Day five of Demolition D day. No dragons here.

No dragons around here today. She went to the beach.

Leaving parts of the village looking more and more devastated with all the work that is going on for the new village by pass road. It would be a good thought looking at this photo that this is where the yellow cottage once stood but it's not. It's where tree's and hedgerows once grew. No bird song now.

The yellow cottage is still standing. Looking even worse than it has done before. After week one it's still there...

It's just as well we went out, it's a sad sight to see. We set off for better views.
It was a cold, wet and windy afternoon, but on days like this, at least we had the whole beach to ourselves.We went a few miles South to Bigbury Bay. At the height of Summer I wonder if the tourist ever think what it is like in the Winter...
It's like this... best time to go, even if it was cold.

Besides there were places that we could escape the wind.

 Loads of digging and rock climbing.

We are going to have a very quiet and restful weekend.
 Ready for week two in the demolition of the cottage next door.

It seems very eerie to see lamp posts and telephone poles standing all on their own on our return journey.
Have a good weekend and we will see you all on Monday x x x

Happy St David's day..................

Demolition (D) day four

Demolition day four... Is it day four ?

At the moment this small trailer is being used to take things away, good thinking to protect our old bridge, All the debris has to carted away somehow. 
The kitchen is out of the yellow cottage,  loaded and ready to go.

Along with a couple of chairs at the back.

Various blocks from a wall.

Today the demolition crew have removed anything removable from inside the yellow cottage next door.
It's been flooded as many times as we have over the last year, it can't be a pleasant job.
Next week the scaffolding goes up around the cottage next door to protect Soggibottom.

We have read all our safety instructions and thanks guys, we were only joking about the hard hats, but it's a very tempting offer to have our names on them...  Orange ones too.
That's about it for today.

Snow drops in our garden.

See you all tomorrow.

Demolition (D) day three

Day three, it seems to be going slowly, but the cottage next door is starting to be demolished. I have to thank the demolition crew for not waking me too early this morning.

The other side of the cottage. The wall between the children's play park has now gone, beside the wall there were Hazel trees sparrows used to nest in. Not sure where they are going to go this year. The thought is when every thing calms down, maybe we can put up more and more bird houses for them all.

With all the extra activity around, it all seems terribly interesting. It also seems so sad to see this 200 year old cottage slowly disappearing.

We have a saying at Soggibottom cottage at the moment, "beware of men with yellow coats".
They are everywhere, no escaping the sound of machinery along the main road.

We did escape today, Freya can be found over at the CAT FLAP CAVALIER feeding the swans at Exeter Quay.

The tomato seeds I planted a few days ago have already started to sprout. Maybe the noise has woken them early.

I thought it wise to keep everyone updated about them especially Caroline. I'm not going to be too big headed, last year all my new tomato seedlings died off and I had to reseed them.
 

Something that has been constructive today,   Marley Wynn's new slippers.
See you all tomorrow......

Demolition (D) day two

The yellow cottage is still here on D day two.
Although there have been slightly more coming and goings today.
You can see how close Soggibottom is to our neighbouring yellow cottage.... a tad to close for comfort at the moment..

There isn't anywhere else for the workmen to park without blocking everything up for the pedestrian traffic, they are fine where they have parked. As long as they leave a part of it for us and our neighbour's car to be able to back into the car park opposite... no problem....

Quite right about safety...

ASBESTOS REMOVAL ? Where is our face mask and what about one for Frankie de tabby and Freya Rose Blossom ?

Hard Hats, we have covered hard hats before in the last post.

Safety harness must be worn... that might not be needed for us... we have no intention of going higher than a foot into our own cottage... However this is an interesting read.

Caution Keep out and Children must not play on this site.
Did I ever mention how close the yellow cottage is to a children's play park.... it's on the other side of the yellow cottage wall... This is one rule at weekends when the demolition men go home is going to be hard to enforce... a small inquisitive child can get underneath the fencing... depends on how inquisitive they are but as a rule, Caution Keep Out is a warning like a magnet to go in for kids... Trouble is children go around to the play park all the time and not all of them are supervised.


