I can’t believe it’s been a month. At the beginning of September, I was doing the finishing touches to the sink unit and getting it plumbed in. I was also getting my stuff together to prepare to walk the Camino Primitivo. Then I got a message from Richard and Suzanne (who we lived with for a year when we first came to Spain in search of land). They were looking for a carer to help them out but needed some help in the meantime. So I packed my stuff and headed over to lend a hand. Dave followed on a week later and I stayed a total of 2.5 weeks until a new carer started working for them and their son came to visit from China. When we got back home, I had a tummy bug followed by flu, which put me out of action for a bit.

I spent a day in the garden clearing out old beds and harvesting a few things too. I put a bucket load of beetroots into storage, collected a kilo of amaranth grain and strung up some super hot chillies to dry.

Beautiful amaranths

Biggest of 20 pumpkins

Physalis

Basil

Peppers and chillies

Busy bee

Drying in the attic

Dave has been working full time on the computer the whole of September but on his weekends, he started work on some cladding above the old beam on one side of the house. Then, when I started getting better I helped out one afternoon and we developed some good techniques for cutting the awkward shaped wood. That meant I could just carry on with it when he went back to work. It was great – I spent five days measuring, sawing, sanding, cutting and trying to make it all fit as nicely as possible. We thought it would take a week or two to do, so finally we found a job that took less time than we anticipated! Now the cladding is finished and the upstairs is tidied up ready for the next job of lowering the floor.

Battons in front of insulation

One side cladded

Look at that handiwork!

Other side cladded

I’m still getting over being ill but almost back to normal now. It’s been frustrating to get so little done in September. October has arrived now and although the weather is still lovely, the nights and mornings are starting to get chilly. The trees are turning, the pumpkins are ready and the nights are drawing in.

Today we just had our first community workday at a friend’s place. Everyone who is doing projects turned up to lend a hand and we’ll take turns going to each other’s places. It was brilliant how much we got done in just a few hours. And it’s really lovely to be able to just turn up and do some work without having to think and plan! Hosting will be a whole different story…

Clearing brambles

Putting in terraces

Cleared!

Removing some branches

Terraces in

Ready for planting

-Anna