It’s hard to believe that it has been almost 3 months since my freak accident. I can honestly say apart from a bit of residual neck stiffness I am back to normal. I am grateful for the great care I got in the hospital and then back home by Al.  It was a long 6 weeks of recuperation and I made sure I did as I was told and just listened to my body.  I feel very very lucky.  

Before starting this blog I read the last paragraph of the previous blog and with all things that go with building a house they rarely go to plan.  One thing that did go to plan was the installation of the lift on the day it was booked.  We did all the prep work which involved lining it with ply, painting the front faces that will be seen (as it is a 3 sided lift) as well as putting both doors in.  Al and I fitted the doors but got Smithy to come back and fit the door hardware which was bit tricky.   The lift will not only make the 2^nd storey accessible for those less mobile it will also be handy for moving stuff between floors. Funnily enough Sammy was a bit wary on his first trip in it lol. 

And speaking of things not going to plan we won’t be moving in before Christmas and it is looking more like March now.  We are up to the gibbing stage and locals Mike & Ricky have made a start and what they have done so far looks great.  But we are not the only ones with demands on their time and everyone knows that Christmas seems to become a crazy stressful time.  So we are just going with the flow.   We have other things to get on with including building the downstairs and upstairs decks and then installing the louvre system.   Al also whipped up the outside stairs leading up to the deck with the help of Neil. These have proven handy for moving the gib upstairs and will be useful when we have to remove the temporary internal stairs for gibbing.

We also decided that now was a good time to get the section landscaping underway, in particular leveling out the back and front.  Brent from Big B Contracting came in for a couple of days and levelled it all off and put a layer of fill on top.  All we have to do now is throw some grass seed on which we have done at the front.   I now have the beginnings of my garden area and we moved the garden shed to its new home.  The chickens have also been moved to an interim home until we can build a new chicken coop next to the rain water tank.

Neil & Dianne headed back to Christchurch early November.  Neil had a barrage of tests and poking and prodding to face as he hadn’t been feeling on form for a few months.  You wouldn’t really know it as he still continued to work like a trojan helping Al while I was out of action. They found he had a blocked bile duct and needed an operation however during all the scans they found a shadow on his lung also which turned out to be cancer. A long story short Neil had another operation just over a week ago to remove part of his right lung.  Luckily it was operable, and they were quick to get it scheduled.  Neil is now recuperating at home with Nurse Dianne looking after him and we are looking forward to seeing them back here in the New Year.  I know that Neil is keen to get back and put his electrical skills to work.   It has been a scary few months all round that’s for sure.

Last week the solar was finally hooked up.  It was supposed to happen a few weeks ago but the contractor arrived here without the inverter and batteries that they forgot they were supplying.  He drove over from Christchurch and then had to turn around and head back.  But now everything is hooked up and we are just waiting for the power company to get the metering sorted.  We will then no longer have any power bills and in fact will be expecting money back for what surplus we supply to the grid during summer. 

The holiday season is fast upon us and apart from a couple of nights at Bluespur we will be here chipping away.  We hope you all enjoy some rest and relaxation and if you are up our way we aren’t hard to find.  Cheers Margie & Al