It's suddenly reality.

I feel that there is so much missing from this blog already, that has happened between May and now, yet so much is happening day by day. Its a shame you can't fill in the gaps as you go along and end up in a structured chronological order.

However that's not to be.

This week then has been our first visit to building control, Dave (the artisan) builders first look at our proper plans, and the trip to buy our caravan! (Yes its official, I'm now a pikey).

Building control went better than could be expected, our inspector Steve was a constructive and proactive chap. Very aware that we are doing our own drawings* he was thorough in exploring all the areas that he knew we were novices at, fire protection and access, emergency escape, sound penetration and insulation. With the exception of needing a few extra internal doors for fire escape nothing seemed too far out. However we did leave with an understanding of how much legislation and detail there was for every single part of the build.

Dave likewise seemed happy with most areas, Paul and he wanted to see all ground floor walls made of block, 'All?' I said, Dave asked me if I was going to want shelves up? Ah, yes, all I agreed. The best part of this meeting was that we've decided to build all of the ground floor, plus the ceiling/first floor joists before taking the existing roof off. This is a fantastic idea in my mind as everyone can work in a dry environment, plus when Paul and I dismantle the roof, we can do so from the first floor.

As for the caravan... Paul has been a complete star and spent two and a half days literally driving round the country looking at all the mobile home resellers. Its a bit like a shop at home service, he's photographed the good, the bad and the ugly and reported back to us. The conclusions are that a) all mobile home designers have had a taste bypass, and b) the affordable ones have bits missing and smell. Armed with Paul's research we at least felt we had some idea of what to expect and what to pay, the ones we had budgeted for did indeed smell, and required some little bits of work (new toilets/carpets!).

The nearest dealer was just a few miles away in Kettering, it must have been fate that took us to Kestrel Caravans as when we couldn't find one we really liked at all (at least that didn't have a SOLD sign in the window). Just as we were leaving we saw the owner (Chris) working away on a large static. 'Is this for sale' I ask, 'Its just come in, it will be in a few days, you can have a look inside though' That was our big mistake, this one smelt fine, even pleasant. There weren't any missing bits at all. Someone had loved this caravan. Kate looked in the bathroom, it had a proper cubicle with a glass door and a proper shower. It had heaters in all the bedrooms. It was also £1200 above our self imposed budget. Despite the tasteless 'mahogany on every surface treatment' and the dodgy glass lampshades everywhere this one was clearly a nicer prospect, and on the basis its not what you pay, its how much you lose on it in a year, it was a done deal.

*I'm doing my own drawings basically means I'm the chimp with the pencil, Kate's the one with the flair and I've had the most fantastic creative help from three dear architect friends who happen to make glorious buildings for a day job, and some brilliant little ideas from friends, siblings and parents. I'm not wanting to design by committee but any good idea is worthy of consideration. Those details can wait for another post though.

A Start at last - An Introduction.

Having never done a blog I'm already worried I simply won't have the time to keep this up to date, but as I sit here on the start of a year of potential heartache and hard work I'll try my best to keep family and friends up to date. The whole reason for this blog is to hopefully chronicle our plans to develop a huge (fairly ugly) grain barn into a pair of houses for ourselves and for some dear friends. Today Friday 10th August we finally exchanged on a fairly torturous process of let downs, gazumping and false starts. It all started on the 8th of May when I gave a lift home to a contractor who was working with me on a project. As we drove along he (another Rob) mentioned he was selling his barns for development, my ears pricked up, but I did remember that on my last visit some 10 years before I could only remember an enormous hangar full of lorries. What I did remember was that they were on the edge of a pretty hamlet on the Rutland/Leicestershire border, flanked by fields. My memory served me correctly, one enormous barn suitable for two semi detached dwellings and a single barn well suited to a single story conversion. I looked at the big barn, ludicrously enormous was my first thought, unconventional for a conversion was my second thought, that's my new home was my third.

The problem as I saw it was convincing Kate that this carbuncle could be a fantastic spacious house (eventually). The other problem was that the owner wanted to sell the whole plot consisting of two barns to make three properties, and was not considering a split. Part of the first problem should not have been a problem, I had already been looking with a good friend Paul Scott for a large rural house in a state of disrepair to buy, do up and sell on. I remember my text to Paul now 'Found Barns near Uppingham. They are enormous!'

The next evening I found myself standing outside the barns with Kate, Beth and Tom, and Paul, Cathy and their children Megan and Grace. 'This is where it goes Pete Tong' I thought. Unexpectedly the girls were positive, 'We need to sit down and do our sums' said Kate, in that 'Don't start getting exited just yet' tone.

The first start was speaking to my Builder Dave Ardley, (even as I type the word builder it doesn't fit) this is someone I've known and worked with for 9 years) the sort of person who really genuinely does what he does because of the pleasure of the finished project. I'm lucky to start with, in my industry I know and work with a fair number of builders, all of whom are good, but its a different thing to work with someone for a year. I think the word we need to be using is building artisan. Also as I have intended not to use an architect (officially, more of that later) and do all the plans and building control drawings myself, I needed to work with someone who actually is happy on that basis. To quote Dave 'In 20 years I've yet to have a plan which actually agrees with the site/or works out first time'. This clearly is good news for me, if Dave can work from a fag packet drawing, he won't mind mine. Literally after getting the agreement from Cathy, Paul and Kate we need to find out if this whole project is feasible, then we can make an offer on the barns. A quick call to Dave bursts my bubble, he has 18 months worth of work booked in, as he has a years work on a large development. He's gutted too, I can tell.

Two hours later Dave rings back. His had a think and long talk with his wife. 'A barn conversion you say?'