Mi casa es su casa

Sunday 11^th March

We spent most of the day finishing off the kitchen, fixing on doors and handles, and fixing the extra large wall cupboard to the wall, but as an ordinary cupboard. The new wall cupboard was missing some bits (dowels and fixing screws), which had been used on the other cupboard, so that will have to wait until Monday.

I was hoping to plumb in the sink…..hot and cold water and waste pipes…..but I think this is beyond me, although I may try the waste pipes in Monday. Worked out how to fix the sink to the worktop…..wrong type of fixing plates provided, so another trip to the ferreteria Monday.

We then transferred all the kitchen stuff that was in the tall white cupboard and other stuff from surfaces into the cupboards, which allowed the white cupboard to be released and taken upstairs to the front room to become a wardrobe. We also transferred the larger white wardrobe into the front room, and J designed a wooden ottoman to fit between them. The pine drawer unit was transferred to the small bedroom, along with the small bed which folded under the existing bed in there.

These furniture movements allowed the front bedroom to be transformed, with all our clothes stored away, and room for everything else to be stored, once the unit is made.

Picasso ??

Saturday 10^th March

Another cold sunny day. No work on house today. After breakfast, we drove to Beltran to order a bit of chipboard for the gap (15 cm x 70 cm), and a piece of blanco 45 cm x 70 cm for the hidden bit of the corner cupboard that would not be seen, but would stop stuff falling out. Even with pictures on the digital camera, it was difficult to explain why we wanted these 2 pieces of chipboard…..I think they thought we were just showing them pics of the kitchen for them to admire….muy bien (very good). We got our chipboard eventually and a few extra screws etc, and then drove to Fuengirola via the alternative route ….loads of rally cars driving towards us at what seemed like rally speeds up the winding mountain road, so it felt quite dangerous, particularly on the bends !! The weather had warmed up by then on the coast to 20 C.

We stopped off at a huge kitchen DIY store we discovered last time we went this way, and got screws, fixing plates and brackets etc for fixing cupboards and the worktop, and also stopped off at a swimming pool shop to check out mosaic tiles….much cheaper @ 19 € per square metre …..only problem we only need 0.75 m² and the minimum order was 2 m² .

On to the market, where we spent a couple of hours. J picked up a few books and I got a nice art deco porcelain figure in Picasso style for 10 €. It is hand made in Spain by Axia ….looks like value to me, but it may only be cheap replica tat ….any views ?

We then went on to the Swedish wifi internet café to post blog and catch up on e mails, and also had an English breakfast and carbonara. J went to beach to sit and read, and I caught up with her at 4 pm. We then walked around the port for the first time, and back home by about 6 pm via Mijas……no rally cars but it seemed the rally had been along this road.

Kitchen building continues Spanish style

Friday 9^th March

We awoke to another beautiful day, albeit a bit cold to start, with the wind having died down. After breakfast, we got ready to continue building the kitchen. However, J discovered that we had an extra 70 cm unit with doors, no doors for the sink unit, and that the wall cupboard that we had nearly completed was 70 cm high rather than 35 cm high ie far to big to fit on the wall…..why we did’nt notice this whilst we were building it the previous day is a mystery.

J decided that we would keep the big wall cupboard, put legs on it and use it as an extra cupboard against the boiler wall. Rather than start building, we decided to take the extra unit back and get the missing doors, handles, hinges, screws, 4 extra legs etc…… and order another wall cupboard. Beltran man seemed unsurprised to see us and was amused about the mistakes ……poco problema….a small problem. We took the door furniture home and told to return at 6 pm for the doors and new cupboard.

We started building again at 10.30 am, and with a short break for lunch, had completed what we had and loosely arranged the kitchen as it would be like, including the sink, by about 3 pm. The sink is much deeper than we thought, and J quickly realised it was a washing sink, and the “drainer” was in fact a washboard. Also, the long worktop was marginally too long to to allow a fridge freezer to fit in, and the short bit of worktop was too long and partially blocked the doorway. Also, there was a gap between the door on the corner unit as there was no need for the other door, and we decided that this should be blocked off with a similar piece of matching wood.

