More House Tiddling

I often say to Andy, 'Next time I have a brilliant idea, tell me to step back from it immediately,' and he always says, 'No, your ideas are always good,' so he never does and thus I carry on regardless, crashing from one idea to another and leaving a trail of destruction in my wake. I would add, though, that the destruction generally precedes the rising of something fabulous (because my ideas are rarely whim-laden) but when we are halfway through one of my idea processes we generally wish we hadn't started and I know we are both silently cursing the day I said, 'Wouldn't it be a good idea to (insert latest idea here)?'

Anyway, about two months ago I raised the subject of a wood floor for the dining and living rooms. Andy immediately capitulated so I found a carpenter and by the time I had finished discussions with the carpenter we had agreed a wood floor, plus a bespoke office space under the stairs (computer desk, shelving, storage, that kind of stuff) and the removal of the entire bannister and spindle set up on the stairs to be replaced and the bannister rail located on the opposite wall. I told Andy of the two additional mini-ideas I'd had during the carpenter visit. He nodded. He knew it was too late to back out now.

Our cottage is pushing 170 years old. It was built in the days when damp proofing wasn't de rigeur and the most practical solution for flooring in a farm worker's cottage was quarry tiles. Quarry tiles have to breathe in order for the moisture from the bare earth upon which they are laid to escape into the atmosphere. If you put a wood floor straight on top of quarry tiles, then, you are asking for trouble. Also, quarry tiles can make for a bit of a wonky floor which is no good for laying a solid flat floor upon. Therefore, the carpenter left instructions for a self levelling compound to be installed, two layers of, with a damp membrane in between.

A flooring specialist was found. He suggested two layers of self levelling compound plus a damp membrane sandwiched in between which is EXACTLY what the carpenter said so I knew this chap was the right person for the job. And not the other guy who quoted for the job who said something about one layer of something or other which sounded like the cheap and shoddy option we wanted to
avoid. The only fly in the smooth ointment of the plan was that the carpenter couldn't start the work until 3rd September and the closest the flooring guy could get to that date was today and tomorrow because he was then going on holiday for two weeks. Ah well, minimal living we could could cope with and I told myself that from today it would be only a month before everything was done! The carpenter came out to remove skirting boards and architrave and yesterday was 'Why Did We Have This Idea?' day. (When I say 'we' I mean 'me' but Andy is excellent at standing by me as a partner in all these shenanigans.)

Yesterday I spent removing all the furniture from the living and dining rooms and relocating it to other places in the house. I went into the studio and shuffled everything into the smallest space possibly, ditto the bedrooms. Andy had banned me from attempting to move ANY of the big furniture on my own, citing the day I once got stuck halfway down some stairs under a sofa. Still, I emptied the dresser, the TV unit, the sideboard and the big bookcase and relocated their contents. I moved all cushions and throws. I did manage to get the sideboard upstairs by rolling it end on end and only had a couple of heart-in-mouth moments en route but we shan't mention that to his Lordship Malarkey, shall we? I upended the sofas and unscrewed the wooden bobbles they sit on. The sofas were my big worry about getting out of the house and into the studio. But hey! Positive thinking hat on!

Once Andy was home we set about moving furniture. Not too much swearing, minimal bruising, huge buckets of sweat. Dining table, sofas (hurrah!) and part of the dresser in the studio. Dining chairs, TV table and coffee table in front bedroom. Big bookshelf in our bedroom. Sideboard and TV in middle bedroom. Rest of dresser in laundry. Andy's ancient Ikea computer desk dismantled and ready to go to the tip because he is getting a new bespoke office space! (I feel he would rather keep the old desk because their relationship goes way back further than ours. But hey! A new bespoke office space?!)

And then came the carpet removal debacle which was when thoughts of 'Why did we start this?' really manifested themselves. The previous owners of Damson Cottage, it seemed, thought it was a jolly good idea to build two stud partition walls on top of the carpet that ran through both rooms. They gave no thought to the fact that one day, someone (e.g us) might want to take up the carpet to put down a nice oak floor. More cursing and sweating then, but the quarty tiles were eventually revealed and were in remarkably good nick.

However, it is 'bonjour et au revoir' to the quarry tiles as the first layer of compound is going down as I write and tomorrow is damp membrane and second layer day. Bambino is banished to our bedroom and I can hear him trying to burrow his way through the bedroom floor into the kitchen in order to be part of the action. Flora is being sensible and is asleep.

I like to think that in a hundred years from now someone will be cursing the idiots (e.g us) who decided to cover a period feature with two layers of compound, a damp membrane and a wood floor, thereby ruining a lovely quarry tile floor.

But for now and for us in our little cottage, it is a jolly good idea!