July 2010

We took a long weekend in July and flew with Ryanair from Thursday to Tuesday. Great connection for us! The mission set for ourselves: buy a Bar-B-Q for the summer.

Mission accomplished!

Our Oleander in full bloom!

Own feature: Oleander

Borrowed feature: Mountain

Me 'n my Olea

Ready for the Summer!

Guestroom floor

Guestroom floor: note the stencilwork

view from master bedroom to guestroom

view from the balcony

hmmmm, guess we need to do some gardening this summer.....

Mimosa trees down the cliff

dressing table: 2nd hand bargain, sanded & oiled

master bedroom

master bedroom view to the balcony

Gift from God: fig tree? Yummie!

Next project: window to the cantina. Renato will make it as big as possible

cantina window from the inside

cantina

This is the life! Le Dolce Vita

April 2010

Unfortunately our camera broke during our last visit in September 2009, so no blogs were posted since March.

We did manage to get the lions share of work done to make the house habitable, so our next visit in April 2010 was finally a real vacation! In spite of the volcanic ash from Iceland that crippled the air industry, we did manage to fly out on the 22nd instead of the 20th, so only lost 2 days of vacation.

Rudi's mother Sien: in a guilded cage?

The kitchen

View from kitchen to the living room

kitchen view towards staircase (notice lovely new handrail!)

view from living room to kitchen

relaxing in living room

living room

living room

guest bedroom (bless this guest!)

guest bedroom (new wardrobe & Rudi's handmade dressing table)

stairway looking down (look at the new handrail!)

upstairs landing (painted concrete & stenciled)

lovely new handrail for staircase

Renato fixed the balcony in February 2010 while Rudi was there working

Now that they cleared the hill you can see our shed from the road below

The waterfall below our house

NOW IT'S VACATION TIME!

War Memorial on Memorial Day in Fara San Martino

ME!

Memorial Day in Fara San Martino

March 2009 Work Done!

Between 3 and 12 March we returned to settle accounts with the workers and check out the work done.

We especially want to thank Giussy and Phillip Carleton for all their help: Giussy for helping us find the property and set up all the details for the signing & sealing. And Phillip for all his help in translating, organising the work and letting the workers in, go-between, moral support, getting telephone numbers for restaurants, and even weather reports. Phillip and Giussy, you are worth your weight in gold!

Our beautiful view, where you can just see the snow-capped mountains!

The kitchen:

The new lamps and ceiling...

The new cupboard:

We even used the fireplace! It was nice and cozy.

The faucet that allows you to open the window: see how it bends?

The living room all painted and ready to relax!

We found this old cabinet in the shed. It only needed some TLC -cleaned and painted - it was just like new.

This is the lamp we bought in Guardiaregele - the town famous for their wrought-iron craftsmanship:

The Cantina: you can see now that it totally opens up the space here. Someday it will be our summer-time living room, where it will be nice to have a glass of wine during the hot summer days.

We have a washing machine now (we have the technology). We ordered new couches and they should arrive at the end of March - again, Thanx to Phillip for opening up!

All in all, we accomplished our mission! Now we can relax this summer!