Are we being a bit picky about what the signs say and what actually happens when the demolition crew go home at night and the weekend ?

The yellow cottage is being demolished as a part of a new road that is being built to bypass our village. The road won't really effect us as in noise or pollution, in fact we won't even see it down here at the bottom of the hill. It will be on the other side of the village, but the amount of extra water that will run down from the new road to the bottom of the hill is the reason why they are building new culverts all along the route.
The removal of the yellow cottage gives space to build a culvert at the bottom of our particular hill.  It might also help us with our flooding problem, but as we said, we aren't going to put our flood gate into mothballs yet.
This photo shows one lonely stump of a tree. All along this road were hedge rows and mature trees... now all gone... some of the route resembles a moonscape... but if you can imagine a red moonscape not a grey or white one... maybe I should have said Mars, but then it's definitely too cold for Mars today.

It was a bit nippy on the beach this afternoon too.

You can tell there weren't many people out on the beach.

One mutley dog, 

One guy on the cliff taking a photo of us while we took a photo of him.

Why did we take his photo ?
He was near to a fresh landslide along the beach. At the moment it's not a good idea to walk close to the cliffs when your on the beach, or on top of them because of all the rainfall we have had during recent months which has weakened their structure.
Maybe we are far too safety conscious about things that others take for granted. It would be a good thing if there were safety signs along the cliff top and on the beach. There probably are at some point, but do people ever take notice of them ?

Arriving back to find that after a parking agreement had been reached yesterday, straight away as soon as we were out it had been broken, wasn't a good start to the afternoon.. The site supervisor sat in his warm car which was parked in the space that we asked to be left clear... well, it was cold. But if he was supervising why was he sitting in the warmth of his car while the other guys were working hard ?
Oh, we are watching you carefully... :-) HA HA. no slacking Mr Supervisor.
After being asked as you can imagine very politely by the soggibottom carpenter TO MOVE... not sure there was a please, but the site manager did after a lot of muttering on his part... we then made them all a cup of tea because it was so cold.

Freya has a new toy box over at  Catflap Cavalier... she loves her dad.
 
See you all tomorrow...

Demolition (D) day one

Well, just look at that, seems we now have an outside bathroom beside Soggibottom, if anyone walking past on their way to the park needs to quickly nip in.. please make sure you wash your hands, but I'm not sure about a flush.

 Here it is in all it's glory.
Things on day one haven't gone well, not at all according to plan to demolish the cottage next door to Soggibottom.

No scaffolding as yet, maybe the railway behind this wall and also close to the soon to be demolished cottage weren't keen on the scaffolding idea.

Or maybe the posse of Parish Councillors that arrived for an on site meeting have complained.
There is nothing more Parish Councillors love to do, apart from go to sleep at their parish council meetings. .( Strange if you need hard hats Mr Councillor, we have been walking past this monstrosity of a derelict cottage along with half of the village for over er, let me see... eight years. )What ever the reason is, no work on day one apart from the new creature feature on the way to the park..

Day one, all a bit of a let down....

At least we were able to finish some painting and outside repairs today. Not sure how much longer this wall will look brilliant white.

I even found one of my old mosaic mirrors in the attic that I had forgotten all about.

This one unfortunately had been taken off the wall way back at the beginning of last October... left beside the wall on the ground, so the wall could be painted. As most know without me repeating anything about floods, like other things it got a bit wet. It still needs slight repair, but it's safe enough. I used beach glass and shells. It's always been outside on the wall, now it's back in place again.

 Apart from knitting frogs and ducks, that's all there is to report for today...
Normality on the comments page. Although I have had to put in a slight moderation because of spammers. As normal feel free to comment. Thanks to everyone who left a comment on my last post. I'm still intent on blogging every day when possible over the next few weeks. At least three weeks, or four, or five or six... 

See you all tomorrow..... 

Demolition d day - normal comment mode is back.

