A dry one

Friday night took us by surprise - we were sitting on the sofa watching TV when we saw a flash of light. We literally looked at each other and asked 'what was that?'. It really doesn't take a genius to work it out, but with the day having been clear and bright, and a sunny day forecast for the next day, the possibility of thunder and lightning didn't even occur to us and we were genuinely puzzled - until we heard a low rumbling noise shortly afterwards. It wasn't long before rain was hammering on our sky light, and we went to bed to the sound of clattering rain and thunder. Thankfully the storm didn't last more than an hour or so, and by the time morning broke the clouds were dispersing.

This morning, our guest, Laura, was planning to catch the train to Florence, so we'd offered to drop her to the train station on our way out for our morning dog walk. So we all piled into the car and headed off for Pescia. On reaching the end of the drive it became clear that, for the hills just a little further up the valley from us, last night's thunderstorm had brought snow rather than rain - the hills were all lightly dusted in white. It always amazes me what a difference just a slight change in altitude and a couple of miles along the road makes to the weather.

As we drove into town the sun started breaking through and it seemed like it was going to be the clear sunny day that had been forecast. After dropping Laura off at the station and making sure she got her tickets OK, we stopped at Cafe Delice near to our chicken-run parking spot, where we quickly put away a cappuccino and a croissant each, before finally taking an increasingly impatient Reggie for his long awaited walk along the river bank.

Today was the first time in a while that we'd been able to see the bottom of the river - the water level was still high, but it was a lot calmer and clearer (crystal clear, in fact) than it has been for a while and the water seemed to be babbling rather than raging. Reggie had a great time, as always, and ran off plenty of his pent up energy.

After our walk we decided to pop to Borgo a Buggiano to call in at the agraria there to pick up a large sack of dog food. We'd somehow managed to miss that off the shopping list when we did the supermarket shopping on Friday evening, and rather than facing the supermarket again we decided to buy from the local agraria.

We then headed home and spent an hour or so clearing out and cleaning up in the utility room. Once our guest has left us next week, the plumber will be planning to come in and start on all the pipework for our new hot water system, which will involve running pipes through the utility room and down into the apartment, so it seemed like a good time to clear the room out, which has become a general dumping ground for items ranging from cat travel baskets to walking boots and washing powder.

By the time we'd finished that, it was such a lovely bright sunny day that we decided to have lunch outside on the patio. It was gloriously warm in the sunshine, and sitting in the fresh air with the sun on our faces while listening to the birds and taking in our beautiful view, we were reminded of how lucky we are to be here - we've had a fair bit of wet weather of late, and it's been a while since we've been able to sit back, relax and take our surroundings in.

It won't be long before this house disappears from our view. During the summer months the tree cover is so dense that we can't even see it.

Of course we didn't relax for too long - after changing into work clothes I headed down the terraces to continue to build a set of tyre steps on the bottom of the vegetable bed terraces that I'd started way back last summer, while Stuart turned his attentions to attaching the various connectors he'd bought from Frateschi yesterday to the three rain water collection tanks in position at the end of the house.

Determined to finish the flight of steps to the lower veg garden terrace!

After running out of tyres, and having come across one too many acacia root in the bank I was cutting into, I called time on the steps for one day and headed up to the drive to split some more logs while Stuart continued to connect up tanks.

First of three air release elbows fitted - we won't know whether they work until the tanks are full!

Lower tanks all linked with taps, pressure gauge and t-piece to link in the upper three.

The weather remained bright and sunny, as predicted, throughout the day and the sun was even hot enough on my back for me to work in a vest top while digging steps - the first time I've felt it that warm this year. It was also the first time this year that we've been able to continue working outside until nearly 6pm - the days are drawing out, which means we have longer to be able to get things done. Of course, the changes in the weather and the daylight hours are also having an effect on nature - we have crocuses all along the driveway, snowdrops on the banks, daffodils in the garden, blossom on the fruit trees, all around the valley the mimosa trees are in flower... and the grass is starting to get long and messy on the terraces. It won't be long before strimming season starts again!

We headed indoors at 6pm to get a fire lit - the days may be warming up but the evenings are still chilly, and after Stuart had been to collect Laura from the station we settled down to dinner, wine and a bit of Inspector Montalbano by the fire.

Sunday

On Sunday morning after a short lie-in we decided to take Reggie straight out for a walk, so we put our boots on and headed out. First stop was, of course, Da Nerone for a coffee and a pastry, before heading up the Sorana road for a change. It has been a long while since we headed up in this direction, and it was nice to have the change of scenery. We were heading for the wooded area a little way beyond Sorana - we've tended to avoid woodland walks in the winter for fear of coming across hunters and having to backtrack, but today it was nice and quiet with the exception of a farmer on his tractor. We found the track very muddy and churned up, and littered with fallen trees and branches. Clearly the strong winds of a week or so ago did more damage in this part of the valley than elsewhere. Reggie didn't mind of course, and kept disappearing off into the trees eventually coming tearing back down the track to find us just as we were starting to wonder where he had got to.

Before coming home, we made our customary stop at Amanda's to buy something for our lunch. Once again, Samantha cut up a couple of slices of bread and took them out to the car for Reggie, which he wolfed down with gusto - she's definitely got the hang of how to win him over now!

We then headed home to do a few chores before settling down for lunch. As we neared the end of lunch we both admitted to feeling extremely unmotivated as regards to getting outside to do some work. In contrast to yesterday's glorious weather, today was cloudy and grey, and while it wasn't particularly cold, it didn't feel very inviting. We toyed with the idea of lighting the fire and settling down to an afternoon on the sofa, and were sorely tempted, but our consciences (and those nagging chores) got the better of us so we made a deal that we would go and work outside, but that we would only work until around 4pm, at which point we would come in and light the fire.

Stuart decided to try and crack on with the pruning of the olive trees as it's a job that needs finishing before we get properly into the spring weather, so while he did that, and Reggie looked on from the garden, I got the hedge cutters out and cleared the section of terrace behind the old shed.

Come 4.15pm, true to our word, we packed up our tools and headed inside to light the fire, get showered and changed into comfy clothes and settle down for a relaxing evening - the way weekends are meant to be!

Rain, rain go away!

After a damp weekend we were due more of the same for the start of the week, which would mean yet more delays to outside work - but that mattered little on Monday as we had an apartment guest arriving so my day was to be spent turning it from a Christmas-decorated gym back into a decent and hospitable accommodation proposition.

