Time to test out the homemade roof scaffolding – Renovating a 1930s French House

I hadn’t planned to go up on the roof but I stuck my head out the attic window and there was no frost so I decided to just go for it. Major job ticked off the list and happy now that no water will come down the chimney and into our new kitchen!! I’m uploading from the Gite again so upload speeds are slooooowww so the videos are a day late.

You can watch Part 1 where I built the platform here

Links below to the Galibier website. This isn’t a paid advert just a plug for some great products produced with passion.

Colombière Pro Jacket that keeps me so warm during the videos

https://www.galibier.cc/product/colombiere-pro-cycling-jacket/

Galibier Fire Feet socks that keep the feet nice and toasty

https://www.galibier.cc/product/fire-feet-2-merino-wool-cycling-socks/

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This is a daily vlog of our self-renovation of a French Townhouse which was originally built sometime in the 1930s. We left Ireland in August 2023 with our two kids and two dogs in search of a family home and these videos are a way to document the process for ourselves, as well as hopefully inspiring others to take on a similar project.

Good morning welcome back to a nice day here in France one degree nice and wild yesterday’s – 7 it was freeing yesterday there was 10 minutes at the start where I actually couldn’t do any work my hands were so cold I just had to get all the blood back into them anyway Sunday

Tonight maa’s dad CL is still here he’s upstairs listening to jazz music uh he’s stripping wallpaper up in our room and job just you know put on the long finger where the bigger stuff was going on so it’s really good uh having someone to do that it was great having them here

Yesterday like the extra pair of hands just made all the difference and getting all that stuff there yesterday there was a lot of stuff there was three van fulls of stuff so good to get it all gone so I’m going to continue on just get the kitchen cleared up this morning finish

The last bit of plastering in there decide which bits I’m going to replaster ‘s a few lumpy bumpy bits we’ll see if they look what they look like but in general quite happy with the Finish there it’s Rough and Ready but it’s kind of nice it’s kind of rustick here you

Know um so yeah let’s go check out what cl’s doing better make sure he’s not asleep on the Job what your Cloud hey hello s how’s it going good wow wow a good day wow look at that a lot of work a lot of work that’s old old wallpaper it’s been on there forever so okay we’re all ready to class now nice clean machine I just have to do

That end wall there I’m not going to do the reveal today cuz it’s too time consuming I want to crack on we can come back to that and there’s a little bit along the bottom here I want to do um I should really fill that hole but I sort

That out if anyone’s wondering how it’s actually bearable to work here in Winter I have a little plug for a friend of mine’s website it’s giia h this isn’t a paid sponsorship but miles my good friend has been sending me jackets over over the years and uh it’s basically what keeps me warm

They’re designed for cycling but they’re great for for uh for DIY stuff as well because they’ve got really long arms and long backs so they when you’re stretching you don’t see that Builders boom too often and you don’t have to Cold going up your arms but really warm

Once you’re moving really warm really snug reversible it’s got a a hood it’s detachable I think yeah um the other day I accidentally wore while I was doing plasting and it was covered in plaster in the wash brand new again so big shout out to Gia I’ll put a link Down Below in

Case wants to have a look at the stuff and the socks every day I have my Gia socks on they’re designed for cycling shoes so they’re thin but they’re really warm so um you don’t have that big like if you wearing a hiking sock you don’t

Have that big bulkyness in your shoes so there a little plug there for gate uh link will be down below in the description He Oh right h on this okay we’re good for yellow y yellow this looks this looks look the what is it hope he’s not looking for me to fall off the Roof L of vulture no it’s it’s a little long maybe that was longer can you bring me up the grinder it’s in the in the garden just outside the back door don’t look down don’t look down you’re okay yeah it’s not too bad to is in good

Condition this is a different size to that chimney that’s a double chimney so I’m just going to cook the the lip off this so there’s no kind of wind suck going anywhere anyway ain’t going nowhere man there ain’t no rain going in there the platform feels very sturdy the

