sunny days and self-building

The weather is uncharacteristically glorious so the children are outside as much as possible. When you live in the Highlands you feel you have to be outside on a good day just in case it is the last good day of the year and then you would be kicking yourself for not having made the most of it. The only downside to the recent good weather is the bright mornings. My kids are getting up earlier and earlier. Either I will have to fit a blackout blind or just resign myself to becoming a morning person and getting up at 6am. I could only do it with the help of coffee. It wouldn't be so bad if the baby wasn't waking me during the night as well. I don't think he is hungry I think he just feels like a bit of company. The benefit of breastfeeding is that I can just bring him in with me and feed him as I lie with my eyes shut. Most times we both fall asleep and the night limps on until the early morning games begin. It must be amazing to wake rested with a big smile and ready for action.

We are making good progress with our self-build house. We have finished foundations and have filled them with hardcore. This week we (when I say we, I really mean my husband) is going to whack it with a whacker plate. I had never heard of such a thing but it is a way of compacting the base. Then perhaps the following weekend we will pour the concrete floor. Also we have to drill holes in the foundation walls for drainage pipes as the brickies never left any spaces and we have to get the brickies back to start the chimney. We need to get all this done before 20th May when our timber-frame kit arrives. As I write it I am thinking it is quite a bit still to do before the kit arrives as we only have evenings and weekends.