I do appreciate that anyone reading this blog over the last week could have thought that I was on my holidays in France, with some justification.

I am, however being reasonably functional.
I am here to answer all the questions of the workers, and, more importantly liaise between them.
Because the French system is more separate than ours this means that I am directly contracting a builder, a plumber, an electrician and a carpenter.
On the whole they all communicate together well but occasionally they need me to negotiate, difficult with my far from perfect French.

This week is my first attempt to perform this role, heretofore very ably handled by Sile with her superior French.
I am however managing much better than I expected, they are patient with me and , should all words fail, we get by with hand signals and sketches.

Here are some pictures of the work in progress, they will be difficult to interpret by anyone not familiar with the house but will, hopefully start to make some sense as the work progresses.

This is the second attic bedroom, now much extended by losing a large piece of (redundant) corridor. This will be reserved for family and other freebies.

These are the windows and frames made by the carpenter for the window in Sile and my attic bedroom.

And this is the space into which they will go.

At the very top of the stairs there was a little useless room we called the nuns prayer room because it had a strange red plastic window.
The builder said that the walls were shaky so we decided to pull it down.
A good decision, as we then discovered that this was how it had originally been with the bannister making a little landing.

This the large attic room which is having a large chunk cut out of it for a bathroom, this is going to be “family” space, as the attic is where our bedrooms will be. (One of the few consessions to luxury here is to have a bath large enough for me)

And again the new bathroom shaping up.

This is a view of the whole attic room, bathroom to the left and remaining space will be a sort of family escape hole, sitting, breakfasting kitchenette.

If you peer through the lttle window you will see a family having lunch in the place outside their house, we are after all in France.

And in the garden a surprise, all the clearing had allowed these to flower. Although they look like large crocuses they are in fact (Colm tells me) a type of autumn daffodill.

And this is the Castor Oil Plant.
(a small explanation is necessary)

My sister D was staying with us the first easster we were here when Sile spotted a large castor oil plant growing up the wall in front of the winery which is just in front of the house.
Aha! says Sile looking at the plant. “That’s a castor oil plant”
“Is it” says sister D, looking at the winery “I thought it was a wine making place”

Since then M. le Vinticulteur’s wine making area has been known as “The Castor Oil Plant”
It has always been without much activity but in September, we have discovered the place becomes a hive of activity.
A virtual cabaret in front of our eyes from our terrace.
Colm and I are having constant disagreements at what the machines, which seem very sophisticated, are actually doing.

The trouble was that the tree our Chinaberry tree, has grown enormously with the rains of June and our garden watering so its branches are virtually obscuring our daily show.
Yesterday Colm mended this by going up the tree with a ladder and saw and creating a proscinium arch for daily entertainments.