There’s something magical about snow, particularly thick, fresh snow. Yet, while I was excited to see the snow come down heavy on Thursday, we were a little worried when it kept going on the Friday. Having booked a van to go collect our kitchen on Saturday, we didn’t fancy skidding around on the ice. Luckily, while day 1 was traffic chaos, by day 3 the gritters and snow ploughs had gotten things under control.

Having collected the van and headed to the house and we tried to get on with a few small jobs before heading out to collect the kitchen.

Gathering up some of the accumulated rubbish I headed to the recycling center. Sadly, a lot of the rubbish we’re now producing isn’t recyclable, such as expanding foam and insulation board. I always feel like I’ve lost somehow when waste can’t be separated and sent off to a new life. But restoring a house, quickly and to budget, just isn’t possible without creating a good deal of waste.

While I was gone Chris continued with some of the more fiddly bits of lighting electrics he had to sort. Leaving him to it I started to tidy some of the upstairs. With our mortgage inspection coming up in a few weeks we want to get the house a little more orderly, so as to make it look more appealing. Plus it’s nice not to have to step over piles of wood and scattered debris to get everywhere.

With the morning gone we headed out to collect our kitchen. Rather than buy a new kitchen we’d bid for a second-hand one on eBay. The previous owners had removed it from its previous location and it was already in pieces for us to collect. Chris had made sure we’d have enough units to rearrange into the island and floor units we wanted. The kitchen had originally been handmade by a local company, meaning it was a much higher quality than we could have afforded if buying new.

Part of the package were several massive slabs of granite. Although we knew we weren’t going to use them we decided we could take them for resale. As we would never have been able to lift them ourselves, Chris asked his brothers to lend a hand. Rich helped load them into the van at one end and Phil to unload them at the other. Hopefully someone will want them, as it seems such a shame to waste such incredible stone.

Finally, we made our way to the house to unload the kitchen units, made more difficult by the slippery snow on the path. With no floor in the kitchen yet we had to fill the lounge with the units. Hopefully it won’t be long before they can move into their proper place. It’s likely we won’t need all of the units in the end, so we’re planning to sell on whatever doesn’t suit our plans.

Dropping off the van we’d driven around 130 miles in a long day of lugging things to and fro. Exhausting.

Arriving at the house on Sunday we found the winter wonderland gone, with almost all the snow vanished. Our first job was to take down the scaffolding. On Tuesday we’ve booked a concrete delivery, which provides a barrowing service. While we were happy to awkwardly squeeze past the scaffolding we doubted they would be.

Next I installed a strip of foam around the bottom of the wall. This is to allow the concrete to expand and contract as it heats and cools, which can help prevent cracking.

Chris meanwhile installed the manifold for the underfloor heating.

One final piece of the old concrete floor needed to be removed by the door to the garden. Chris had wanted to keep this in place till the last moment to avoid rainwater seeping into the room. Digging out the concrete and attempting to remove the hard clay soil, made me remember how soul destroying the floor excavation had been.

Our last task, to make the floor ready for the concrete delivery, was to lay out boards for the wheelbarrow to travel along. Luckily we have a stack of old doors which we were able to place on wooden blocks so as to protect the pipework underneath. Looking at what needs to be done it feels like Tuesday will be a long day. But hopefully, at the end of it, we’ll finally have a floor.