After much debate, we agreed 1.2cm to be cut off the long worktop and 23 cm cut off the short bit. We loaded the worktops into the car and took them to Beltran, and the saw man quickly cut them to size with no charge. The wall cupboard had yet to be made, but someone quickly knocked one up ……..but made up out of wooden chipboard rather than blanco (white) chipboard……..less haste, more speed. We had’nt realised this was our cupboard, but Beltran man saw the error and told the guy to make another one with blanco !! ….which he did in about 10 minutes. On getting it home, the cupboard still looks wrong …..90 cm long but with 2 x 35 cm doors……but we left it in its polythene wrapping for another day !!

They were suddenly very busy, so we took our cupboard and doors without ordering the new piece of wood for the corner unit, and went home. J showered whilst I popped out to Mercadona for wine and shopping. After showering, we went out to dine at the Argentinian’s restaurant and had an excellent menu of the day @ 12 € …. leek soup, fried pork fillets and flan, washed down with his fine house wine @ 8 €.

Shaky start to building kitchen

Thursday 8^th March

Another cool , bright and very windy day. Again, winds forecast to get to 100 km per hour in Andalucia. After breakfast, I went to phone the Solicitor again, as she had failed to exchange contracts yesterday as planned. As we thought, they hang on to the interest when there is a delay in completion, which is now planned for Monday 12^th.

After I returned, I started to update the blog which is about 10 days behind….I even had a comment from T asking where the blog was. We had agreed we would go to Fuengirola later in the afternoon to post the first instalment.

After J had done her gardening, there was little she could do, so she started making the kitchen, starting with the partially made drawer unit. I joined her, and together we started to put on the drawers and doors.

We ran out of screws quite early and went to several cheap shops and a ferreteria, but without success, and would have to go back to Beltran to get proper kitchen screws, but it was approaching 2 pm, so we had lunch. Later, I caught up with first week of blog and pics ready to post, but it was well past 4 pm, so we decided to postpone and concentrate on kitchen.

Drove over to Beltran with a bag full of bits to query which bits went where, get more screws, and to change the handles, and query how to fix some long screws, as no tool had been provided. The chap was very helpful as usual, and changed the handles and sold us a special attachment for the drill to fix long screws, more screws, how to affix legs and how to hang the wall cupboard.

We then went to the ferreteria to take back the Chinese lantern…..the boy laughed as we entered, probably knowing that we would bring it back at sometime. They were happy to refund, but we bought goods to the equivalent price of 21 euro inc and expensive hammer J did not approve of…..essential for kitchen builders !!

Back home with our new knowledge and toys, and started putting the handles on drawers and doors. J devised a novel way of fixing the handles in the exact place by “painting” cleaning fluid on the handle screw holes and then placing the handle on the front of the drawer or door, “imprinting” the exact position of where the holes needed to be drilled. The first drawer was perfect, but the second was more difficult, and the drill broke, with hole slightly out of position. Managed to drill holes bigger in end to make fit ! The drill bit was excellent, although a bit fierce, as only fast speed on drill. We finished about 6.30 having finished the drawer unit and partially finished the wall unit, leaving 2 more tomorrow.

We had a glass of wine on the porch before going out to check e mails and eat. I had an E mail from Solicitor confirming exchange of contracts on the house, so it was now legally binding, and end of uncertainty.

Getting the kitchen

Wednesday 7^th March

We awoke to another bright and sunny day, but with very strong winds forecast later. Today was going to be a more relaxing day, with no painting !!.We drove to Pizarra to pick up sink from Pavisan, telling the girl we had already paid for it when we ordered it. On the way back, we stopped at the river to birdwatch….a few white cranes/storks and black winged stilts, with their red legs, silhouetted in the water.

We drove back via Beltran to see if the kitchen was ready, and sure enough it was, and ready to go. The man had partially made up the drawer unit with the drawers, as they are a bit tricky apparently, and the rest was flat packed on a pallet. They offered to cut the 3.6 meter worktop @ 2.08 metres, and we got the sink out for them to cut out the sink hole…..all a bit nerve wracking, as we had planned to double to check measurements.

We loaded up the car with the units, drawers and doors, and drove home to unload, returning for the worktops and sink. We then walked up to town….J to get money from bank to pay Ricardo, and me to check e mails, and to my surprise, they had received my money via Lloyds and were ready to exchange and complete on the Bristol house. I was asked to phone Solicitor about this at 1 pm……it was 12.30 and I couldn’t open the house insurance quote, which needed to be in place.

Off to a better Locutorio with a bright girl who was able to let me download the quote on her master computer. I then phoned up broker and got insurance in place a few minutes before 1 pm. I phoned up, and they planned to exchange contracts and complete in the afternoon ….great as this would end the uncertainty.