I'm over dramatising a little - all of the decorations apart from the twinkly icicle lights that I'd stapled to the centuries-old chestnut beams had been taken down and put away shortly after Christmas, and all that was in there on the gym front were two bikes, one turbo trainer and two dumbbells. My first job was to remove all of the above before I could start working my way through our 'turnaround checklist'.

I busied myself until lunchtime, having done all but the floor mopping and bathroom cleaning, so we were in a good state of readiness at that point as we weren't expecting to collect our guest, Laura, until 4pm from Pescia train station.

As I stopped for lunch with Helen the rains arrived, meaning that after lunch, in order to keep the apartment clean, a second pair of footwear was needed so that I could change at the door when going in and out! By 3pm all was done and the gas heater was on to raise the temperature in there by  a few degrees ready for our guest's arrival.

Reggie had missed his window for a walk today, which wasn't ideal as he's always more vocal when he hasn't had a walk, but that was the way it was today and soon I was heading off to collect Laura from the train station. I soon spotted her exiting the station lugging a large holdall, so I pulled over in a very Italian way to load her bag into the car - by which I mean I parked diagonally across chevrons right outside the station doors.

After taking Laura to Esselunga to grab some supplies, we headed back up the valley to install her into the now warm and dry apartment.

Tuesday morning was surprisingly dry - the rain in the night had been quite heavy at times, so when her alarm went off Helen took the chance to head out for a bit of exercise, having all but written the idea off before turning lights out to sleep.

Once up, I plodded around in the house before taking Reggie out for a much needed walk: I checked and watered the garlic, which is now living in the poly tunnel, collected some wood for the fire and went up to see the chickens.

Garlic loving life in the tunnel.

Our white Livornese (leghorn) was in the nest box so couldn't collect any eggs, but I threw a handful of grain down for them as they really enjoy eating from the ground and nowadays get excited at the prospect when we go to see them.

It seemed the grain bin had had a visitor overnight, and a very determined one at that!

A very determined visitor.

One more night of this kind of behaviour and they, what ever they are, will be in and bathing in grain, so I guess we're going have to find a more robust receptacle very soon. It seems it's very easy indeed to underestimate the wildlife here and its determination - I can see it will be a constant feature of rural life in the hills in some form or another.

After doing the rounds, I loaded Reggie into the car and headed to the chicken run to give him a chance to run along the river which he did with gusto, chasing off a cormorant and the same pair of mallards three times, and another dog that was out walking itself.

There was a fairly strong breeze this morning but no rain, and it seemed likely to stay that way until 3 or 4 in the afternoon, so after our walk I went to the nearby garden centre 'Natali' for a couple of large sacks of compost for seed planting and some small plant pots, ordering more for tomorrow.

Once home it was time for lunch and lighting the fire not to mention tidying up a little in readiness for Samatha's weekly visit. This week, Samantha came prepared with a large hunk of bread for Reggie which seemed to do the trick very well and he was almost putty in her hands.

Wednesday morning it was group Italian lesson at Numero 182, so with the fire lit and coffee pot on, we awaited our guests and wondered how Reggie would respond to Johnny this week. Sure enough, Johnny was barked at, like last time, but the arrival soon afterwards of David and Sarah seemed to serve as a small distraction, and we were soon all inside and seated. This time we suggested that Johnny should sit furthest away from the door (and sofa) to give Reggie a little more space to come into the house. This seemed to work really well and soon Reggie was fast asleep in front of the fire having had a few sneaky sniffs of Johnny's knees beneath the table - a huge improvement over last time when we'd had no choice but to put Reggie in the car for the morning. Onwards and upwards we hope!

After lunch it was back to work and while Helen headed for the office I went down to the poly tunnel with a range of power tools and wood to see what I could fashion from the bits and pieces behind the house to act as shelves so that we could get on with some seed planting.

By the end of the afternoon and after many trips up and down the terraces for yet another drill bit or piece of timber I had our first set of shelves constructed. The shelves are free-standing so that should  the poly tunnel ever take flight in the strong winds we get here, the shelves and plants need not necessarily go with it.

Let the planting commence!

With tools put away and Helen having done her office work for the day we loaded Reggie into the car for a quick walk at the cava before the light faded. After that we headed home to light the fire and cook dinner. As our wood pile for this winter starts to noticeably diminish we wonder how many more fires are left before the warmer weather arrives - it's only mid February, but from memory the fire was out of action sometime in early April last year.

On Thursday morning David had offered to come down and help out again for a couple of hours, which he did, but not before a few kisses from Reggie and coffee first. David and I then spent a couple of hours working in the car park area while the electricity board's helicopter worked in the valley delivering materials to the car parking area down in Pietrabuona (not that we heard it much over the noise of the chainsaw).

Spot the helicopter.

I was logging more of the acacia for Helen to split later in the afternoon, while David worked on finishing the steps I had started toward the back of the house.

Looking good David, thank you!

By lunchtime the steps were finished and looking rather splendid and there was a huge pile of logs ready to split for Helen so we retired to the patio in just T-shirts to have a cold glass of white wine, such was the glorious weather today.

Once Dave had left and after Helen and I had a quick lunch, Helen changed to come outside and while she spilt logs I continued with some more logging until the daylight started to fade.

On Friday morning I headed out with Reggie for a walk while Helen got a bit of work under her belt before Sue arrived for coffee around 11am. Reggie and I arrived home just before Sue got here, so I lit the fire and put some coffee on as we all caught up with each others dramas and happenings over the week. Our most notable drama of the week was the arrival of Mr and Mrs Rat (and probably Ratty offspring), as by this time we'd worked out that our very determined visitor(s) gnawing through the chicken feed bins were the Rat family. As the saying goes, you're never more than a few metres away from a rat, no matter where you live, but in urban settings they're generally largely invisible, setting up home in the sewer system. In a rural setting, however, especially one with livestock and their associated foodstuffs, it's an occasional occurrence that one has to deal with - and now seems to be our turn.

After a quick coffee I left Helen and Sue chatting while I went to see Paolo at Frateschi to see what he had in stock for dealing the ratty situation. I rummaged around the shelves for about ten minutes while some Italian chap bent Paolo's ear over a new spade handle (not literally). Once the guy left Paolo made a sigh of relief and rolled his eyes - it seems this level of chat was extreme even by local standards.

Paolo apologised for not having any bait traps in stock but said he'd order some urgently for us. While there and having Paolo's ear to myself I decided to try and explain our rain water collection system to him to see if he had any useful bits and pieces so that I could finally get on with the next stage of the project, having now had our six collection tanks standing empty for about 9 months.

