Aaaaand relax!

image from Magnific.com

Until the next crisis comes along, at any rate 😏

I left you on Friday with the rebuilding almost complete, with virtually all that was left to do was put back those lovely old coping stones.

As I said, because of not having all of the old stones available to reuse, the new wall is lower than it was previously...

...as you can see from the much smaller and lower shaped section where the two walls meet.

We will be adding some planters along here in due course to stop folk toppling over into the shared driveway on the other side 😳

We will do likewise along the wooden retaining wall, to provide a visual barrier, as there is another drop there ~ ah, the joys of living on a hill with a garden sloping in two directions 😏

Of course, now that this length has been rebuilt, the garden side of the other section is looking even more scraggy than it was before!  At some point we will get George back in to re-do the mortar along there to tidy it up.

The new pillar really helps to marry the two sections of wall together...

...and distract from the straight and not-so-straight lines 😄

George then re-did the mortar on the rest of the wall...

...which made it look so much better!  I'm really happy that the dratted crocosmia is no more.  We filled in the gap with more stone chippings which has widened this end of the drive a little.  It all looks so much tidier now and we (and our neighbour!) are extremely pleased with the end result ~ thank you for all your hard work, George 😊

Beware the YouTube rabbit hole!

image from Magnific.com

As promised ~ and before I forget again 😏 ~ here in no particular order are some of my favourite sewing and refashioning YouTube links:

https://www.youtube.com/@StephanieCanada

https://www.youtube.com/@gettheetothestitchery

https://www.youtube.com/@rachelmaksy

https://www.youtube.com/@shesewsseams

https://www.youtube.com/@AshLG

https://www.youtube.com/@tmyershandmade978

https://www.youtube.com/@HandCandylady/videos

https://www.youtube.com/@b_stephanie

https://www.youtube.com/@AnnasKitchenAndStitchin

And lastly, although he's not a sewing/refashioning YouTuber, I really love watching Jude's weekly videos about life in his cottage and garden:

https://www.youtube.com/@rewildingjude

Hope you enjoy them all as much as I do 😊

Peace...

 

www.allposters.co.uk

Father, Mother, God,

Thank you for your presence during the hard and mean days.

For then we have you to lean upon.

Thank you for your presence during the bright and sunny days.

For then we can share that which we have with those who have less.

And thank you for your presence during the Holy Days.

For then we are able to celebrate you and our families and our friends

For those who have no voice, we ask you to speak.

For those who feel unworthy, we ask you to pour your love out in waterfalls of tenderness.

For those who live in pain, we ask you to bathe them in the river of your healing.

For those who are lonely, we ask you to keep them company.

For those who are depressed, we ask you to shower upon them the light of hope.

Dear Creator, You, the borderless sea of substance, we ask you to give to all the world that which we need most.....PEACE.

Maya Angelou

(4th April 1928 - 28th May 2014)  

Let the (re)building commence!

image from Magnific.com

Before I continue with the saga of the garden wall I thought I'd let you know that despite the weather warming up, the smell of decomposing rat seems to have dissipated 👏 We did have a brief episode of flies suddenly appearing in the dining room, which were coming up through cracks in the floorboards of the cupboard under the stairs.  Thankfully there wasn't a huge number of the blighters and that, too, seems be over.  I admit that I am still a wee bit paranoid about every little creak but hopefully things have calmed down now 🤞 

Anyhoo, back to the wall!  George had got this far before we went south.  I mentioned yesterday that there was slightly more of an issue with the rest of the wall than had at first been apparent.  It seems that when this section had been rebuilt back in the mists of time it had been lined up with the rest of the wall, which must have been bowing out to some degree even then.

Of course, George was rebuilding in a nice, straight, line which meant that there was going to be a discrepancy between the two sections of wall 😏

The solution he came up with was to incorporate a pillar between the two sections.

This actually helped in a couple of ways...

  ...it added some support to the section that wasn't being rebuilt, as well as giving both sections a point where they could be "tied in".

It also helped to disguise the fact that one section is properly in line whereas the other definitely isn't 😳

It's a double-sided wall, with the void between the two sections filled with concrete and some of the more "rubbly" pieces of the old stone.  I was a very happy bunny when George sent me a photo update whilst we were away, showing that the garden was now contained by the wall once again! 

Obviously George didn't end up with the same amount of stone available to use as the original builders had started off with.  As I've mentioned previously some of the old stone had decayed too much to be reused, and of course some had to be incorporated into the new pillar. 

Consequently the rebuild is lower than the old wall was.  You can see in the photo above how the garden wall was built into the wall running across the garden, which itself was built into the side of the house.

