That was 2015
2015. It’s been, erm… well, it’s been a year. It’s safe to say there have been some ups and downs, so many in fact that this feels more like a […]
Category Archives: Renovating
Check out the house!
So, this is it. The house is done and ready for guests! Don’t fret though, this blog is going nowhere, there will still be plenty of stories about our adventures […]
Welcome to troll town!
We’ve finally hit the big time… we have not just one, but two facebook trolls. I didn’t realise sympathetically renovating an old house could incite such hatred, but I guess […]
And breathe…
The past couple of months have been ridiculous. We haven’t stopped. Sanding, painting, filling, painting again, chasing, deciding, organising, calling, sanding and a bit more painting. Finally though, all that […]
The big idea
For the last two years I’ve rambled on about the Langhe, wine, food, renovations and falling over. What I haven’t ever really talked about is our plan. Why we’re here. […]
First night: Take Two
Two years ago, almost to the day, we spent our first night in our big, scary new house in the Italian countryside (you can read about it here). It was […]
What a week!
Who needs words when you’ve got photos… Instead of rambling on, I thought I’d just share a few images from the past week here in snowy, sunny, occasionally rainy, but always […]
Snowmageddon
It’s been an interesting week… Last Tuesday it started snowing and it just didn’t stop. By Wednesday afternoon we were well and truly snowed in and by Thursday morning we […]
Surprises of the good kind
As you’d expect, most of the surprises we’ve stumbled across so far during the renovation have been of the relatively bad kind… supporting walls that don’t exist, rotten beams, snakes […]
Quanto Costa?
Every couple of days our Geometra, A, comes up to us, grinning from ear to ear. “Ho un’idea!” he says excitedly. We listen to this idea of his, and it’s […]
The great escape
I’ll start with the good news (although actually it’s all good news): the problems with the back wall of the house are not as bad as first feared. It’s still going […]
All that glistens isn’t concrete
It had to happen eventually. After five months of relatively pain-free renovating we’ve finally hit a bump in the road. Or, more accurately, a huge hole in the road. I’ll […]
The day of rest (and Barolo…)
Why did nobody tell me that Living the Dream would be such hard work? I had visions of days spent mountain biking through the vineyards and evenings passed sipping G&T […]
Renovation update: The roof is finished!
So, phase one of our build is complete. Or at least it would be if we were professional enough to have split it into phases. What I’m trying to say […]
The good, the bad and the Italy
There’s this thing about Italy… it likes to build you up, show you how amazing it is, makes you think that everything is good in the world and then, just […]
And so it begins…
After months and months of waiting, work has finally started on the house and suddenly things are really moving fast. At ground level, the existing concrete floors have all been […]
Sometimes you just have to laugh
I sometimes feel like Italy is having one giant laugh at my expense, and the only thing I can do is laugh along. Four weeks ago we discovered, quite by accident, […]
Renovating reality
Big news… we have a date for the renovations to start: April 1st. April Fool’s Day. There’s a joke in there somewhere. It’s taken almost a year of planning, quoting, […]
Back to the build
Feed, burp, sleep, cry, change, feed, burp, sleep, repeat. Parenthood is pretty rock and roll. Our little Italian bundle of poop and puke (who is awesome by the way) has […]
People power
The more astute among you (who am I kidding…) might have noticed that I was slightly angry when I wrote my last post. I hid it well I think, but […]
Not quite living the dream
Autumn is an exciting time of year here in the Langhe. For a start, it’s harvest time and everyone is talking about how good this year is going to be. […]
Really Renovating Italy
My wife is one of those people who like to furnish themselves with all available information before doing anything. She is most definitely not one for surprises. Right now, she’s […]
Permission Granted
I come bearing good news… as you may have guessed from the title of this post, we have just received planning permission for our renovation.
Italian planning controls: Playing the game
It’s just dawned on me that I’m supposed to be blogging about renovating a house. I’ve written a bit about gardening, some stuff about falling over and breaking things and […]
I’ve got scythe but I’m not a scyther
This post was going to be a DIY success story. Enough of these disasters, I was ready to tell the world (or at least 20 or so people) how I’d […]
DIY Disaster No.2 – Cutting the grass
That’s right, I said cutting the grass. It barely even counts as DIY, but I was doing it myself, which is surely the first rule of DIY, and I somehow […]
Have we made the right choice?
“Do you think you made the right decision?” It’s a question that I’m sure anyone who’s upped sticks and moved country hears a lot. I’ve been asked it on three […]
DIY Disasters – No. 1: Removing the plaster
I’m no handyman. In fact, I’m barely even a man, let alone handy. Much to my wife’s dismay though, my lack of any discernable skill doesn’t stop me from trying.
Ripping off the Piemonte plaster
Our house has a strange and somewhat confusing set-up. It’s about 40-metres long and ten metres deep. The whole back section is storage and isn’t quite full-height upstairs (we have […]
First night nerves…
Well, we’ve just spent our first night in our new house and although this blog is really just an excuse to post a few photos, I’ll try to give you […]
The house is ours!
Da da da da da da daaaa… that’s a fanfair. And it’s sounding because we finally, after more than a year of searching, deliberating, ruminating and a bit more searching, […]
