OUR KIDS LIFE IN FRANCE, AND OURS - finishing touches and open for business

We had a lot of shingle left over so I came up with an idea to use it up..We built a boule court!! Turned out to be a good idea, and has been used by all of our customers young and old alike. This didn't take long to do and our kids had great fun testing it out. We also put in a table tennis table and a see-saw for the mini-kids, and, of course we had already put in the swings.

We put a few finishing touches in the gite; a basket of essentials which we call a "welcome pack", some fresh flowers, a list of all local markets, restaurants, supermarkets and lots of tourist information.

Our first customers were here, they were great two couples with 2 children...Our kids were happy, new friends to play with. We were delighted with the end product, and so were our customers!!

OUR KIDS LIFE IN FRANCE, AND OURS - driveway home improvements

As you can see from the pictures there was a lot of shingle to spread around. Fortunately the kids were off school that day so everyone was handed a rake or shovel and all five of us pitched in. We dumped piles of the shingle in strategic places around the driveway and all placed ourselves in circle like positions to move inwards and meet in the middle. At least that was the plan....Turned out it was a bit like icing a cake, you always end up with more on one side than the other, so you have to keep going over and over to get it level. This was especially noticeable on the twins sides as they were young and not as strong as us, and believe me, it takes some heaving.

it was worth the effort though, even if the kids did give up half way through, but I was secretly hoping the weeds wouldn't grow through it...Time would tell. It was July by then and incredibly hot, how glad were we that, after all that effort, we had a nice cool pool to jump into..........Had to make the most of it before the first customers arrived!!

OUR KIDS LIFE IN FRANCE, AND OURS - I'm back in the pool

Hi, I'm back!! The holiday was great, but as usual it goes too quickly :( :(. So back to the pool. I managed to get a week off work just before the first customers arrived, so I was able to help get the last finishing touches in place in the garden. The next step with the pool was to make the surrounds look good. We had loads of large rocks piled up round the back from where the digger had excavated for the pool, so we decided to make use of them and form a rockery with plants, and fill in the gaps with dark cork to stop the weeds coming through. Whilst the kids were at home, they helped me to barrow the rocks over to the pool and I spent the first half of the week arranging them around the pool. My hubby was busy putting the bamboo wind breaker round the outside of the fence and planting grass in front of the gate, where the digger had been. As you can see from the photos, the finished product was pretty good once the pool furniture was in place. All we had left to buy were the parasols.

The next stage of the garden, however, was going to be a little more tricky and a lot more hard work....We had already laid shingle around the gite drive, but now it was time to tackle our driveway, it's huge, so with two rakes and a lot of motivation, the spreading began...

OUR KIDS LIFE IN FRANCE, AND OURS - an easter break

HAPPY EASTER EVERYBODY!!!!!!

For those of you who follow, I'm sorry but I'm away for the week for a short Easter break. As I will not be in a place where I can log on, I will have to interrupt my story for a short time. The kids are very excited, just hope we don't get too many "are we there yet?" 's. For those of you fortunate enough to have an Easter holiday...HAVE FUN and hope the weather is good for you. Sorry for those who don't and don't work too hard. Be back soon......

OUR KIDS LIFE IN FRANCE, AND OURS - tiling again..

It took us hours to drag the kids out of the pool, and in the end we had to bribe them with promises of sweeties as it was getting too dark. We sat out on the terrace and had a lovely barb-b-cue in the evening sun and admired the work done so far. It was rare that I had an evening off so I wanted to make the most of it.

The next day back to work, it was tiling again!! As if the men hadn't seen enough tiles already. First the steps were put in the pool and then the large surrounding tiles. We ummed and ahhed about the type of tiles for the rest of the plage, as we were on a tight budget and they aren't cheap. As you can see from the photos we opted for a sort of crazy paving, it was more difficult to lay, and longer, but sooo much cheaper. They turned out to be a good choice, neat and not slippery as so many other pool tiles are when you get out with wet feet.

My parents-in-law had to go back to the UK at this point, so the final works were up to us to get finished, we already had several weeks booked...beginning the next month....I needed to ask for some time off work to get finished in time.....

OUR KIDS LIFE IN FRANCE, AND OURS - twittering into the pool

Things were moving fast now with the pool, and the surrounds were filled with the earth that was dug out for the pool, or at least some of it. This would later be tiled to make the "Plage", to put the sun loungers on. But first the liner had to be fitted. This was less complicated than we had first thought, probably due to the clear as mud instructions, you just had to be sure that there were no creases in it and this was done by vacuum, literally.

The kids were besides themselves when they got home to find blue in the pool, so as soon as the liner was fitted we decided to fill it with water for a test drive. As predicted, the kids were too impatient to wait for it to fill, this takes an absolute age, so it was shoes & socks off and in paddling as soon as there was a cm of water. And like twittering birds in a bath, boy did they have fun!

OUR KIDS LIFE IN FRANCE, AND OURS - skimmers and pool house

The next step was to cement the bottom of the pool, which was real precision work. Difficult to tell from the photos, but the base had to slope down from the shallow end into a kind of upside down pyramid at the deep end. This had to be done in stages to get it just right, so whilst the cement was drying out, (which didn't take long in the heat), in went the skimmers and the pool house went up. It was beginning to look more like a pool now.

The children got bored with the blow up pool we bought them and decided it was far more fun running in and out of the hose, occasionally spraying the men accidentally on purpose, but they didn't mind at all their backs were toasted by then and the cold water cooled them off. When on long journeys their frequently asked question is always; "Are we there yet?", this was altered at this time to; "Is it ready yet?", referring to the pool, and was asked every day when they got home from school. I ended up guestimating the due by date, buying them all a calendar, marking out D Day, (or J Day as they say here in France!), and getting them all to tick off the days one by one until they got to the chosen date.....There would be hell to pay if it wasn't finished......