What else does one do with a wet weekend?

Over the years we have worked on and redecorated most rooms in the house but we have always shied away from the massive hallway, stairs and first floor - until yesterday! Despite my vehemnet protestations, Sinead went full steam ahead and stripped 75% of the wall areas up and downstairs to reveal an unbelievable array of wallpapers and colours from previous redecorations. Most areas stripped well but as always there was one area by the radiator that took an hour!

As you can see there is one large area that Sinead could not tackle and we will look for specialist ladders to borrow or hire to complete the job. The walls have been sanded and despite their multicoloured appearance they are quite smooth with only a few small areas needing some filler. I plan to give everything a base coat of white emulsion to bring it back to neutral and then we will see from there.

Thankfully the "Huckleberry Finn effect" took hold and Hannah joined in and her efforts can be seen above and below and she worked well and hard and is now off to a Hawaiian themed sleepover party! Back to work tomorrow.

All images shot with the Canon G9 with the top two being 12 frame Photomerges . . . the first 4 x 3 frames and the second 6 x 2 frames.

Broken the duck

Having had the great theory of getting out on the bike very early in the morning through the week for the last few summers, I finally did it last Tuesday! The alarm went at 5am and I finally struggled out of bed at 515am, dressed and had a quick drink and was on the road by 530am. As sunrise is around 445am at this time of year, it makes sense to "use" the available daylight to pack in a short ride rather than trying to make time for it through the day. All went well with even less traffic than the usual Sunday morning and I was back home at 630am, invigorated and "up" for the day ahead - wonderful! I will need to pack a few more morning rides in before our rapidly approaching holiday to make the most of the bike time in France. I have Google Earthed a couple of routes already and these look more interesting than Italy last year, without being over the top.