As it stands, I have put down concrete pads for the tanks to rest on, Kerys and Ben painted the first three tanks (black to cut out light to reduce algal growth) in the summer, and they the tanks have been sitting proudly in place on the pads for several months. However, before I can go any further I need some way of allowing air to escape the lower tanks as the water fills them from the tanks above - otherwise the air inside would effectively act as a massive airlock.

First three tanks sitting as they have been for months now.

Either my Italian was excellent this morning (which of course it wasn't) or Paolo had supplied parts for exactly this problem before, and he dragged me upstairs to the plumbing room. After giving me three 90-degree elbows, he left me rummaging through a box full of random washers while he went to serve the next customer who had just walked in.

Air release elbows.

I made it back home with my bag of elbows, washers and connectors in time to chat a bit more with Helen and Sue before Sue headed back into Pescia, leaving us to have lunch.

After lunch I headed up to Castelvecchio to see our friend Paul - not to only help him set up his inherited chain sharpener but to have a nose around the building works they're having done at their place. We chatted over a mug of Yorkshire tea and then traipsed around the muddy build site before playing with the chain sharpener in his man cave. The guys Paul has working there seem to really know what they're doing and I've no doubt the end result will be top notch - I'll be looking forward to going back and seeing the finished work.

We could have chatted well into the evening, but as it was I'd told Helen I'd be home around half three so that we could go and do the food shopping so I headed back down the hill to collect Helen and head to Esselunga.

Having done the food shopping last Friday and thoroughly enjoyed having the entire weekend to ourselves without the trudge around the supermarkets hanging over us, we'd decided to do the same again this week, especially as we'd been promised a couple of dry days this weekend - a good chance to get some work done together outside.

With the shopping done we headed home to start the weekend with some wine and a toasty fire.

A wet weekend

After having been away in the wet and windy UK last week, and having had to get my head straight back down to work after coming home, I was looking forward to a nice weekend getting back to Tuscan farm-life. As it turned out, both the weather and a cold I'd brought back with me put paid to much in the way of, well, anything. Nevertheless, it's good to be home.

Saturday

Saturday morning started out unexpectedly dry - we knew that the forecast was for rain this weekend, so we decided to take the opportunity to go and walk Reggie before the rains arrived. After a bowl of porridge each therefore, we put Reggie in the car and headed out.

Our first stop was of course for a coffee at our local bar in the village. While drinking coffee we were surprised to see a fire engine and another fire brigade vehicle turn up in the car park opposite. The owner of the bar (Sig. Nerone himself) explained that they had probably come to sort out the small landslide, or frana, that had happened on the hillside just behind the restaurant, and sure enough that is where the firemen were heading.

Over the last few days, the amount of water in the rivers and streams around here has increased significantly - the stream that borders our land, which dried up completely during the long heatwave of the summer, can now be heard crashing along down the hill to join the larger river in the valley bottom. The drop in the river in the village is usually all but a trickle rather than a fall, but at the moment it's almost enough to rival some of the falls we're used to seeing in parts of England - while it's not a spectacular drop, it would definitely qualify as a small waterfall.

It's little wonder, with the amount of rainfall we've had, that small landslides have also been occurring in various places around the valley - thankfully, nothing to have caused us any interruption in going about our business (so far at least)!

Anyway, with caffeine onboard, we went back to the car, where Reggie seemed to be getting worried that we might have forgotten the reason for coming out in the first place, and we headed up the hill towards Vellano.

We were disappointed to see a collection of 4x4 vehicles containing tell-tale high vis jackets on their seats at the start of the Obaca track that we sometimes use. This was clear indication that a hunt was either in progress or about to start. Until very recently, the wild boar hunting season in Tuscany lasted from September until the end of January. A couple of weeks ago, however, a law was passed that allows hunting in the region on 365 days of the year - for the next three years. For us, this is disappointing because the hunters can cause significant disruption. We've lost count of the number of times we've headed off to a nice woodland track to walk Reggie and had to re-route because we've come across a hunt - while the hunters themselves wear high vis jackets for safety, hapless dog walkers are not so well prepared, and of course we can't run the risk of Reggie tearing off into the woods and coming across the hunt.

The Obaca track runs just beneath the cava track that we often use, and which was where we were heading. We thought that we might be OK on the cava track though, if the hunt was only just starting we might have finished our walk before they made it up as far as that. We parked up at the quarry therefore, and started out. We were soon turning back, however, but this time not because of hunters but because, just beyond the water fountain near the start of the track the path was blocked with fallen/felled trees! There was quite a lot of chain saw noise, so whether they were trees that had fallen and were being cut up to clear the track or whether they had been purposely felled we weren't sure, but it was clear that we weren't going to get past the obstacle, so we did an about-turn.

We headed up the road with Reggie on the lead for a while until we came across the footpath that leads (eventually) to the village of Macchino. We hadn't tried this path before, although my Mum and Dad walked it when they visited in October, and our friends David and Sarah have often walked it, so we decided to give it a go. It was a lovely path and it was nice to try a different route for a change. Reggie had a great time crashing through the undergrowth and spent a fair while terrorising the little stream that crossed the path.

After a nice walk, we drove back home, left Reggie to doze on the sofa and headed into Pescia. We had some business in town - I wanted to see if I could change the doctor with whom I am registered to one who I have been told speaks very good English. This feels like a bit of a failure - I have to admit that, before we moved out here, I was sure that by the time I'd been here for nearly two years I'd be pretty fluent in the language (ha! dream on!) - but while we continue to plug away at trying to crack the language, and are making good progress, it is clear that we have an enormous way to go yet and where things like medical and veterinary matters are concerned, it's important to have clear communication, hence my decision to switch to an English-speaking doctor. Of course, the process of doing the switching itself involved going into the health service offices and speaking in Italian, but I'm pleased to say that I managed that part fine and we were both a little shocked to be walking out of the offices within a couple of minutes, having accomplished what we set out to do, without any confusion or obstacles. This has to be progress!

Since we'd parked our car near to Chris and Sue's, and had managed to complete our business in town in record time, we decided to pop in and say hello. We therefore spent the next hour or so sipping tea/coffee and Lemsip (did I mention I brought a stinking cold back from England with me?) and catching up with the Phillipses. Of course, Stuart had only seen them a couple of days previously, but it had been a while since I'd had the pleasure, and as always it was lovely to see them.

We left the Phillipses just before 2pm and headed back home for a late lunch just as the rain came down in earnest.