Off to Bar El Timon for lunch, where we continued to discuss our unease about whether we had in fact paid for the sink, coming to the conclusion that we probably hadn’t, but were still unsure. We then drove to Malaga for a general walk round Aki and Carrefour, getting some long life bulbs and bits and pieces….more shirts and socks !! Then drove to Pizarra to visit Pavisan to see if we had paid, and of course we hadn’t…..anyway they just charged the 135 € rather than the 159 € with tax.

By now it had got very windy and was blowing a gale. We then drove to Ricardo’s house for tea (strawberrys and chocolate dip) and the ritual of receiving and checking the final bill, taking into account the overpayment of 1,034 € for the tiles last time, but still 2,300 €. J spent an hour querying the bill, and managed to knock off 100 €, but still irritated about a load of sand @ 43 € which is unused and taking up a parking space near the house on the waste ground.

J paid him 1,000 € on account, with the balance next week when she had fully checked the final bill and was happy.

We were then invited to inspect his boat of which he is justly proud….a cross between a speed boat and a day boat which is licensed for 6 passengers. He plans to hire it out together with himself for fishing and water ski-ing trips at very reasonable prices.

We then went home into a fantastic sunset and back into town to check e mails. I was annoyed to have one from the Solicitor saying she hadn’t exchanged contracts as one of the vendors was away, and couldn’t complete till Monday 12^th, I sent a reply querying what happened to the interest in these circumstances as they had all the money.

The final rain water solution

Tuesday 6^th March

Another cool sunny day to start with, and J started a major clean of the house from top to bottom , whilst I painted the top of the new tiles on the outside of the house and around the house number.

At about 11 am I went up to the town to check e mails re the house purchase and money transfers, and had an E mail from Solicitor that I could exchange/complete on Thursday 8th if the money was transferred to them tomorrow as planned. After lunch on porch, I intended to start painting the front doors, and cleaned them, but it was too windy, so I scraped the remaining upper hall wall leading to the terrace, ready for cauchoing and painting, which took all afternoon as upper wall very difficult as out of reach…..used my pole !

Tommy arrived about 2 30 pm in a bad mood to fit the gutters and downpipes, and this was not improved when J mentioned that she wanted the front of house tiling finished….3 small tiles at base of wall where he had cemented rather than tiled. It got to the stage where J and Tommy were not talking to each other. I demonstrated to him that the gutters would not work, showing him that the water would just flow off the porch terrace and down the wall. He thought about it for a bit, and then fitted the gutters as planned, with a gap from the wall…….

Ricardo arrived about 4 pm, and J showed him the how water would miss the gutter. Ricardo agreed, saying he had told him to cut it somehow. Anyway, he went off to get some flat plastic to bridge the gap which Tommy fitted. The last straw was when Tommy cut and fitted the 3 tiles, but started to use grey cement mortar rather than the brown tile cement, and J told him to remove it.

Ricardo chatted for awhile, as he does when the bill is about to be presented. We were invited to go for “tea” tomorrow evening at 6 pm to get the bill…..approx 2,000 euro, so not too bad.

After they had gone, we went to another garden centre in Coin which was more expensive and not so good as other one, so we returned to the other one to buy cactus, a tall 6 € bounganvillia and more compost soil.

We drove home in the dark and walked to the Garage ….I had planned a Plato de los Montes ……no lomo ….(cold back meat) , but I got extra chorizo and a third roast pimiento. We watched thed first half Liverpool v Barcelona second leg match , and rest of second half in Bar Bramleys.

Painting & getting to know neighbours

Monday 5^th March

We got up reasonably early to a cool but sunny day, and spent morning painting down from roof terrace after cauchoing upper hall ceiling and filling in an old junction box. Lunched at our favourite menu del dia bar and also bought a screwdrivers set to unscrew terracotta lamps to paint behind.

I popped out for an hour after lunch to check business e mails re Bristol house and try and sort out house insurance.

Our neighbours from up the road passed by, and we invited them in to look round, and they were suitable impressed with the house. They then invited us back to their house, which looks about the same as J’s, but turned out to be twice as big with 3 double bedrooms.

We then popped out to a garden centre about 7 pm …J got feet for the sink garden + soil compost + jasmine…but didn’t buy a 6 € bouganvillia for the patio garden.