La Grange De L'espoir

It's a sure sign you're family are fully behind you, when you get a gift at Christmas such as this! A water colour painting of our new home, as it was, when we signed for it and took receipt of the keys....

Calling All Gardeners! We need your help.

We literally have a blank canvas for the land that will become our garden. We’ve taken down some small trees that were in the middle of the rear garden plot. Now don’t shout, but they weren’t in the best condition, and we do intend on planting many trees, shrubs and flowers and I can’t wait to get started. I say “I” because the garden is my sole project. I love nothing more than pottering around the garden and watching it come to life.

So this is where I’d like some help, advice, insights of your own experiences of creating a new garden from a blank canvas. Where did you start? What would you not do again? What’s your favourite tree, shrub, flower and why?

Well this weekend has all been about planning….

Going through all the videos, drawings and measurements we’ve taken of the house and the attached barn to come up with a plan. It was like being back at school again! Scaled drawings and cut-outs of rooms, stairs, showers, toilets and beds, so we can move them all around to make sure it works.

It actually worked though, we have now got a layout we are happy with. Next stage is to speak to our architect to get everything finalised so that we can submit our planning application. Doing it all in one go, so that we only have to pay once (in theory) and then we can pick and choose what we do each time we are over in our lovely corner of La Creuse.

Hello to all our new followers!

We are only just starting out on our journey, but we wanted to introduce ourselves properly.

Granted, this is not how we'll look, when we are knee deep in dust, lime mortar and everything we are discovering, that's been crammed into every little space the previous occupant could find. But it is us.

We are Jane and Simon x

OK, so let’s take a look inside the farmhouse. Now this brings a real feel of humility to how people used to live. No worrying about the wifi or mobile phone signal, increasing heating costs and definitely no keeping up with the Jones’s.

The front room has a concrete floor, with an imprint on it to make it look like tiles/slabs. The large open fireplace was the sole source of heating and there is still the original brace for the cook pot. However, there was an arga type oven installed at some point.

The sink is concrete too and there is no running water. Just a hand pump that used to have a rubber pipe that ran down to a well. We don’t have the benefit of access to that well now, as the land was divided up and taken back by the neighbouring farmer.

There is an old electricity metre and breaker, but no supply to the house and it’s quite clearly very out of date.

So as I said before, there’s no electricity connected, no water supply and no waste water.

So, what exactly have we bought? We have an old farmhouse with an attached barn, a porcherie and a detached barn.

Sounds great, doesn’t it? Well, there’s no water supply, no electricity and it’s completely uninhabitable. Not even glampable yet (is that even a word?!).

So there’s a long way to go, but we have time. I say time, there’s my version of time and my husbands version of time. Let’s see how we get on.

In France, the 1st May is a special day, with a few different reasons / meanings. How are you celebrating yours?

Whilst we aren't there at the moment, we are putting together planning details for our renovation project and thinking of what we are going to tackle next 🌳🏚

February 2023 we finally got the keys to our new home in La Creuse!

Back in 2017 is when we first started talking about how we would love to own something in France and one day retire to it. But with 6 children, 3 different schools and a busy work life, it just continued as that…. Talking about it.

Fast forward to the confinement and restrictions that Covid inflicted upon us and that is when we reached our turning point. “What are we waiting for”? Old age, maybe…. Because the years are stacking up and we’re not getting any younger. So in the Summer of 2022 the hunt was on!

November 2022 is when we first got to look at the property we had only seen online and during a facetime call with the owners. We knew straight away that it was the one for us. Fast forward to February 2023 and the beginning of our next chapter.