After lunch, with the weather clearly not being conducive to any form of constructive outdoor work (nor my sense of well-being if I'm honest, as I sniffed and sneezed my way through the day), we decided to take a trip to Montecatini to try and pick up a few bits and pieces. Our first stop was the garden centre to try and buy some compost so that we could do some planting in our poly tunnel. Unfortunately this particular garden centre was more about the plant than the substrate, and we left empty handed. Next stop was the pet shop Arcaplanet, where we picked up 6 ham bones for Reggie (which should last him a few weeks!) as well as some chews and a packet of treats for Florence. Then it was on to Stuart's favourite, Obi. I managed to feign interest while in the shop, and we picked up a new curtain pole but failed to find a tin of natural wood oil for the beehive and failed to find a suitable new light for the bathroom. Finally, we called in at Decathlon, where Stuart managed to pick up two new pairs of work trousers (which in fact are hunting trousers). While I'd rather he wasn't mistaken for a hunter, I am relieved that he will no longer have to walk around in his old work trousers that have holes in all sorts of inappropriate places!

By the time we got home after our shopping trip it was time to light the fire and settle down for an evening indoors listening to the rain hammering down outside.

Sunday

We woke on Sunday morning to the sound of rain still drumming on the skylight/roof window, and the familiar sound of drips dropping through the window and into the three tupperware boxes that are strategically placed on the landing to collect them. It was the sort of weather that makes you want to stay huddled under the duvet in bed, but with Florence pacing up and down across us on the bed and Reggie starting to 'sing' from his crate downstairs, it was clear it wasn't going to be a duvet day for us!

After sorting out the animals, we had a quick bowl of porridge before agreeing that we would brave the weather and take Reggie for a walk in town - at least we knew it would be quiet! We all put on our waterproofs (Reggie included) and set off.

After a stop for a quick cappuccino in Nerone's bar, we continued on down the road into town, parked in the car park next to the old flower market, and headed off along the river bank. By the time we'd reached town the rain had eased up a fair bit - which was just as well, seeing as Reggie had managed to wriggle out of his rain coat while in the car. He'd somehow managed to end up with it tied around his waist, making it look as if he was wearing a skirt, so to save his embarrassment I took it off him before he jumped out of the car.

The river was fast and furious again today, having been swelled by the rain of recent days, and I watched Reggie like a hawk lest he decide to try another swim! Thankfully, he stuck to the riverbank for the most part, and only ventured to the water's edge to have a quick sip of water. The rain came down again while we were out, but by this time Reggie couldn't have cared less, and he ran around happily.

With our walk done, we headed back up the valley, making our regular Sunday stop at Amanda's for our lunch and to collect our homework. Samantha was intrigued to learn that bread is Reggie's favourite treat: we had walked into the shop carrying a loaf of bread we'd just bought from the bakery in town. As this wasn't something we would normally do, we explained that we'd had to bring the bread into the shop with us, because if we'd left it in the car there would have been none left by the time we got back, such is Reggie's penchant for a fresh (or even not so fresh) crusty loaf. After checking with Amanda if she could take a slice of bread, Samantha headed out to the car to try and cement her friendship with Reggie via a tasty slice of Tuscan loaf. Reggie was a little uncertain at first, but the bread won him over, and he even let Samantha pet him. The last time she'd seen him had been when we were just about to rush to the vet with him after his strange episode during the week, so she was pleased to see him feeling more like his usual self.

With our lunch and homework procured, we said goodbye to Amanda and Samantha and headed back towards home. As we were approaching the house, a familiar GB-plated car was just pulling away - it was our friend Paul, who had dropped by to drop off some spare chilli seeds but had found us out. We invited him back in for a coffee, so he turned the car around and followed us in.

We had a good chat and catch-up with Paul, exchanging news, stories and experiences and promising to go up and see him again soon - we have yet to see his and Kathy's house in the daylight! After saying goodbye to Paul we put our lunch in the oven to heat through, lit the fire (which we promptly took our eyes off - meaning that no sooner had it caught than it had gone out again), washed up the dirty dishes, and settled down for lunch - stuffed squid, a salt cod and leek stew, rosemary roast potatoes (of course) and some chard.

After lunch, we re-kindled the fire and I sat down in front of my computer... to order a dishwasher.

A dishwasher seems like a big luxury (and indeed it is), and I know that many, many people manage without one. It's also true that part of our reason for being here in Italy is to streamline, get away from unnecessary gadgets and lead a more simple, traditional lifestyle... but the dishwasher is something that we missed when we first moved out here, and something that we continue to miss, almost two years later. Part of the reason for this is that our kitchen here is small, and there is nowhere to pile the dirty plates other than on the cooker top. It's true that we could wash things up as we go (and we try to do that when we can), but without any hot water in our kitchen taps, the process of washing up involves filling a kettle, waiting for it to boil, before finally filling the sink and doing the washing - making it more economical in terms of both time and electricity to wait until there are enough dishes to wash to make it worthwhile (which means the dishes pile up on the cooker)... I've lost count of the number of times we've had visitors pop in unexpectedly and we feel our toes curling in embarrassment at the stack of dirty plates on display by the sink. So, after 21 months of living here, we finally took the plunge and ordered a dishwasher today and we look forward to a life of relative luxury with slightly less cluttered kitchen surfaces (at least a dirty-crockery-free cooker top). What's more, having a dishwasher will also make the sterilising of preserving jars all the more easy, so we should also be onto a winner when it comes to making chutneys, jams and preserves. Now we just have to wait and hope that the courier will be brave enough to make it down the drive to deliver it!

With the exciting prospect of a dishwasher to look forward to, and with the weather improved, but still grey and damp, we decided to spend the rest of Sunday afternoon by the fire, hopefully charging our batteries for the week ahead.

I leave you with the latest round up of photographs from our wildlife camera, which is currently fixed to the pole of our rotary washing line a short distance from the house.

Definitely a cat, but it's not Florence.

Fantastic Mr Fox?

Again, not Florence.

The traveller returns

Monday morning started with a couple of hours of blogging to get the weekend's post published. It seemed like a nice gentle way to ease my way into the week, and it was - until I went to publish the post and found that my web browser had lied to me when telling me it had saved the post and instead it had binned the lot, meaning I had to start the whole process from scratch! That was not something I felt like doing immediately, and in fact if I hadn't have left the house immediately I think the laptop would have been in extreme danger.

Reggie benefited from this in that, when I left the house to try and calm myself down, I took him with me, figuring I could walk him and give myself time to calm down at the same time. This meant that by the time I got home, I was in a good enough frame of mind to be philosophical about the recent loss and start on version two before carrying on with the rest of my day.

