Well, another weekend of working hard has come and gone! Saturday kicked off with Philip and I arriving at the house "late" (about 10.20 a.m.) and being dubbed the afternoon shift!

Our late arrival meant we had missed Terry (an extra pair of hands supplied by Malcolm the builder) attempting to remove a burnt foam cushion from the brambles outside the front lounge window. A rational act, had the cushion not contained a wasps nest. Terry, an ex-Marine was pursued, at speed, through the house, pausing only to pull the bottom of his t-shirt over his head to protect his face, consequently trapping several wasps on his forehead.

Our expert team then decided the best way to deal with what was now a very angry nest of wasps, was to go into the garage and grab several bottles of decade old combustable chemicals, pour them over the cushion and nest and set light to it, (see "The Wasps Nest" above left). This created very little flame but clouds of noxious smoke. Curiously we are still on speaking terms with our neighbours!

Terry, by way of revenge, was now on a mission to beat the front garden into submission (see "Terry on a mission" above right). We had been told that there was crazy paving under the wilderness, which was now reaching to the height of the balcony, personally I wasn't convinced but, as the weekend wore on, we were treated to uncovered paving for the first time in 15 years. (see 'the front through the jungle' below, 'the front garden' below right, 'the front garden 2' below, below left).

Whilst Terry and Pat did battle with brambles, Mum and I set about washing down the last room, the dining room. To get some light to do this by we unveiled the dining room window for the first time (see 'the dining room window unveiled'). The view from this room is spectacular. Even though we are having the windows replaced this week mum felt moved to clean at least one pane so we could enjoy the sun on the sea (see 'the dining room').

Further projects covered this weekend included removal of rubble from the lounge under which we dicovered a tiled hearth (see 'the hearth') although this is now in the skip as neither of us like the grey tiles, cleaning out the hall cupboard and re-piping the central heating.

And for those interested in all that cutlery I found see 'the silver stuff' ... I know the pic is lop-sided but you get the idea!