The new front door

Mike and Sally largely finished installing our new front door before they went off for their holidays. There are still a few details to finish off, and we still have some finishing work on the outside and the inside. The new door is slightly smaller than the old one, so the fill-in paneling has to be finished; all the woodwork in the covered entry needs refinishing anyhow, so this just gets added. For inside the airlock, we'll look for some panelling that matches the existing wall; if we can't find anything suitable, we'll use wallboard to cover up the exposed bits. In this photo, through the new door, you can see the aluminum-framed door, similar to the one that was removed at the outside, leading from the airlock into the living/dining room. (Also, if you look closely, you can see Kaye reflected in the door.)

Stepping back from the previous view, you can see this whole side of the house, which faces southeast. On the right is the old barn (the one we'd like to own and that apparently caused much of our leaking roof problems; you can see the area that been re-rendered to keep water from seeping down). The middle bit is the old stable part of our house; at ground level, to the left of the covered entry, is a shed, covered with an exuberant passion flower vine. Atop that is the area that we call the "conservatory." It's mostly closed, with odds and ends of windows, on two sides. The side under cover is open, and there's a spiral staircase leading to it. (An owl sits on top of this staircase sometimes; we've found pellets on the lower steps.) This area needs a watertight floor so it doesn't leak into the shed, but that's a project for later.

Continuing to the left, you see the old house, barely overlapping the stable, which has our kitchen on the ground floor and the master bedroom above that. You can see the top of the green-shuttered window over the kitchen sink, and the small, unshuttered window we added to the bedroom above that. To the left of the house is a porch where we keep our short-term supply of wood. A bit of fencing extends from the left of the shed and you can see part of the gate leading to the garden. The inside of the gate has already been painted green to match the shutters and this side will get done when we have some sunny days.

With the door no longer leaning on the wall, the living room now looks more spacious. At our favorite depôt-vente, we found just the cabinet we were looking for and have installed it in the newly cleared space. It's easier now to imagine how this will look with bookshelves and furniture. (Unfortunately, the dining table that we had our eye on is now gone.)

Lydia continues not to eat well. The vet gave us some supposedly tasty vitamin gel (in a toothpaste tube) that should help her appetite. We hope. This evening she ate bits of some Indian-spiced fish, no garlic, but quite zingy, but is hardly interested in her regular food, or the gel so far. Her mood is generally quite good and we wouldn't worry, except that she seems to be getting weaker. Since she's already a bit wobbly from her stroke, she doesn't need to lose more muscle strength.

The weather's warmed up a bit, almost to double-digits C, and, in spite of predictions, there was blue sky to be seen in the afternoon. It was very pleasant. The forecase for the coming days is promising.