Tuesday was the day Helen was due home after her flying visit to England - but before she got home I had a few things to do!

Having got to bed early, I got up early and was out walking Reggie by 10.30am, having already put the first coat of plaster on the blocked up doorway in the kitchen.

Feeling very pleased with myself for having already achieved so much, I decided I had time to pop in and say hello to the Philips household on my way home, and we spent an hour or so chatting over a couple of pots of coffee. It was great to catch up with Chris and Sue - it felt like it had been months since I was last there (and quite probably was!).

Once home and after eating a quick lunch I made an effort to tidy up and do a few chores before hopping in the car to head to Pisa airport.

As I exited the autostrada I saw the familiar orange-and-white of an Easyjet plane coming in to land - 20 minutes ahead of schedule - which meant that Helen was through passport control and we were leaving even before we exceeded the free ten minutes of parking outside the terminal.

I was as happy to have her home in our little piece of Italy as she was to be home after a day of travelling by train, plane and automobile, and even Reggie made a really good show of being excited when he realised upon our return that I wasn't alone.

On Wednesday morning it was back to work for both of us, but not before heading into to Pescia to the bank to arrange a transfer to pay for the solar panel that had been delivered last week. Of course we also stopped for a quick a coffee before heading home, although not at our favourite haunt Franco's, as they were closed - as were almost all of the businesses in town, since today was a bank holiday. Luckily for us, the bank itself seemed to have missed the memo on that.

While Helen switched on her PC for the first time in almost a week I put a second coat of render on the wall in the house, which took us up to lunchtime.

After lunch we headed up to Vellano for our group Italian lesson. For those paying attention and wondering why our lesson was in the afternoon this week, it was because we had been asked the previous evening by our teacher Johnny if we would mind switching the lesson to the afternoon for this week (only). We didn't know why he'd requested the change until he arrived for the lesson - it turned out that he'd spent the evening of yesterday's festival at a club near Pisa, not getting home to bed until 6am today! Oh to be young again.

The lesson took us up to around 4.30pm after which it was time to go home and for Helen to do another couple of hours' work. While she got stuck in, I headed straight out up the valley again, this time with Reggie in the car. We stopped in Vellano to collect David for a short walk at the quarry before the daylight disappeared. Reggie thoroughly enjoyed himself, as he had clearly given up all hope of a walk today - not only that, but the extra treat of having his second-favourite male person join us for the walk was almost too much excitement for him to bear.

On Thursday there was due to be a break in the weather, and David had offered me a couple of hours of his time - which of course I accepted. Dave and I therefore spent the morning erecting the poly-tunnel that we'd ordered months back and which had been in its box being moved around since then.

It was a cool but beautifully sunny morning, which made for an enjoyable couple of hours' work while we built the tunnel and put it in position. By the time the tunnel was in place, it was time to stop for a beer and lunch - Dave and I had the beer that is, and then Helen and I had lunch before we tidied the house ready for Samantha.

After having my homework marked by Samantha, I ducked out of the lesson to get back to the poly tunnel, hoping to bolt it down before the winds of the last couple of days returned and blew the entire thing down the hill and into the river Pescia or beyond.

After a lot of walking up and down from the shed to the tunnel to find the right combination of drill bits and bolts I had the tunnel safely (I hope) anchored to four very heavy and dense concrete blocks.

After then plumbing in a standpipe and tap outside for watering whatever may be in the poly-tunnel in coming weeks, I headed up to the house to call it a day.

As I approached the door it opened and Reggie wobbled out - he didn't seem right at all, and I dropped to my knees to catch him as I could see he was about to lose his balance. He seemed unsure of what was going on and although he was standing, his back legs had gone completely and it was only because I was holding his hips that he didn't fall over, then his bladder gave out and he urinated where he stood - not good signs, and Helen wasted no time in asking Samantha to call the vet for us. Thankfully, Helen's lesson had just come to an end and ten minutes later we were Pescia-bound to go and see Alessandra, the nice vet we saw with Reggie a few weeks ago, to get him checked over. By this time he was much more himself, whatever crisis it had been having passed, and he put up the usual fight when we tried to get him to go into the vets.

Once in the consulting room, I had to sit on the floor in the corner of the room with him before Alessandra could get near enough to get a stethoscope on his chest to see what was going on.

She said that his heart was giving an odd third beat - nothing at this point to worry about, and she didn't think it was related to the earlier episode. In fact, she thought that the most likely explanation for the earlier episode was a mild epileptic fit (although he is quite young for this, epilepsy not usually showing up until around the age of 3), so we went away with instructions to watch him and if the same happened again to check the colour of his gums and his pupil response immediately to try and help identify the source of the problem.

Feeling somewhat drained, it only having been a few short weeks since we lost our poor little Lucca, we headed straight home for a glass of wine, bypassing the supermarket shopping which we had considered doing while in town.

Before we knew it, Friday was once again upon us and Reggie and I started the day with a walk as he had clearly been frustrated yesterday when we drove him all the way into town merely to be prodded and poked at the vet, and not even stopping at the river for a walk on the way back.

I decided to head for the "chicken run" stretch of the river and was surprised to see evidence of how high the river had been in recent days by means of a tide mark high up on the bank.

I'm pleased to announce that Reggie had his first swim this morning - he hadn't planned it though! He spotted a couple of Mallard ducks within reach of the bank and charged at them in full-on predator mode. Of course, as soon as they saw him coming they took to the air, but Reggie was determined and kept gunning for them - all of a sudden disappearing into the river up to his collar.

I stood speechless for a second, expecting the still raging water to take him off down stream. Thankfully those strong limbs of his carried him straight back to dry land with something of a surprised look on his face. By now I was almost wetting myself with laughter, which he chose to ignore as he came as close to me as he could to shake himself dry.

Once home and with the doggie dried off, I started work on the final and third coat of plaster on the wall in the kitchen. I'd been looking forward to putting the final coat on all week, and had Dave not offered to come down and help out yesterday I think I'd have been doing it yesterday despite the weather being dry. As it was, I'd made the best use of the dry weather with Dave, and was finishing the final coat as the rain started coming down outside.

When Helen had finally clocked off her office work for the week, we braved the supermarket shopping, after having avoided it yesterday. While it is amongst our least favourite chores, our cupboards, fridge, and most importantly wine rack were entirely empty, so if we wanted to eat, we needed to shop! Of course doing the shopping on Friday meant that we would have that particular chore out of the way for the weekend, which we felt good about.

