PEAR TREE LOG

pear tree log: I started this blog to keep my younger son, Jonny, in touch with life in Lincolnshire, while he spent a year working in China. That year turned into five! Now he is home and training to become a physics teacher. This is simply a patchwork quilt of some of the things I enjoy - life in rural Lincolnshire, our animals, friends, architecture, books, the gardens, and things of passing interest.



Sunday 12 February 2012

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.

12 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. It was a very pretty part of the garden - it was peaceful and calm, plus it had a wonderful grapevine growing there. George used to harvest the grapes and make the most awful, paint stripper wine from them.

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  2. What a formidable undertaking! I would have given up as soon as the planning council gave me problems. Was their objection that the buildings were historic? I'm glad you stuck to your guns and made such a lovely home for yourselves. Glad to hear John is doing OK, as well.

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    1. Ms Sparrow, The planning officer objected to the fact that we wanted to convert the rest of the building and thereby create a second bedroom. He didn't want more development within the countryside. So, our plan still used the whole interior of the building, but we kept strictly to the original number of rooms. We may use the official diningroom as the second bedroom ... but that is our business.

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  3. This is going to be good! Yea to the planing commission members who out voted Mr. Stick In The Mud.

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    1. Joanne, You got it in one! He is well known locally as Mr Stick in the Mud. Of all the planning officers who could have been allocated our case, he was the one I didn't want it to be... but it all came good in the end. The building is still all that it was, and although we took it back to bare bones we kept as much of the original as was salvageable. It should be good for at least another 150 years.

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  4. Oh, Elaine, thank you so much for your post today. As you already know, I have a similar story. Now I know, that you know, what it is like to be faced with mountains of garbage and trash to be taken away, rats and birds to move out of the house, and the list goes on. I'm anxiously waiting for the rest of your story....

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    1. Meggie - You are truly most welcome! It took a while to find the photographs as they were stored on the main computer (and I favour my laptop) but we got there in the end. It was a challenging renovation and restoration - and I am pleased that we did it, but I don't think I would like to do it again. We still have lots of ongoing work and finishing off, which we do as and when. I look forward to reading your story Meggie!

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  5. Looking forward to reading about and seeing more of the transformation. Your courtyard garden looked wonderful. Do you have something similar at The Byre?

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    1. Scarlet, That little courtyard was beautiful - alas it exists no longer. The people who bought the cottage extended out into it. That really saddened me. The Byre gardens are nice, I do like them, but - don't tell George - they do not compare with the previous garden for sheer beauty and the feeling of tranquillity.

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  6. What a tremendous amount of work. It looks so daunting and I can imagine how overwhelmed you must have felt at times. I am looking forward to the next installment.

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    1. Evlyn, I am so pleased you are enjoying it. It really wasn't supposed to be quite that big a job, but ultimately we have ended up with a house which feels wonderful and works perfectly for our simple lifestyle.

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