Oh Bugger it..

I have received a letter stating that due to the on-going situation between the education department and social security we will not be going back to work at the start of September as was hoped but we will have to wait for a “convocatoria” which is an official announcement  of positions available and we will have to apply for our jobs back again…

What does this mean, well normally we have to cope without money coming in for the months of July and August, but we are going to have to cope for another month without any money coming in. Luckily Helen’s son had given us some money to do the kitchen but we are going to have to spend this money to tie us over. This is a very worrying development as we do rely on the money from the school work to cover the basic day to day expenses, and without this we can’t keep going indefinitely without another form of income.

Block up

Just a few blocks added here and there today.

First a few blocks go on to form the wall of the vent hut.

The another couple go on to bring the steps up a little, now this is ready to make the base of the small recess in the back of the steps which will house the valves for the watering.

A better photo of the wall that I mentioned earlier.

Venting

One of the little jobs that had to be completed before the painting of the walls could continue was what we call the “vent hut”. On the roof we have always had this little  square block and underneath was a circular hole which we believed was for a heater before the hole was made in the wall to connect the kitchen and the rest of the house.  Our intention is to use this to make a ventilation system to help keep the house cool in the summer.

Helen through the hole.

once the cover was removed from the top and with a board placed below it was time to insert the pipes that will handle the air extraction, the water feed up to the solar hot water heater that will be fitted one day, and control and power cables.

Then we built a wooden frame to make the base.

Fill with concrete and job is done for today. But there was time just to finish off a few little other jobs, like prepare the wall of the bathroom ready for the render. The blue is a mesh which is fixed on the wall to help the render stick and not crack.

Window top

Once the sides of the window had dried next came the top. the top sticks out a little to push the water away and stop it seeping in through the window.

Then it was time to add a little more cement to the steps

Patching sides

With the window sill cast and dried it’s time to patch up the edges of the window. So we fixed some strips of wood to make nice clean edges, and mixed up the fine white render and slapped it on.

One that was done we still had a little left so we had to find a place to put it.

So a little bit went to tidy the edge of the steps to the roof.

And a bit more to fill the hole where we found the horseshoe in the wall.

Sill season

Now the window is in and set, we need to finish of the window sill. The window sill is concrete but has a step in it to allow for the rendering to be finished off at the front and to put tiles on the top.

Cast windowsill is behind the wooden former.

A close up of the bottom of the window.

And on the inside.

The window goes in

Yess, today is the day when the window goes in, we had though of leaving the final fitting of the window until later in the day but after a quick test fit we decided that we would just go ahead and put it in.

The window cleaned and ready to go in. It had got a little dusty while it was stored in the bathroom.

The window in and fitted on wedges to hold it in place while the cement sets.

A view from the inside showing the cemented fixings, and under the window a load of paper just to block up the gap until the windowsill gets cast tomorrow.

Both windows and the door done…

A window on the wall

Today,was going to be a big day we were finally fitting the window which we brought way back, we brought 2, one which went into what is going to be the dining room. and the other is for the new kitchen. With one thing or another we have new gotten round to fitting the other window,well this week it’s finally going to happen.

The old window removed and all marked up for cutting the new window.

A few hours later and the main hole is cut.

Helen checks the lintel after we cut the hole and quickly put it in. The lintel previously was in the kitchen supporting the concrete hood over the barbeque.

All done for today just one more job to do.

Cover the window with some plastic to keep the insects outside.

Filling in

One reason why we had to get the blocks in yesterday was that today we were expecting Sheila and her husband Carlos to come and give us a hand shifting more soil, like they did before. So with Carlos, given a radio tuned to Radio 2 and a beer and we were off, several hours later, we had filled most of the lower patio and the soil on the upper level was almost gone.

But we now have a very level surface at the bottom.

A little more levelling at the far end, as this end is a little high.

The ramp now is a more gradual which is much better…

Where most of the soil came from.

A Step in the right direction

Work still continues on the step extension and the lower patio. we’ve put a few more of the blocks on to bring it up to the level where we can think about putting in the all important first step, but we have now run out of big blocks.

The blocks laid and ready to get in filled both in front and behind.

The whole ramp can now be in filled up to the height.

And with the left over material finished off rendering the inside edge of the roof.

Draining away

One of the tasks we have been working on is trying to divert the water off the roof to a more useable place. At the moment the water just tips off the roof and down onto the ground around the house, one side effect of this is that the lower storage room at the font of the house stays very damp. As we are laying the patio and the extension to the steps we need to put in the pipes as we go.

The pipes down all glued into place, with an access hole just in case we need to clean things out.

Helen double checking the width at the top of the ramp.

Curves

Finally got the curve finished on the top of the bathroom roof parapet. Following the curve that was drawn on the wooden board at the back it was just a matter of building it up with rocks and cement

Bad News

I received a letter a few days back from Social Security which seems to say that I have been registered as an employee of the Consejria de Educacíon. I seems they have done an audit and consider that use being hired as self employed was illegal and we should be treated as employees. We shall have to see what impact this has when I get back to work in September.

Watering

With the two tubes laid in under the surface of the lower patio, we can now sort out the watering systems.

So from the valves the pipes go down the tubes.

Out the other side

Along the wall

And down to the crops.

And while Helen was doing the piping I was busy running the cutter over the lower terrace.

Uphill

On the lower patio we have a number of pipes for the grey water irrigation that used to just sit on the surface, but with the changes to the lower patio these are now being placed in large red tubes that need to get buried under the earth as we put it in.

So having put the pipe in we needed to fill in some earth on top to make sure that the path was still useable.

OK looking from the other direction you have to go up over the pipe before you go down the ramp, but hopefully that will get in filled in the next couple of weeks.

The side wall of the ramp which is almost finished now, showing the irrigation pipe coming out through the wall instead of over the top as it used to.

A long time ago we built a small wall on top of the bathroom roof. One part never got finished this was a small curve to blend the top of the wall with the slope down to the existing wall. so with a board screwed to the side of the wall and a few pieces of bar inserted top stop the whole lot sliding down the slope this is already to be cemented next time we make some.

Another row and finishing the door

Two jobs for today, the first was to bring up the wall for the steps down to the lower patio up another row. After this just one more row and they will be up to the height  required to finish the infilling of the lower patio.

And once the blocks were done with we could used the rest of the wheelbarrow full of cement upstairs to finish off around the door.

That's the top done, now for the bottom, and that is where the trouble started, we had a great trouble getting the wedges out from under the door. It took close to an hour just to get them out once this was done we could then fill the holes with cement.

Inside

Outside