Only a few hours left of peace and quiet around here until the 200 year old cottage next door is pulled down...

It never ceases to amazing us the things local authorities do when it suits them...
The normal weight restriction that can safely cross our little entry way is 7 and a half tons. Strange how the weight limit has suddenly jumped up to 40 tons a few days before the cottage next door is due to be demolished. The little bridge badly needs resurfacing, I wonder just how it will look in a month or two's time.
Especially with all the comings and goings over the next, three weeks, well, they said three weeks, but then it could be four, or five, or six. They have to build a new water construction to help the flow of the river. There is also a possibility that it will help our flooding problem, so, fine... pull the house down next door, but please take care of our medieval bridge.... We won't put our new flood gate into mothballs yet!

Normal comment mode has been restored on Soggibottom's blog, in my haste to again try and filter out spam, I over done it with something or other, so it's all back just the way it was now...
Blogger is quite good at filtering things that shouldn't be there, but there's always someone who can sneak past..... I will be very vigilant and on the look out for spam more often. If there is anything that doesn't quite look right on the comments page, anyone advertising their own blog is a good example, please don't click, you never know what your going to find at the other end of the click... I'll try my best to get rid of them first. 

Thanks for all the mail today letting us know about the unable to comment mode...  I thought I must have bored everyone silly jabbering on about a packet or two of tomato seeds !

Lynda over at The Friendly company of bears sent me an email this morning to say her seeds are already in...
I'm not sure how much light the pots in our window are going to get over the next weeks, but they have been sown.

With luck they should get more light eventually... that yellow wall is going... It looks close in the photo doesn't it.. it is...

Freya Rose Blossom has been out and about over at her blog, she will probably be out and about a lot more in the coming weeks... Although I do intend to try hard to post a daily blog during the next month or so.  Lack of sleep and noise might just get the better of both of us...

So, big day tomorrow, bring it on, they start work at eight in the morning... groan, far too early...

2013 tomato challange

The 2013 tomato challenge is about to start.
I hear you say, what on earth is that ?

Caroline and I are competitive, at least as far as growing tomato's.
I have to admit she is a better knitter than I will ever be...
Caroline also won last year's tomato challenge...(one all so far).

If you want to join, such silly stuff, do a post and show your tomato plants growing, from start to finish. No matter what the weather. No matter where they are grown, inside or outside. Tub, window box, small pot. Normally as long as you feed them well, give them light and air they will produce and home grown STUFF is so much better, it tastes better............... It would be a good thought to give a link to other tomato entries.
You are also welcome to borrow the photo I have above to put on your side bar or blog. NOW THAT IS A FIRST, me telling you to use my photo's... but you can and your very welcome to do so.

The winner is the first to pick and be able to eat a red,yellow or what ever colour the tomato is, easy... All just for fun.. no hard sell. No great prize at the end.... just for fun. Although I will try and think of a winner's prize, normally it would be seeds to sow for the year after, but as this is a world wide thing, I will have to think hard and let you know about the prize. Hope that pleases everyone.. ah, no cheating by the way ... as if any of Soggibottom's followers would... :-)
Believe me, we really do have fun and jokes about the tomato challenge, maybe it's just a gardener thing................. OR THAT VERY COMPETITIVE NATURE Caroline and I both have..

You can find Caroline........ JUST HERE..,

As I mentioned in my last post, there are many things going on over the next month or so at  Soggibottom cottage. All outside and not inside so that's a blessing..  Our flooding problem MIGHT be helped slightly, but our flood gate is at hand anyway, because nothing that is written down is binding... If it rains, it will rain, and if water levels go above normal.... hum...
Promise to keep everyone updated...

Freya is fast asleep, Freya doesn't snore which in it's self is another blessing. She will be back at the Catflap Cavalier as soon as she wakes up.... Have a very QUIET and peaceful weekend.. WE HAVE ONE DAY LEFT OF IT BEING PEACEFUL AROUND HERE.. see you all soon, x x x