1.25pm, Thursday 26th June, 2025 – the roofers exit stage left:
The renovations, extensions, remodelling, and general future proofing are all done, all finished, 5 years, 3 months, 13 days since we moved in, just before the first Covid lockdown, and 8 months, 16 days since we eventually sold Coven Sud (so finally had enough pennies to finish all we wanted to do).
There’s definitely another post coming soon about the re-roofing just completed, including how I had to peel some stickers off their star chart on Tuesday (something I spent all my working life telling teachers, parents and others never to do) due to my raised blood pressure, but how all ended happily with an excellent job that exceeded our hopes, the area around the house cleaner than it was before they started, and everything now uncovered, stowed and ship-shape. And nothing broken by either roofers or scaffolders!
But, for now, we are celebrating.
Almost immediately they left, with home-made strawberry ice cream (with added chocolate drops on top for Mr BW) and a bottle of Cava:
And very soon with a very early night with no need to wake up at 6am to be ready for workmen before 8am.
And breathe…
Mr BW
Ahhhhhhhh
Kippy
What a long challenging journey it has been. It must seem odd to not see building materials or equipment outside or works in progress inside. Enjoy your lovely home and property!
Scoakat
Interesting how the flat dormers angle back to the roof for the water to run down the crease, but it seems they know what they’re doing and it all looks sharp. I don’t recall seeing flat dormers like that over here, but now I’ll be aware to notice.
Congratulations!
Tim W.
Cava – made traditionally, so underrated, and SO MUCH better than Prosecco, made by the Coca Cola method đŸ™‚
Well done!
Blue Witch
Kippy – thank you; although, there will forever be piles of building materials and tools around as we keep useful things to re-use or re-purpose eventually, and we still have many projects that we will do – but they are aesthetic, creative ones, by us, which are fun! The biggest thing to celebrate is NO MORE ANNOYING WORKMEN!!!
Scoakat – you are very observant! The picture does accentuate the angle, but, as you say, the dormer tops do lean back slightly so the rain/snow don’t cascade over the front, and the muck doesn’t gather on the front lip. I’m not a fan of dormer windows, and we did consider making them pointy, or slopey, but it would have been a lot more work/cost and it was unclear whether the roof timbers in their present form could take so much alteration (ie it would have needed a structural engineer’s opinion, plans being drawn up, maybe planning permission, maybe building regs oversight, then reboarding, replastering, and repainting all the upstairs rooms inside, where we had already long-ago finished decorating and carpeting – huge cost, time, mess), plus the roof depth is really too shallow to make them look proportionally correct anyway. Plus it would have made no difference to the inside, and when outside I do not spend my time looking up at the dormers. So we stuck with the 1974 look (put in when the house was originally renovated from a wrecked traditional old cottage with linear attached barns). The ‘rubber’ covering on the dormers is much better than the roofing felt they are traditionally done with, and is guaranteed for 20 years. “Sharp” is a good word – not a word you hear used in that sense very often over here, but yes, they have done an excellent and precise job. Even Mr BW was impressed!
Tim – Amen to Cava. In general I don’t like Prosecco – and definitely not the sort sold in supermarkets in the UK.
delcatto
And breathe…
Congratulations, it’s been a long and stressful haul for you both.
Enjoy the ice cream and Cava but more especially your lovely home.
delcatto
And breathe…
Congratulations, it’s been a long and stressful haul for you both.
delcatto
Lol.
My comment was refused because of too much content in a short space of time?! Now it publishes both!
Z
Wonderful. Have a lovely, restful July.