You may not recall but our greenhouse was built on the other side of that wall.  Like the garden border wall, this was also not in good condition.  The greenhouse was built with concrete blocks, the full-height back wall of which was "tied" to this old wall to stabilise it.

Looking good from both sides 😊

The photo above shows more clearly how much out of line the old section of wall actually is.  Had we had more funds available we may well have had the whole length of the wall rebuilt.  Unfortunately we just didn't feel that we could afford to spend that amount of money on what would in effect be aesthetics as opposed to a genuine need for rebuilding the whole wall.  It is what it is ~ after all, you do have to cut your coat according to your cloth 😉

You can't make an omelette without breaking some eggs...

image from Magnific.com

This particular "omelette", of course, being our pesky garden wall 😏

George began the task of dismantling the stones, cleaning and saving as much as possible to be used in the rebuild, including all the lovely, hand-shaped, beautifully weathered coping stones.

A lot of the stones were in good enough condition to be re-used but not all of them, unfortunately.

The original wall had been built straight onto the ground, with no foundation.  These two big pieces of granite were a tad too much for George to move far, so he just left them in situ!

He was as surprised as we were to find that the "good" soil went all the way down.  Those weird little things hanging down, by the way, are the pins we used to hold the weed membrane in place 😄

We had quite the pile of demolished wall sitting in the shared driveway for some time.  Although the drive isn't suitable for vehicles to pass along it, we are nevertheless very lucky that our neighbour is so understanding 😊

George numbered all the coping stones, putting them to one side to be placed back on the rebuilt wall in due course.  Looking at the section of wall which wasn't being rebuilt, you can see that there was a little more going on there than had first been apparent, which meant an addition to the remedial work was going to be needed 😳

It was a relief to see the concrete foundation in place so that the rebuild could get underway.  I must confess that I found this stage of the proceedings as worrying as discovering the dire state of the wall in the first place.  I was very concerned that the garden would simply collapse with no wall to support it!  George reassured me that the soil was well enough compacted not to move but I admit that I wasn't totally convinced, even though he obviously knows what he's talking about ~ and you'll no doubt be pleased to hear that he was of course perfectly correct😄    

Little words of wisdom

 

The house that just keeps on giving!

image from Magnific.com

You may remember me telling you in a previous post that we have had a major issue with one of the front garden walls ~ putting it bluntly, the damn thing was in very great danger of falling down if the situation wasn't remedied PDQ but definitely had to be done before next winter 😦  So once again we found ourselves calling on the trusty services of George to come and sort it all out for us, and I'm very pleased (and relieved!) to report that the work is all finished now.

There are a helluva lot of photos to accompany this latest saga, so I'll be dividing them into a few posts over the coming days!  Today's offerings give you an idea of the deterioration issues we were facing with the wall:

With masses of rampant crocosmia at its base, it wasn't until the bloody stuff had died back that it became horribly obvious that the wall was in trouble.

As you can see, it's a long stretch of stonework with no pillars to break it up.  It was also terribly bowed at the end nearest the house due to a sycamore (which we had to have removed when we first moved here) growing so close to it.

The photo above shows the bowing much more clearly!

George examined the wall and told us that it would need to be rebuilt from about where the stone chippings are in this photo all the way back up towards the house, where the greenhouse is.

The rest of the wall had apparently been rebuilt previously and although not in perfect condition, George said that it would be possible to simply do some remedial work along the base and repoint the stonework.  This came as something of a financial relief; as I'm sure you can imagine the rebuilding of just half of this wall has taken an enormous chunk out of our living room renovation budget.  Oh well, we've lived with the living room in its current state for eight years, so another couple won't matter much in the scheme of things I guess!  Some stuff just has to take priority 😏

"Proper" sewists.....

image from Freepik.com

.....may I humbly suggest you look away now 😉

In a previous post, I threatened suggested I might humour the latest whirrings of my little butterfly brain and have a go at sewing myself some clothes.  But Sharon, I hear you ask, in your very-nearly-65 years on this planet have you actually ever sewed a garment???  Not so as you'd notice, nope 😏  Do I then hear you sigh and ask: but presumably you're going to plough on and have a go anyway???  Yup, I most certainly am 😏  No doubt your final question (before closing your eyes and wondering if I've finally taken leave of what little sense I had left) will be: are you going to take sewing classes and do things "properly"???  To which my answer is "have you learned nothing about me at all whilst reading this blog???"  Of course I'm not, my lovelies, I shall just blunder forth making it up as I go along and hope for the best 😏

Having said all that, though, I have found myself going down the proverbial rabbit hole of sewing videos on YouTube and have found some that I think are fab ~ I will share them with you in a future post 😊  I have also come across lots of ideas on Pinterest (many of which I've pinned to my boards, as you will see if you click on the link on the right-hand side of this page 😉), along with various tutorials from blogs that I have stumbled upon in my travels.  So I suppose in all fairness I'm not going into this new adventure totally clueless theory-wise, but it's certainly not something that I've had actual hands-on experience with!

