Glebe and continue planting here too;just needs maintenance 'stepping stones' to finish the 2020 work but 2021 work already well under way
- carry on weeding, weeding, weeding ...never finished!
This will be year 6 of our self-imposed 10 year programme for the garden but then, gardening is never complete! This year may also see our attention given to sorting out Woodside Stream as it passes down the eastern border of the glebe [at which point it is more of a marsh than a stream].