Uh board underneath isn’t the bcy board the first board I put up the big beam is perfect I’m not put any weight on the chimney stck that one’s in worse condition so Hope give you the grinder now I go over there same again don’t pull up I’ll be okay hold on there there we go you don’t put your white on the Firefox no no absolutely not absolutely not this is is a bit lumpy this one hey does this look bigger than that

One one two three three and two halves one two three and two Hales yeah that’s the this is the big bigger chimney so this was two fireplaces this is why there’s obviously two openings in it one here can’t see the brick is really cold any I’m hanging on to a big big

Area here which should come down but I don’t really want to take it down because I know from experience that these things are heavy and that if I take it down it’s going to fall down I ain’t going to be able to hold it so I’ll leave it up

There for now going leave it up there for today it’s not in my way I ain’t Do no harm now this would not have been a job to do on your own it’s great how C here he’s down get me a second tube ready this the job that’s been kind of

Hanging over me since day one this chimney breast blocked off cuz the rain was just coming straight down there’s no caps on them and coming into the room so like a glove I look forward to seeing this on the next updated Google Earth Do Got Oh He And Bour clour everybody it’s Sunday but we are working worked all weekend didn’t we I’m working again tomorrow oh yes yes sure so good progress this weekend yes yes good job big changes no I can see but good job yeah I know people can see it people can see it uh there’s people

Watching every day so they see the changes even though they’re kind of subtle but this weekend there has been big changes two men on the job just made a big difference uh so I’ll give you a quick tour now we’ll have a look and see what has happened so the

Kitchen uh all the plastering is done there which is pretty good have to do around the reveal um and just tidy that up there’s a bit of work in that probably a couple of hours on the own so uh we’ll do a quick tour upstairs Just give this a quick sweep here is going to continue take a wallpaper off tomorrow and he’s going to do the hall stairs behind behind me this room now is stripped so I know this looks all funny but it’s just the uh it’s kind of the imprint of the wallpaper that was

On it’s h it’s an internal wall so it’s not mold definitely not mold a few cracks all right it’s just where that floor shifted down here where if you watched the earlier videos we took up these boards to make sure there was nothing wrong down there there not the

Board is just slightly sagged over the years 90 years it’s been here um and this is these are kind of a Terra Cotta tile up here so cracking that um fireplace because it’s CA now I’m able to put some insulation up there and block that off now there’s a crack in

The wall here here but that’s just the difference between the stone wall and the block and the chimney breast so it rugs up along along there don’t know what that is could be lead paint something to protect from the heat cuz I say that would have been

Pretty hot when there was a big fire downstairs so I shall take that all off just in case um not sure so this room now uh I filled along here with plastic today oh we not plastic with with uh with lime mortar and so I just did a

First pass on it to hide all the cables I’ll do another skim on then the same over here that room’s not too bad the CL is going to start up here now and start stripping the wallpaper off here the end is done there but he’s going to do the

Rest which is great it’s not a fun job absolutely not a fun job and then the garden show the Yes again just give you a little bit more of a a view of the garden so this is a kind of lower Terrace if you like this is all sewing

At the moment So the plan is to uh is to pave this uh and then put some drainage along the edge of the house I have started dig it out a trench here for that um we’ll do the same along here we do the same all the way around put put

Eco drains in or something so that’ll be our kind of Terrace and kind of dining area get the Evening Sun really nice well kind of probably in summer it probably gets from from lunchtime but it gets fabulous Evening Sun and then up to W wobbly steps is the rest of the

Garden so I the plan is just to take most of the stuff out just start from Scratch so our boundary is this line here round with these trees around by the barn then behind this here over to that hedge R there then that HED R continues along there and around the back of the neighbor’s house and then obviously around here so

Yeah it’s going to be a lot of work to keep us going once we get the house habitable um we haven’t done a PL for the garden yet so we’re not sure what we’re going to do yet have put a little fence along here to make it safe for the boys

Um and after that then sure we don’t know great anyway we’ll see you all tomorrow for another video enjoy your