Bad weather halts the build

Our new build has been plagued by rain. In fact, we look set for the wettest summer on record – which in Somerset means we’re been completely drenched.

As month three began and we finally started building the blockwork, we hoped the weather would take a turn for the better.

The house will have three floors, although the entrance level will fold into the hillside so it is essentially a basement. As well as housing the hallway, this storey will contain an all-important wine store and a large entertainment room.

This will be at the heart of the floor, and was used as a key bargaining tool to get our PlayStation and SkySports enthusiast 13-year-old son on board with the project.

The basement will also have a pretty basic cold store for curing meat, and storing chutneys and jams. There’ll be a nice utility room, albeit without the laundry chute we wanted – we had to rethink our plans when we found out just how much they cost!

Our two large dogs will sleep in the basement boot room, which will be pretty utilitarian. I’m not sure how they’ll adapt to the new house as they’re not usually allowed upstairs, but they’re going to have to get up to the ground floor; so they’ll have muddy paw access from the boot room up through the garage.

The first floor, which will house the bedrooms, overhangs the ground floor, providing a shelter in the basement. As we’re using timber to fuel our range and stoves, we need a decent wood store. So we’ll utilise this space for covered storage.