Proof of the pudding...

It's December, and time I blogged again. The last seven months of occupancy have been intense at ECF, not only with moving in but also just catching up with 'normal' family and work life. Despite the festive season being just round the corner, we at least feel we're getting there!

On the energy front, seven months of occupancy means we've got some data on energy consumption to compare with what we specified and predicted...and the results are quite a relief!

The bottom line is that we're using 25% less energy than we expected; and that's in a house already designed to use less than a quarter of the energy of the average new housing stock. In general hot water and space heating energy use are on target, although these account for less than half of our predicted energy use. The big savings have thus been made in other energy use, namely lighting and appliances. In particular the use of LED and CFL light fittings, coupled with A and A+ energy rated kitchen appliances has paid dividends.

Whilst in most houses heating and hot water use accounts for up 80% of domestic energy demand, our experience just shows that real savings can be made with little effort by replacing lighting and appliances (when worn out of course!) with more energy efficient equivalents.

Catching up with our crops

Its a funny thing - as with conversations with friends when you haven't written your blog for ages you just don't know where to start..."what have you been up to?"..."ooh not much really, y'know just the usual".

So despite it being December here's a harvesting the potatoes photo. We had great success with the red Desiree and will still be enjoying those 'til well into the New Year, they taste good, were quite prolific here and very few had any sort of damage or rot of any kind. The Kerrs Pink were tasty but much more prone to damage and much less hardy, as you might expect really. In late Spring I was given some diddy wee broccolli seedlings, planted them very late and just stuffed them between flowering plants as I hadn't prepared a proper bed, haven't a clue what type they were but they turned out just grand. The peas we planted just got lost or nibbled to the extent there was no crop to speak of this time.

The apple trees were fairly sparse in production but thats neither a surprise nor a worry. The Golden Spire which is an old Lancastrian cooker, also well suited to cider production, did quite well and produced large firm fruit which tasted delicious in crumbles etc. The Ribston Pippin and the Thorle Pippin both produced some small eaters but they were a bit on the sharp side, presumably because the sunshine wasn't abundant in the middle summer months. I've just been mugging up on pruning the trees which is a good winter task.

We're back!!

Hello from us! The blog is being reborn....with this photo which was taken in July.
We're online in the house which has taken countless agonies with BT and we're looking forward to catching up with progress and news from our part of the world.

Food production underway

The fruit is forming on this Golden Spire apple. We could really do with some rain as we've had around 7 weeks of significantly dry weather which is mighty unusual. I'm not expecting too many apples this year as the stock is only a year old and I'll need to learn the best way of pruning apple trees to ensure good healthy growth. In the border between the hen enclosure and the stone wall we've planted peas and broccolli amongst the cottage garden flowers and greenery.

We've planted Desiree and Kerrs Pink potatoes this year, both good Scottish stock, the former producing firm red skinned tatties and the latter for salads. Although we thought we'd just plant the 3 bags this year I bought far too many seed potatoes and after giving away loads to friends we've planted the remainder in fairly rough soil behind the top of the long stone wall. Despite planting late they're coming through nicely. We aim to create our raised bed veggie garden this year with plans for it to mature into an attractive parterre style affair over time. We'll be using joists from the old house to create the structure and hope to get that underway in the school holidays which start here next week.

One year since moving here

It was one year ago this week that we moved from our old house, a Victorian sandstone place, into the caravan here. As we turned the key in the lock it started raining but we laughed as we set out on this journey of housebuilding. I know there are a few people reading this who are just commencing on that journey so I just want to say its so worth it, although unquestionably hard work, and to keep plugging away as you will get there. One year on and we're unpacking our worldly goods which have mainly been stored in one of the outbuildings here. Thankfully no damage has come to them after 12months+ of storage.

The newell caps are one of the snagging items - the design is excellent being square with a shadow band but unfortunately someone at the manufacturer has used indelible pen to mark the house name/contract number on the top. No-one is actually looking to deal with this so we're going to see if a joiner friend has any ideas. I think sanding it off isn't going to work as the pen has absorbed into the wood. Our on-site joiner tried rubbing it down but I think its one of those small items that we will end up sorting out as no-one else is 'taking ownership'!


These pics are of various internal finishes. There are lots of reflective surfaces, black glass and oak on the hall wardrobe illustrating the light coming through the windows in the dining area. The 'flowers on the wind' stickers coming from the velux window are from Pedlars. Door handles from Carlisle Brass. We bought all our velux blinds online at Bumblebee Blinds who seemed competitive and were certainly efficient.

Building Control Certificate

Last Wednesday the joiner returned to fit this to the large upper floor window and on Thursday building control visited and all completion certificate and paperwork were handed over. Another key landmark in the creation of the house. The window illustrated is a fixed light 1.8m x 1.8m and affords a stunning view. We were so disappointed to be advised that this would need an internal barrier in place to comply with building regs. If we had known then perhaps a different design or different specification might have been created in the first place. Looks like a play pen.

BT have failed to meet four appointments to connect the phone. OK they pay compensation of £10 each time but we'd really rather have a phone line. So hopefully order number 5 will work...........

The wonders of nature never cease to soothe, we have an abundance of brown hares who are particularly visible in the early morning

Fine days

Last week our good buddies from Norfolk came for a holiday. As always it was lovely to catch up with them and it was also fun to have the house busy with the noise, mess and activities of two families. This marks one of those transitions between this place being a home rather than a house. Other self-builders have commented on the time it takes to settle in after designing, planning and constructing a house. Tamzin and her family bought us a beautiful handcrafted box for collecting apples from the orchard in years to come and some herbs for the garden. The herbs are being planted in the beds we've created between the top of the stone wall and the hen enclosure until we have formed our raised beds. The trailer in the picture above is full of plants ready to be put into the bed.

We officially had one rainy day in May.