A bit of an update!

Whilst the weather in much of Europe has been bitterly cold with lots of snow, this last week here has been ever so pleasant, most days have been in the +'s...the day before yesterday was a balmy 10° and all the snow and ice has pretty much disappeared.

 

 Sunny days

The days are getting longer with sunrise just before 10am and sunset just after 5pm...before I know it we will have 24hr daylight.

 Sunrise

This week I am into the final stages of negotiations re selecting a builder for the renovations...the process has taken sometime but has been very thorough and I am very thankful that I decided to go with Stoð to help with the process....their professionalism has made the whole procedure pretty painless.

Hopefully by next week the renovations will be underway, so expect plenty of pics documenting the  process during the next few months.

Of course the procrastinator in me has left a few things to the last minute and I have been busy over the weekend emptying the middle floor of a few remaining items such as bookcases, shelving and desks left by the Post Office and have had to shuffle the storage space around in the basement...my studio looks like a whirlwind has gone through it and I need to get this sorted so it is once again a pleasant usable space.

So here are some before pics of what the middle floor currently looks like.
 

view from back wall to the front

view from front wall to the back

 Office

Safe

Side section of the building which will become gallery/art retail venture, this area was an addition to the building in the 1980's.

Gallery side with the stairs that lead down to my studio

Kitchen area off the gallery side.

View from the stairs.

My main concern at the moment is my 150 year old plan drawer that is stuck on the middle floor as it is too wide to get through the doorways down stairs to the studio.

This lovely but very large old antique piece has had some shunting about over the last few years and goodness knows what life it had before me.  It came from England on a container to Australia just a couple of years before I purchased it.  I first acquired it about 14 years ago and I had to take a glass sliding door out to get it into the house...it then lived in a room that became my bedroom.  Originally this room was a lounge room which had large archway openings and the plan drawer fitted through these no problem.  However, silly me bricked up the openings and put a door for privacy (as you would for a bedroom) everything was fine for several years until I sold the property and had to move...the plan drawer was trapped in the room...so I had to have it pulled apart to get it out.  Fortunately in the next house there was access via double glass doors from the verandah and so no problem getting it in or out.  When I sold that house it then had to be packed and shipped to Iceland which took 3 months in a container on a boat and shipping docks.  When it arrived here it managed to just fit through the rear door into the backroom but could go no further as the other doorways are all too narrow.

So I am back to pulling it apart...I can almost hear it groaning in pain...noooo! 

A view of the back room where I have managed to remove the top off the plan drawers...yay, just need to remove the back...gently gently and then hopefully we can maneuver it to the studio!