After having done the shopping and put it all away, we lit the fire and settled down with a glass of wine at the end of another lightning-fast week.

No wife (temporarily) and it's showing.

2 points of business before I get into the business of the weekend.

Firstly, to Ian Whalley and all others that we're somewhat offended by a rogue apostrophe in the title of the weeks blog (I would have been too), I do know better despite my below par schooling and put it down to an over reliance on the editing department, a department which is blatantly absent, hence the error, I hope we haven't lost too many readers because of it :-)

Secondly a apology for the brevity of this post, I had spent two hours this morning writing and publishing the post only to find that Google Chrome was lying to me when telling me it was saving the post as I went along and then lied when it pretended to publish it, the end result I had lost the lot and wasted two hours of my life, I immediately grabbed the dogs lead and left in my wellies before the laptop took the brunt of my frustrations.

So, to the post...

Saturday morning was still dry, the wet weather that had been forecast had now been put back until sometime this afternoon so I headed out with Reggie for a walk in the dry.

After Reggie had a good charge around the river and in it, we headed homewards stopping for a coffee at Nerone on t he way, me that is not Reggie.

After a good run around we headed homeward bound stopping for a quick coffee at Nerone on the way as he was pouring the frothy milk into the coffee I noticed other English voices in the bar.

I took it upon myself to go oveer to them and say hello and they quickly invited me to join them and we sat and chatted for a pleasant half an hour, they were a couple of guys from London who have a holiday home in the valley somewhere near Medicina and were over doing a bit of work on their place and had stopped for coffee delaying a trip to OBI for paint, sounds like a familiar story and I can't blame them for not wanting to rush over there.

It turned out they had found this very blog only the night prior and had been reading it with interest as they had viewed our house sometime around the time we were doing viewings ourselves, yet someone else that could have been living here instead of us had things been a little different.

They were very complimentary about what we'd done to the place so far which is always nice to hear and we parted company saying that we would stay in touch, I said they should come and see what we'd done so far if they were interested which they indeed seemed to be.

It was on leaving that I wondered if Tom was the same guy I spoke to about our internet service sometime last year when a guy called me having been given my number by the now infamous Brad from Italia WiFi, anyway, that will be a question for when our paths cross again unless you're reading Tom? Did we speak last year?

After getting home I decided to cook lunch so that I could get out and do a few hours work as soon as possible before the rains arrived.

Lunch and tomorrow's breakfast in one tasty swoop.

After lunch I headed up the terraces to do some more pruning as I've seen a little growth on a couple of the trees so really want to get this finished sooner rather than later and if I needed any further convincing I noticed that both the Almond, Apricot and Fig trees are all in bud, the plant life it seems have all decided winter has run its course.

By mid afternoon I had pruned as much of the remaining olive trees that I could reach and decided rather than climb up high into them to try and finish to job I would replace our extendable pruners and do the job safely, especially as Helen wasn't around to scrape off the terraces and take me to A&E should I slip.

With that done I decided to spend the remaining couple of hours tidying up the parking area some more so lit a fire to burn another heap of wood splitting detritus while I set to work on a washing machine I'd picked up from the bins on Thursday afternoon after dropping Helen to the airport, there was another shiny steel drum inside and I wanted it for another fire pit, I won't need ever need 4 but It seemed a shame to let the scrap man have it when I could give it to friends or sell it even, it turns out they sell for anything up to €40 on ebay!

It wasn't long before the raging fire was dying down and I'd made a real mess with the washing machine, this one being the least happy to give up it's drum meaning I had to resort to cutting the back off with a grinding disk and then smashing the casing around the drum with a hammer.

After that was done and the carcass loaded into the car I decided to have a little play on the tractor, having acquired a manual for it in PDF form over the internet last week I was keen to try out the gearbox now that I had instructions for it and I can confidently say I can use all 8 gears now!

After unloading the last of the gravel collected from the gates at the house I put the tractor under cover and went indoors for the evening, the rains still not having arrived.


Sunday the rains arrived in earnest waking me up at 5am briefly by drumming on the roof window.

I finally woke up at nine and got up to take Reggie out for a walk, dressing him in his coat this morning as the rain was coming down earnestly.

He let me put the coat on without fuss but looked more than a little embarrassed when I tried to take his picture refusing to look at me except for out of the corners of his eyes.

Take your stupid photo quickly will you and let's go!

I pulled in to Nerone first though for a quick coffee in an unusually busy coffee bar, there was only standing room not that it mattered as coffee is only accidentally served too hot to drink here, coffee culture isn't about sitting around sipping litres of hot coffee, coffee is functional and as such is imbibed quickly, which I did this morning, paid and left.

No sooner had I pulled out onto the road than I saw a guy hunkering under an umbrella at the bus stop with his thumb out in my direction so I stopped to see where he was going...Pescia bound, so I told him to jump in.

Reggie was not contained to the boot as I had took he bars out to go and dump the old washing machine yesterday evening and not put them back in so he now hopped into the back seats as this short exchange was going on and he got up close an personal with this intruder growling at him at full volume.

The guy was too busy collapsing his umbrella and trying to get into the car without getting too wet to notice and when he shut the door Reggie instantly shut up and backed down, I guess with nowhere to run to he had chosen to trust me and my decision to pick this guy up and he didn't make another sound.

The guy seemed nice from the brief exchange the short trip into Pescia allowed, apparently he had met a girl on facebook and moved here from Milan to be with here, bit odd but love has it's way of doing things I guess.

Reggie and I then had a nice quiet walk along the river in town, it's reliably quiet when it's raining and I quite enjoy being the only one out when it's raining like this although we both got more than a little damp despite Reggie's coat and my umbrella.

That patch of grass is MINE!

When we got home a dried Reggie off as much as I could before the towel became the subject of a game of tug-of-war then gave up to light the fire.

I spent the next couple of hours while Reggie snoozed on the sofa building the flat packed bee hive that arrived last week

The 'brood box' and the 'super', the brood box is the living quarters of the colony,
the Queen lives here and lays eggs, young are hatched and some honey is stored here too.
The super sits on top and has the newly invented flow frames for easy honey extraction.

We're 'Founding Supporters', this is the inspection door to the super so that we can watch progress.

...and behind the door the cells of one of the flow frames.

The flow frames from the front, tubes are inserted into the bottoms and honey drained out, sounds too easy.

The finished hive...well almost, just needs a couple of coats of oil now and of course some bees!

