My Heart Was In My Boots

This one is for  Meggie on the Prairie.

This was the side courtyard at the 'forever' cottage which I left behind

I vividly recall the day The Byre became ours.  It was a bleak, bone-chillingly cold day - inside and out.  I stood in the dirty, shabby, building and wondered what on earth we had done.  I couldn't believe that I had agreed to leave my 'forever' home.

The Byre was built to be the cow shed, stables and cart shed for The Old Farmhouse.   We had already agreed that our daughter and her husband should have the original farmhouse, we would have the other building and turn it into something which should suit us for a long time.  The location was ideal, the gardens large, the potential enormous.


An old brick, high in the house wall, over what would have been the original front door had been scribed with  J&D April 20, 1861.  That seemed to be the clincher.  Our daughter is called Davina, her husband is yet another Jonathan.

J&D?  A sign that it was meant to be?

I wandered from room to room, across carpets which stuck to my boots, trying to avoid the dirt on the woodwork, hardly daring to breathe in the kitchen - and let's not even mention the bathroom.    All enthusiasm, motivation and inspiration had deserted me.  It felt as though it would never return.  I truly could not see myself living here.

We had some friendly discussions!

It took a couple more weeks of wandering around the place before an idea, for how we could be comfortable in the place, began to form.  We wanted fewer, larger rooms, no need for an en suite as it would normally only be George and I living here, open plan for the living area.  We thought, and re-thought, decided on what we would really like and what we could do without.

The 1970's kitchen

We had decided on the layout - based on the original location of doorways and openings and worked the rooms in to fit.  We consulted with the local planning people - very discouraging.  He told me he would oppose our proposals!


That was just what I needed.  Red rag to a bull!  My enthusiasm suddenly took a leap, we would fight them on the beaches, if necessary.  I wanted those plans passed.  We got a local architect to draw them up - if only Jonny had done his architecture degree by then he could have saved us the fees!

We got ready for battle,  prepared our defences - and felt almost deflated when it was passed first time!  Ready or not we were in business.   So we set to and stripped back as much of the building as possible.  We filled skip after skip and ferried countless wheelbarrow loads of rubbish out of the house.  We prepared the way for the builder to come in and do his stuff.

He stripped it back even further, until eventually it was practically just four walls left flapping in the wind as we waited for the new roofing timbers to be fitted.   We hadn't wanted to go that far, but we had found, as we stripped it back that the roof comprised three separate sections and would need to be unified.  Just what we needed!

We took this rainbow to be a good omen!

I fear I have gone on too long and will have to make it into a two part post.   Apologies!

PS.  We checked on Old John today, he remains battered, but undefeated.  We'll keep looking in on him.