There are a couple of reasons why I'd like to try making myself some clothes.  The first is that I really like the idea of making something from scratch, in a style and fabric that I like, instead of "making do" with what fits me and doesn't cost a small fortune 😉 

I'm finding that I am increasingly drawn to more colourful, perhaps slightly "eccentric" styles.  Mind you, to be fair, I've always had a hankering for the styles that I've saved on my Pinterest boards but haven't had the courage to actually dress in that way.  When I was young I think it was the thought of just fitting in with what everyone else was wearing rather than being confident enough to dress in my own style.  Then as I got older and put on more and more excess weight, it was a case of hoping that no one would notice me if I tried to blend into the background.  Of course that is a ridiculous way of thinking because no amount of dark clothing is going to hide the fact that I am a very big woman ~ albeit one who is currently over two stone lighter than she was 😊  I finally reached the point where I just thought "sod it" ~ hence my upcoming sewing adventures 😁

As I mentioned above, I am still on my weight-loss journey.  I have got clothes in smaller sizes but will definitely need some more in each size as I go down the scale.  I'm thinking that elastic waists on skirts and trousers, and billowy, breezy styles in tops and dresses will be very useful to bridge at least a couple of sizes ~ perhaps even more.  I also like the idea of upcycling clothes so hopefully I won't be having to send too many things off to the charity shop!

I mentioned in that earlier post that I'm going to start by making myself a skirt as I hadn't found anything that appealed to me.  Well, since then I have come across two that I really liked.  I couldn't make up my mind which one to buy though ~ so I've bought them both 😄  One has an elastic waist and the other is a wrapover-style, so I'm hoping that they will see me through some smaller sizes as I shed more weight.  I had also found a skirt from JD Williams (where I get most of my clothes from) that has a shirred waistline.  It's a size smaller than I was wearing and fits really nicely.  I think it will be fine for the next couple of sizes down.  

When I was sorting through my smaller sizes recently, I found a skirt tucked away that I had completely forgotten about.  To be honest I don't know why it was in the next size down pile as it easily fits me now.  In fact I'm going to have to alter it as it's a bit too long now that I'm not quite so "bloated".  It's in a border print fabric, so I'm going to hack it from the top.  It's got an elastic and cord waistband at the moment, so I'm going to cut that off and make a new waistband just with elastic.

This means that instead of just having one skirt, I now have five 😏  Despite this I think I will still start off this sewing lark with a skirt ~ or perhaps to be slightly more accurate, a petticoat to wear beneath my new skirts.  That way I will be more comfortable wearing said skirts once the weather starts to get cooler again in the autumn ~ layers are definitely the way to go, methinks! 

We've got such a lot to do out in the garden this summer that I may not have the energy to start my sewing adventures for a few months, but never fear as soon as I do you will be hearing all about it, my lovelies, so brace yourselves 😉

Peace...

www.allposters.co.uk

Father, Mother, God,

Thank you for your presence during the hard and mean days.

For then we have you to lean upon.

Thank you for your presence during the bright and sunny days.

For then we can share that which we have with those who have less.

And thank you for your presence during the Holy Days.

For then we are able to celebrate you and our families and our friends

For those who have no voice, we ask you to speak.

For those who feel unworthy, we ask you to pour your love out in waterfalls of tenderness.

For those who live in pain, we ask you to bathe them in the river of your healing.

For those who are lonely, we ask you to keep them company.

For those who are depressed, we ask you to shower upon them the light of hope.

Dear Creator, You, the borderless sea of substance, we ask you to give to all the world that which we need most.....PEACE.

Maya Angelou

(4th April 1928 - 28th May 2014)   

Little words of wisdom

 

Peace...

www.allposters.co.uk

Father, Mother, God,

Thank you for your presence during the hard and mean days.

For then we have you to lean upon.

Thank you for your presence during the bright and sunny days.

For then we can share that which we have with those who have less.

And thank you for your presence during the Holy Days.

For then we are able to celebrate you and our families and our friends

For those who have no voice, we ask you to speak.

For those who feel unworthy, we ask you to pour your love out in waterfalls of tenderness.

For those who live in pain, we ask you to bathe them in the river of your healing.

For those who are lonely, we ask you to keep them company.

For those who are depressed, we ask you to shower upon them the light of hope.

Dear Creator, You, the borderless sea of substance, we ask you to give to all the world that which we need most.....PEACE.

Maya Angelou

(4th April 1928 - 28th May 2014)  

Little words of wisdom