Tag: plumbing

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Snowy days and wall foil

It snowed again overnight. We awoke to brilliant white, and the strange, blanketing silence that a covering of snow brings to the world.

Silence that is, apart from the raven, who called loudly from the old pine as the sun came up.

Husband managed to get out to insulate the water pipes yesterday, just in the nick of time. We had running water this morning for coffee, despite the overnight temperatures.

We’re cracking on with the interior wall foiling now, fuelled by hot coffee and egg butties.

Even though the house is a shell without insulated flooring or plasterboard yet, the solar gain from the big, south facing windows, coupled with a small 3kw heater is maintaining a temperature of about 13 degrees centigrade.

Which considering the temperature outside, and the volume of air to heat in this 200m2 space, is pretty good.

We think that this bodes well for when the house is fully insulated and sealed. It should be very energy efficient and cheap to heat.

Just what we need.

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Autumn cladding progress


Pictures taken on a blustery, rainy autumn day last week on the island. The first frosts were a few nights ago, so autumn is definitely well underway.

The larch cladding is nearly complete now. There seem to be a few bits left around the rear dormer bathroom window that have yet to be finished, but the scaffolding is down and we’re hoping that these remaining areas won’t take long.


We’re also still waiting for the water to be connected.

What’s needed before we can get approval to connect is a small value, simple return valve, but it seems that obtaining one and getting a plumber to fit it is holding everything up. It’s frustrating at this stage with just weeks to go until we will be living on site. We can’t live for long without piped water to the caravan, and with no date in hand for this to be done it’s a worry on a very long list of things to think about. It will happen.


I can’t wait for the larch to weather. It looks strangely stark in the landscape at the moment in its raw colour, and I much prefer the muted grey tones of weathered wood.

We have neighbours in a nearby  village on the island who have also just built a larch clad home and who are a few months ahead of us in terms of build progress. Theirs is silvering already, so I’m hoping ours will soften too very soon.