Good news …

Well back from Arras and we needn’t have worried. When we left the footings were in place with the concrete bricks for the foundations and breeze blocks for the walls ready to go.

By the time we came back three days later the walls were well under way. They had even remembered to install the extractor duct for the cooker that we want to run down under the units and the floor rather than up through the roof. The openings for the sliding doors from the kitchen and the windows and the door from the utility room at the back were also materialising.

The drainage pipes were neatly lined up on the lawn ready to be installed and connected. When fitted a water test proved the calculations were right and it all flowed smoothly to the manhole the other side of the garden. One challenge successfully overcome.

Another big challenge for Ken and his team was the delivery and installation of the 1 tonne steel beam over the space for the sliding doors. They didn’t even want to think about what would happen if the lorry couldn’t reverse down our drive. Thankfully we didn’t have to go there and it was successfully levered into position onto two supports inside the emerging extension.

That was only part one. Once the wall had been built up to roof height they then had to lift and manoeuvre the steel into place – this time without the help of the lorry’s mini crane. It was at this point it decided to pour with rain. Undeterred they gradually positioned it onto a small winch and with four of them lifting, nudging, shoving and probably praying it finally slotted into the hole they had created in the end of the existing extension and rested gently on the breeze block wall at the other end. I watched heart in mouth from the existing kitchen out of sight as I didn’t want to distract them.

So in a week the walls have gone up, one of the two main beams is in and the scaffolding is in place ready to build the two gable ends and start on the roof. Amazing progress. What can stop us now?!