Stable renovation: part 1

In case you've been working why I've been a bit AWOL from both social media and from the blog it's because over the last several weeks I've been chilling out and spending some quality time with friends and family 💞 My brother came over from Finland for nearly a week with my nephew (who is 18 months old and the cutest little person in the world!) and we spent the majority of the time discovering new local places, going shopping and playing with Lego. We've had old family friends pop over for the day and I've had horsey friends come to visit. My grandparents are coming over for a week and we have a party planned for after the renovations are done 🎊🎉. Real life has a way of suddenly catching up with you and taking over your time unexpectedly!

But I'm finally feeling settled enough in our day to day life to be able to bring you guys up to date on one of the most exciting things that I've ever been involved with, which is the renovation of our American barn! When we first came to look at this place, we all knew that it would require quite a bit of money and work to get it looking like our own home. One of the biggest problems of the property was that the barn had only 4 stables, that it was 17 years old with a leaky roof and that it hadn't been looked after properly. Not only was it mouldy everywhere due to the leaking roof, the internal partitions creaky when a person just lightly leaned on them AND the entire barn was covered in cobwebs and an inch or more dust and dirt, which is so not the environment you want to keep your horses in, especially if you have horses like Basse is very sensitive to dust.

 

Luckily we were in contact with West of England Stabling who were able to come to have a look at the barn before we had even moved in and let us put the order in before we had finalised the purchase of this property, and we went with the Tintagel internal partitions (this design is different from their other fronts as the curve is made from tube rather than box section or flat) in a light wood and their classic American barn which is the same size as our old one, but this time we'll have 5 stables put in as well as a tack room and a storage room. The rest of the remaining space will be used for the storage of hayledge, straw and the horses' feed.

So far,  the old barn has been torn down and some of the parts of the new barn are slowly but surely arriving! The photos below are somewhat similar to what it will hopefully look like in the end ⤵️

This style internal partitions, but ours will made from a lighter wood