Ok, so off with the rose tinted spectacles......

The biggest, and best achievement recently has been the granting of Full Planning Permission. Yippee! But whilst the large principles – size and scale of our project – are granted, we have serious concerns with some of the decisions that have been forced on us. So we can tick the 'Planning Achieved' on our (non existent) project plan, but we are going to go straight in for 'Alterations'. The most serious for us is that two of the bedrooms have only been allowed obscure glass windows – who wants a child's room overlooking beautiful scenery that you can't see through?

 

 

Our euphoria at getting planning permission was also quickly dashed with the arrival of Structural Engineers and Building Regulators. Unhappy with the structural designs and taking one look at the thick pure clay, the Building Inspector closed the site down. We had builders on site ready to start digging the foundations!

The clay (and its non porous qualities), a huge Weeping Willow, Lleylandii and our proximity to flood plains mean that the foundations have to be very very deep. Too deep for normal concrete foundations. So we've now had the clay tested for its Plasticity – which came back as 41% or High – and we are going to have to pile our foundations. I've watched enough 'Grand Designs' to know that this means more time and lots more money. Piling means the creation of stilts that go deep down to hit the bedrock for its stability. Ours will be 8 – 10m deep with heave boards which allow the clay to move/expand/contract without cracking the building.

So our lovely builders are off the job and we need to find a speciality Pile company (am I the only one who secretly sniggers Miranda-like at the word 'pile'?)

Separately we have had to part ways with our original Engineer and recruit a new one. Our initial drawings were called into question and combined with his lack of service skills meant he was difficult to work with. All very stressful. 

Upshot of this all is that we won't even start foundations until Jan 14 and at greater cost. 

We have progressed the converting of the house - it is now a shell; all internal walls have gone. Steel joists are on order to create a larger living room and utility room. The house is split into two by a block work wall; to get in one side you have to climb up into an external door. To get to the living room you have to take down a temporary MDF shuttering so we go there very rarely. 

Halloween passed without the Boggy Creek monster getting me in Eric – phew! A close friend's sister is a forensic specialist – and she offered to look at the bones we'd found. I'm glad to report that non are human! Two are a calf's right knee joint; there's an adult dog, possibly an adult goat and finally something smaller like a pig or sheep. So no plague pits then, thank goodness.

With the winds of the storm in October, the last vestiges of autumn have gone. In its place is mud, mud and more mud. I've banked the Disco Bus in the mud once already; much to Jules' horror. (It did come out after much effort on his behalf). Getting anywhere from Eric and Ernie is becoming treacherous. We are employing several strategies at once to keep the garden stable; carpet, gravel, garden slab and MDF boards to name a few. I'll report on the efficacy of each material in future blogs.

Living in Eric is getting harder too. Keeping him dry is proving impossible; we are currently sharing him with small mould cultures and a damp sheen on virtually everything. So we've upped the heating; preferring electric oil heaters rather than the expensive gas bottles. I'm trying dehumidifier gel pellets but I've read that it's like trying to dehumidify the sea.

The best bit of the last month has been the digger. The builders gave me the key and a short lesson prior to the weekend and off I went. I've demolished two robust sheds and dug a 30m trench for a new hedge. It was just brilliant fun; quite addictive and absorbing. The best bit was when the builders complimented me on my trench thinking I'd done it before (or do they just want more work?!?) 

We all had a go; the kids all drove it around and dug up some of the rubbish piles. I have to say the females were really good; calm and methodical. The younger males were more erratic and wouldn't listen to instructions!

 

We celebrated Livvy's 11^th birthday with a sleepover in Ernie – so the girls had the run of their own caravan which would've been perfect except for the regular loo trips into Eric throughout the night. William lost another tooth as a result of munching into one of our pears. This was the second tooth in Over; the first got caught on the trampoline net mid jump and was yanked out. It got lodged in the netting!

 

 

Lastly the head gasket (don't ask me what that actually is) in the Disco Bus has finally broken meaning that instead of buying a double cab Pick Up Truck that I was coveting, we've bought a people carrier as our main car. In true Lerway tradition we've gone for another Japanese Import with blinds, double bed and two man tent awning – the Bongo!  

With much sadness the Disco Bus is relegated to Refuse Dump trips until it finally gives up the ghost. I'm not emotional about cars usually but he has provided us with some fabulous memories. RIP Disco Bus.  I'm usually recognised locally by the Disco Bus so if you see another space wagon with a mad woman waving to you; it'll be me!

'The Legend of Boggy Creek', fruit gluts and an Asbestos Anniversary

Over the past two months that we've been living in Eric, I've been having flashbacks. A long forgotten memory of being scared silly keeps coming back. The film was about a large hairy bog creature thing that tormented a family in a trailer – well that's what I remember. A scene where a large hairy arm comes in through an open window remains etched in my brain – it scared me then, and now comes back when the dark descends over Eric. Woooo-oooh, Happy Hallowe'en!

 

 

We're settling into trailer life in all it's glory. We're warm and largely dry but the full eight hours sleep has eluded us for a few weeks now. Even the little snuffles we all make in sleep sound loud in a static, and some of us (not me!) emit long reverberating snores which are disturbing our littlest hobo. She only has one volume setting to her voice – foghorn – and when she can't sleep, no one can as she complains bitterly about the snores.

 

 

Autumn has gripped the household. Our harvest of apples, pears, plums and greengages has astounded us. Despite at least three years of neglect, the orchard of around thirty trees is still producing large quantities of fruit. In an attempt to enthuse the children one day, their Granny suggested a stall out front to sell the produce. And thanks to the generosity of passing cyclists, drivers and dog walkers they made over £20 in two days. Well into October, we're still collecting fruit – and caterpillars. I found one dead in my bra after apple picking one day – but as my husband says, what a way to go!

 

 

 

 

The Planning Application continues to drive me hopping mad. The short story is that it is looking likely we will get permission for a set of diluted design plans we've put forward. Great. The long story revolves around a Planning Department that's archaic, over bureaucratic and smug. The sheer subjectiveness of their decisions astounds me. 'I don't like it so you can't have it' seems to apply. If we had been assigned another, less officious and more pragmatic Case Officer we might be getting a much more aesthetically pleasing design......

Good news is that the builders start this week taking internal walls out of the existing house, and the deep ground works should begin the day after our Planning Permission should come through – 12^th November. It will be a big boost for morale to, at last, have some visible pushing forward of the project.

Whilst we are in the period of Halloween, we have been finding bones. Quite large bones. I'm not worrying too much about why they are there; I don't think they are human and that's good enough. After a conversation today regarding historical plague pits in people's gardens (still off limits for digging, just in case they can still contaminate) ….... I'd prefer to think they are bones from the odd cow or fox come to a natural end. And to add to the All Hallows theme, we have some owls that visit mid evening and hoot and hoot and hoot. 

We have a new member of the Lerway caravan team; today we were given 'Miranda the Marauder' from some good friends who were scrapping her. She's been put in the orchard, in her last resting place, as somewhere to go if you want some peace!  

Lastly of note, we celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary in late September. We spent the day emptying a full 16ft skip of inadvertently loaded asbestos – our alternative to the traditional giving of 'tin' to each other! 

 

Thanks to Abi for supplying some great photos.