By the time I finished it was time to change into 'civvies' and head up to Vellano to Join David, Sarah and their friends for lunch at Manero's as well as Donatella who joined us, we were just missing Helen to complete the gang.

Lunch was the usual epic affair and I didn't leave until 6pm leaving the rest of them to watch the remainder of the Chelsea vs Man United game on the TV with Fabrizio the chef.

Once home I settled on the sofa with Reggie for a while in front of the fire and Helen and I even managed to find time to talk on the phone rather than message which was really nice, her busy schedule hadn't allowed her time to call up until now.

Shortly after we put the phone down I found myself descending into something of a meat induced coma so took myself off to bed for an early night.

You'll be pleased to hear the next time we post Helen will be home and will have edited the entire lot before it makes it gets to your eyes for reading.

A taste of England...or at least its weather.

Monday was looking like the only dry day of the week according to the forecast so after breakfast I left Helen to settle in front of her computer while I headed out to acquire a few bits and pieces in town.

First port of call was a return visit to the agricultural merchant 'Sorini' to get that new pair of welly boots I talked of getting recently as after another walk along the river in my current pair last week and getting home with sodden feet I decided it was time to retire them and get a new pair.

It was a quick exchange, trying on both a 43 and a 44 and making sure I had winter sock space, I left with the 43's very pleased that these were yet another acquisition not only from a local store but that that they were also made within the bounds of the country within which we live, i'm still amazed at how much is still manufactured over here unlike back in England where a few years back I quickly gave up the idea of producing a website to list items made in England (for people wanting to not only reduce the carbon footprint of what they buy but to try and keep their money in their own economy) because I could find very little that was now manufactured in the U.K. other than some plastic buckets at that time sold in Wickes!

So, with wellies on board I dashed down the road to fill up the car as I was now just a stones throw away after which I made an about turn and headed back towards Pescia stopping at the garden centre to see if they had any garlic left for planting as the last bunch we bought but hadn't quite got around to planting had already gone soft and mouldy! I don't think they enjoyed living with the dehumidifier in the utility room

Luckily they did, although not many showing just how late it now is for planting garlic but there was enough for us this year as having been too late to plant any at all last year anything was a bonus.

On a roll and feeling motivated to work outside in the sunshine in the veg garden this afternoon I headed for the other agricultural store we frequent to buy another box of 250 large steel 'staples' used for pinning down the ground control fabric that we have around most of the veg beds, in which we clearly have too few as the winds of late had got underneath a lot of the fabric and unpinned it for us damaging a couple of the remaining artichokes that had survived the heatwave of last year.

With a heavy box of staples in the boot and the time approaching midday I headed home feeling very pleased with my mornings procurement with a plan of an early lunch so that i could get outside without delay to make the most of what little working time I was going to get this week.

After a lunch of egg mayo sandwiches on fresh crusty bread with our own free range eggs Helen went back to work in the office and I headed out onto the lower terraces with the box of staples to carry on pinning the fabric back down and coiling up the irrigation tubing so that we can prepare the veg beds.

It wasn't long before my hoody was off and I was working in a t-shirt for the afternoon and I plodded away draping lengths of fabric and stapling as I went eventually breaking into a sweat...a sweat in winter..IN A T-SHIRT!

I got to a point mid afternoon where I had pinned all the fabric back down meaning we were back to where we were before winter and had the irrigation coiled up so now we were a baby step forward, any progress at all is good around here some days!

Starting to look tidy again!

Not wanting to let the new batch of garlic go the same way as the last and it being the last day of January I went to pot the garlic cloves up.

Once the garlic was done the daylight was soon starting to dim and the sun was heading earnestly in the direction of the hills opposite promising to disappear behind them in the next hour so I headed off up the terraces behind the house into the olive trees to do a little more pruning until Helen finally emerged from the office looking more than a little disappointed that she wasn't going to be able to see the day out swinging an axe into acacia logs, this was largely my fault for not having cut any more logs from the trunks we had lying on the driveway.

Garlic!

It was soon time to head indoors as light was fading quickly now and the temperature would be dropping with it also so time to light the fire and make dinner before settling down in front of the TV for an episode of Inspector Montalbano.

Tuesday was a complete turnaround and the English weather arrived, grey, completely overcast and raining, so it was a day for us both to inhabit the office and while I dove into the heap of paperwork and emails that had been waiting for me since building the desks before christmas Helen did some real work, work that paid money, money that meant we could be here doing what we're doing.

We broke from work for lunch after which we gave the house the usual quick tidy before Samantha arrived for Helen's lesson, I say Helen's lesson but since I have been getting homework from Samantha as well for the last two weeks (i'm still not sure quite how that happened) I've been joining in at the beginning to get my homework checked, eating into Helen's lesson time, not that she seems bothered by my joining in, in fact the opposite this week as she encouraged me to stay and parrticipate for a large chunk of the lesson while we covered pronouns some more, I really wish I'd paid more attention in English at school as i'm finding my complete lack of understanding of grammar something of a hinderance when learning Italian as this new language we're wrestling with is ALL about just that...grammar.

As Samantha was leaving Donatella arrived with a lump of handmade butter for us, not made by her but bought by her for us to try, it comes from a farm north of us in Tuscany near the ski resort about an hour away, let me explain a little more...

Lovely artisan butter, amazing on toasted sunflower bread!

Donatella has recently joined a scheme for producers of all sorts of things, in the main largely edible items but not exclusively so, it's a nationwide scheme but each area has it's own setup and is basically a way of small producers selling their produce locally to members and of course a way of local people to buy locally produced items also, a fantastic idea that we hope to be a part of in the not too distant future not only as an outlet for some of our products but also to cut down on our food miles while supporting local folk and the economy that we're in, this has lead me to a grand idea of working towards eliminating the supermarkets altogether, something that will take a huge amount of effort and time on our part but a great goal to work towards as we continue to build our more sustainable lives here.

Once we'd taken the butter from Donatella, and Reggie had had chance to put muddy paw prints all over her coat she left along with Samantha and Helen and retired indoors for a little more office work which ended quite late by our standards at some time around seven.

The fire having been lit at lunch for the lesson needed little encouragement to get going again and we settled into dinner and another bit of TV in the form of 'Endeavour' which felt like a real luxury.

Wednesday brought with it yet more rain and another damp reminder of the weather we thought we'd left behind although we soon banished the cold from the house by lighting the fire, not something we normally do on a Wednesday morning as we're normally heading up tot Vellano for our group lesson but we had finally got around to offering to host the lesson this week.

