We finally got the money together to get the soil pipe done. I had two friends over, Paul and Lau, to help dig up the concrete where the existing soil pipe is. With the right tools it took us a day to dig the trench down the soil pipe. It turns out it's a clay pipe which had been repaired a couple of times over the years. This is now not up to regulations anyway, so the builders replaced the soil pipe with a plastic one, and ran the new soil stack up the side of the house. They've also installed a pipe leading into the new bathroom so the toilet can be fitted, with the waste for the bath and basin also leading into it. We're a little concerned the pipe is too high though and we might have some trouble with water back flushing into the bath! Time will tell. However, no more has happened in the bathroom as I've been waiting until April to get my new allocation of annual leave before I can tackle some of the larger problems.
In the mean time the weather has improved dramatically. We no longer feel the need for a fire in the living room in the evening, and we've dialled back the central heating in the evening. The veggie plot has been dug over a couple of times to remove as many of the weeds as possible - and the damn things keep growing back. Never mind! We've seeded some onions, brussel sprouts and cauliflowers. Our next door neighbours have given us some garlic. So we have the beginnings of our veggie garden.
On the weekend, I dug over the area by the shed and found some potatoes growing, so I've re-planted and spaced them out a little, whilst mixing in some compost for good measure. I hope they continue to germinate. I also dug over the area that was becoming infested with ground elder, which now has strawberries growing in it. I'm told strawberries are very good at fighting off ground elder. Time will tell :)
We've also discovered that concrete path round the house was being rather successfully encroached upon by the grass either side. So we've got a much clearer path now, free of weeds and grass. I also dug up the area that was being used as a fire pit - conveniently placed in the middle of the lawn! Having spent a not inconsiderable amount of time digging the ground over, and removing quite a lot of broken tiles and other rubbish, we've now got a big hole. We're doing a bit of an experiment. We were going to turf the patch, but the local B&Q had run out, despite them having an entire trolley the day before. So we've used the turf from the path on a small patch of lawn that only had moss growing in it, and we're going to sow grass seed in the larger patch to see which one works better. Time will tell.
My wife had some hanging baskets left over from one of her business ventures, so we've put them up at the front of the house. We've just got to remember to water the darn things! The house faces south, so they will get sun all day every day. With the recent good weather, I wonder how long it will be before we forget to water the pansies and they die :(
Finally, I've managed to install one of the water butts on the side of the house, so we can water the front garden without drawing on mains water. This is hooked up to the drain pipe on the side of the house, though I'm going to have to remove the extensive plants from the guttering before that will be effective!
