Sharing the load.

I've been trying to get the Studio up and running with varied levels of success. There is so much to do here, that I can't leave T to struggle on alone.
When the children were here, they helped with the animals and my son learnt about carpentry and helped with the building work. But for now it's just the two of us and I have to help with the house or it just won't get done. It does worry me that I also need to be bringing in the pennies, but I have to find the balance. It's all about the balance!
So this is what we've been up to lately.

The loft is progressing nicely, but the flooring can't be finished until the re-wiring is completed. This is a long slow process as the house hasn't had new electrics since the 70's! We're actually going to have plug sockets in the bedrooms, yay :D

 Our new boiler is in place beside what will be a small built in wardrobe. The boiler is electric and next year will be mostly powered by solar panels. It will save us so much money as the current boiler guzzles oil and is about the size of a small car, it needs to be gone!

 Two weeks ago, the Tour de France literally whizzed past us. Three hours waiting and whoosh they were gone in less than a minute!

 I did enjoy taking photos of this beautiful mare nearby. She may find herself in a painting, some day!

 The sweet potato is doing really well and will be planted this week. I have another to sprout as a back up, but once they get going, they seem quite vigorous, but that's fine, I adore sweet potatoes.

 Here's Maggie looking beautiful. She had a terrible accident late last Friday night and only rejoined the herd yesterday. Merlin accidentally clipped her back leg while 'horsing' around, and she bled profusely. I'm a panicker, made worse by buckets of blood, but we cleaned the wound and put a pressure bandage on it. By the next morning it was dry, but she was in pain, so we kept her in a tiny paddock and spoilt her rotten. The change in Merlin was shocking. He was so lost without her and wouldn't go anywhere without Bo to look after him! I need to squeeze in a little work with them all, but it's been too hot and I need more hours in a day.

 I made my best bread yet! I followed some you tube vids and worked out why my bread has been a bit unreliable. It's all about the kneading. I don't believe in taking out your frustration on the dough, as I feel you're passing on that negative energy into your food. I don't want to consume anger! Anyhoo, the upshot was that I need to knead for much longer. The texture of this dough was creamy like a dry mozzarella. It's hard to explain, but once the dough is ready, you absolutely know :D

 Here are a couple of comparisons. Below, spaghetti squash from 10 days ago.

 Same squash this week. They've been a resounding success and I'm definitely growing them again. I have some wonderful recipes to try and I can't wait for them to ripen :D

Finally, the pictures that led to the blog title. Now that the children are back in the uk for a while, we have the oppotunity to get on with sorting the downstairs of the house. I cleared out the old sitting room with a view to making a start on painting. I peeled off a sheet of paper and discovered to my horror the walls are all lined with polystyrene and our workload just doubled right there!

 I started with a wide scraper, but it was just no good. T found me a long pallet knife type scraper.

 I put on lound music and got stuck in. One and a half CD's later and one wall is finished. All the yellowy stuff is thick glue! Some of it is peeling off but the rest will have to be scrubbed, I think!

So that's my next few days planned out, but I intend to spend a bit of quality time in the studio as it will at least give me a chance to sit down!

Edited to add:   I don't think the squash coming up are the spaghetti squash after all, they're the wrong shape. What a shame, that means something ate my spaghettis and my infill of potirron is what's doing so well!!! Ah well, at least we still have squash to eat!