Johnny was the first to arrive having found us without problem and even managed to negotiate our still lumpy entraceway in his Panda.

As I greeted him Dave and Sarah arrived and we walked along the back of the hoouse to see how Reggie was going to be with the new face, at first he didn't notice Johnny as he was too excitied to see Dave and Sarah but when we opened the gate to walk in he went nuts, Reggie style, barking his head off and running around in circles along the fencing refusing to get too close to Johnny.

We all went indoors for coffee and Johnny ignored Reggie as suggested but it didn't stop Reggie barking at him making it all the more difficult to ignore him as it was hard to hear a word of conversation above Reggie and his lungs.

He slowly started to settle approaching for a crafty sniff of our new guest occasionally but then retreating into the garden for a bark, this wasn't going to be easy.

Reggie eventually ended up in the boot of the car with a bone so that we could get down to business, the business of yet more pronouns, it was a slow but very good lesson, and I'm now convinced that if I could get these pronouns fixed in my head it would make a massive difference to my language skills in both constructing sentences and understanding people, more so the latter but for now I'll have to be happy picking my way through tables of pronoun options and labour over the sentences they need to be inserted into until I figure out the right option...is it ci or vi or li or ti or la or lo or gli, I think you can see the problem.

Amazing sunflower seed loaf from Sarah.

The afternoon was spent in the office as the rain hadn't let up, well that was Helen and I spent the afternoon in the office, Reggie spent a large portion of the afternoon letting himself out into the garden and barking into the woods towards the old stone quarry, a part of our land we don't visit often, I have no idea what it was that had annoyed him so much but this was the second day he'd been doing this with no sign of letting up, in fact as I sit here right now he's out doing exactly the same again...in the dark this time, it's a good job we have no real neighbours to speak of.

Thursday was a complete change in weather and by the time I got up at half eight it was clear blue skies, the sunny weather originally forecast for the weekend having got impatient and edged it's way into the tail end of the week.

Helen having finished her usual morning exercise went for a shower after which we ate breakfast and then loaded Reggie into the car for a walk in town choosing for a chicken run walk so that we could take in a couple of the very good cappucini served at Bar Delice near the parking spot.

Sunny walk beside the river.

Coffees dispatched we ambled along the river bank under clear blue skies to our usual point of turning back bumping into three other dog walkers today, we clearly weren't the only ones with the same idea this morning.

By the time we got back home it was almost noon so Helen finished packing and we sat down to lunch and all too soon it was time to get into the car to take Helen to the airport for her trip back to England for a whistelstop visit of family and friends.

After a teary goodbye at the airport I left her in the queue for security and left to head home to see what mischief Florence and Reggie had been up to while I was away, but was pleased to see nothing was out of place when I got back and think Reggie had probably been sleeping the entire time I was out.

I had already given up on the idea of squeezing in an hours work outside and instead lit the fire and sat in front of the computer for a while to start typing up the blog for the week, a task I later found was on a to-do list left for me on our bed by my thoughtful wife who was now 1000 miles away in England.

After the majority of the blog was done and the laptop battery died I cooked dinner (vegetable fajitas for one) and then sat in front of the TV to watch a film with Reggie although Reggie slept through most of it, I think he lost track of the plot within the first two minutes so gave up and I have to admit to getting to the end of the film and couldn't explain what was really happning either, it was an old film by David Cronenberg called Naked Lunch from back in 1991, complete madness!

After the madness had ended I headed up to bed to see Florence and get stuck into a book but it wasn't long before lights out as I didn't want to wake up too late tomorrow as the plumber was due to deliver the solar panel!

I awoke around quarter to nine when Florence finally started asking for breakfast, either that or she wanted to go out, either way I jumped to it and she followed me downstairs hopping through the catflap, the noise of which started Reggie complaining to be let out and after charging outside to see if he could see Florence he charged back in for his breakfast.

Before I knew it Anton the plumber had arrived with one rather large solar panel,they look much smaller up on the roofs of houses!

After making a space around the back of the house and helping him move it into place Angleo arrived and together the three of us walked around the house an apartment planning how to run the pipework so that work could start in the next couple of weeks, work that I'm sure Reggie will hate if today's behaviour was anything to go by, he barked almost without stopping to breathe for over an hour until they left, after which he went in for a drink and a lie down.

It was now 11am already so after a quick bowl of cereal I started work on the remainder of the waste pipe work in the hope that I could tick this rather important job off my list today finally, a job that I'd been leaving until Helen had left for England so that she didn't have to endure any more disruptions.

With renewed enthusiasm for the task and knowing all too well that not only after half six today would I not be able to buy any further bits I may need and that more days of rain were due to arrive in the morning I had a short window of opportunity to get the house connected back to the septic tank.

It wasn't long before I had fitted one of the remaining three inspection ports and was feeling very optimistic for the day, even as the church bells chimed midday.

A walk in the woods amongst the clouds (earlier in the week).

With this bit of the job done and having worked out now how to fit the last two inspection ports I knew I needed another two repair joints from Frateschi, but it was now almost half twelve, too late to get there before lunch closure so it was a good time to take Reggie out for a walk so that he could get rid of some of the mornings tension, we headed up the valley to the quarry so that he could have a charge around in the woods which he thoroughly enjoyed, disappearing out of earshot on more than one occasion.

After our lovely walk in the dappled sunshine we headed home for lunch after which I headed out to Frateschi to buy the repair joints as well as half a dozen bags of render and some 25mm water pipe that I had decided would be good to run from the rain catchment tanks along next to the waste pipes and out towards the veg garden so that I could then bury it along with the other pipes, this pipe being much more sturdy than the current garden hose would be.

Paolo sent me home with a whole 100m roll of this pipe and told me to bring back whatever I didn't use on Monday or Tuesday and pay him for the amount I had taken, very trusting and much better for me as I can lay the pipe out and cut off exactly what I needed which I did after fitting the last two inspection caps.

So finally with all the inspection caps finally fitted, the mains water for the house re-routed along the same route, a new rigid pipe for the new irrigation system and the electric cable for the security lights all run along side each other I could start work burying the section I needed to and making the place look a little more tidy finally. BIG TICK!

By the time i'd finished and feeling quite filthy after messing with soil pipe all day I headed indoors to light the fire, shower off the days grime and sit down in comfort with a glass of red to finish this very blog post for you all.

Did we mention our bee hive arrived this week!

Here come the daffs!

Not wanting to be outdone by the daffs the Iris make a show.

HAPPY WEEKEND ALL!