More about us & "The Rumble"

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Cuppaster , Isle of Yell, Shetland Isles, United Kingdom

Sunday 9 October 2011

A House , A Hoover and Hello Girls !

A HOUSE

Almost wind and water-tight. Our building site is now a HOUSE !!!!
 Fred & Steve have achieved so much in the last weeks. Slates on next.








We've been very hampered by the weather at the moment, mainly the wind which has rarely been a gentle breeze of late. Without a safety harness (!) health and safety has to come first when clambering around on a wet roof in a force 9 gale. So Fred & Steve have been busy with some internal jobs,

Remember this photo from a couple of months back ? This will be our living room ..,




Here it is now .... just waiting for the concrete floor to be laid



Internal walls of the old house now rendered and ready for the Foamglas insulation (the glass bubbles!)

A couple of other internal shots - this our bedroom


Photo taken in the hall area - window on left looking out onto Alans Wall and the Lamby Shed, stairs will start just next to the window



A HOOVER


Words fail me .... other than "a womans work is never done"  =) !!!!




HELLO GIRLS !!!!

 Rambo welcomes our new arrivals . Considering he's a vasectomised ram, he was MIGHTY interested in the Shetland ewe lambs that we picked up yesterday. Very, welcoming !!





6 gorgeous ewe lambs. This years lambs, so they won't be tupped (mated) until this time next year. The Shetland breed have 13 different colour markings and we've decided our Shetland flock will be a mixture of Moorits (all black) and coloured.


Sheep settled out up on Grind croft , Digger keeping an eye on them ...





More arrivals next week, some breeding ewes from Hascosay hopefully

Watch this space !




Saturday 3 September 2011

Yell 2011 Agricultural Show

"It's not the winning, it's the taking part ..."


OK so I didn't expect to win any prizes, I've never entered a baking competition before or a photographic competition come to think of it ... but I thought I'd give it a go. You know what I mean, enter into the spirit of it ; make up the numbers. So ... when I saw 3 of these =)




I won a second  place for my chocolate sponge 


                                                    
                                                         







2nd place for my quiche







             2nd place for my picture of Rambo eating "High Tea" on top of a wall !


And a "Well Done" for my picture of the Schoolhouse



                                    
                                            Seriously Chuffed !!


  Who needs the sun with Mr Stripey at your show ?





Weather started well getting wetter as the day progressed. We took our neighbour John down with us, here are some shots from the day .


This is what you CALL a set of horns !




Below is a pure bred Cheviot YEAR OLD tup (a male lamb bred to do the business basically !) One of the largest breeds of sheep. He was a major prize winner and a big nosey lad !




Working dogs are very important so it's only be expected that they're also judge too.



Show winning Pure bred Shetland ewe; looked gorgeous after having a wash & blow dry earlier in the day!



Its hungry work being penned up and look at all day - an old crofter feeds his Shetland gimmer



A Shetland coo with "calf at foot" - another prize winner from Burravoe, she was a healthy fine looking coo.



Of course, Shetland ponies. Mum with her foal - they're so little you just want to put them in your pocket!




A prize winning & very vocal cockeral. Not sure what species he is but he wasn't happy at being looked at!




A fine day - who knows in future years we may even enter livestock! Just to make the numbers up of course.


Sunday I'll be sorting through our pile of salvaged roof tiles we removed, swiftly followed by undercoating some fascia boards.

 Enjoy the rest of your weekends



Wednesday 31 August 2011

A Changeable last week but lots got done ...

Fred & Steve (with help from their mate Gareth) have been working hard on the roof all last week and have made real progress in a few short days - it's finally looking like a house again. However  -



in the topsy turvy rollercoaster world that is "Fred-Cheshire-Land" we have to have to accept that the downs are there to make the ups so enjoyable =). This is how I feel  sometimes on a very good day .



All in all Thursday proved to be a bit of a pooh day when Fred realised that the plans vs the actual building were 16 inches out regarding the position of the stairs. Seriously not good news - however many times you say it out loud and shut your eyes, cross your fingers and pray.


Thanks to Cuppaster's excellent Vodafone mobile coverage there then followed roof truss manufacturers talking to builder: builder chin-wagging for 1 hour to chief building controls officer followed up by a semi-helpful conversation with the architect blady blah blah.
  stock photo : young man climbs the ladder of success and a virtual career. Collage.


Sorted. Why so  important? well in such a small house you have absolutely no headspace to play with so this - for a  day only at least - was quite a problem. Problem solved though.



Saturday we spent an enjoyable evening in the Booth of Sound, this is the small croft house near the Ness of Sound, the little island near the Schoolhouse we're renting. We shared a drink with and got to know some new friends. Peter, also a guest, recently moved to Yell and is our Dutch neighbour who lives at the end of the Cuppaster Road; a school-teacher by profession he and Steve started talking about getting boat to get out and start doing some sea fishing ... maybe something like this? watch this space




Nick - who owns Booth of Sound - works as a judge in the field of child protection. Even from just a few meetings we can see he is an interesting & very passionate man immersed in his work around the world that really makes a difference in peoples lives.


He loves dogs, so when we visited we took Digger and Max, who along with his 2 cocker spaniels made for a cosy evening in front of the peat fire in his living room. Whilst it may have been blowing a gale force 9 hooley outside, and whilst we may have DRIVEN the 500m to his house for fear of getting stuck in the bog, it was  - nevertheless - SUMMER. So Pimms was my tipple of the evening.


                                                            Thankyou and goodnigh m'lud =)


xxx




A Bucket, A Big Boudoir and a lovely pair of Valleys

We've had some pretty grey weather up here recently , "the worst summer in 15 years" according to the locals. So the fact that less than 2 working days have been lost to weather is testament to Fred's ability to grit his teeth and get on with it (whilst hating every moment & having a good grumble!)


So at the end of a day, when its dark wet, miserable and blowing a gale force hooley outside .....



I suppose plonking a bucket by a cosy fireplace is as good a place as any to sit and enjoy a quiet fag.



The house continues to take shape and the man of many talents and his hardworking little
scouse mate has been busy





And ..... at a spacious 5m x 6m


This is the master boudoir. It will have 2 large velux in the roof & a window in the gable end.

Here's the man hard at work



If Steve Wilder is looking at this - hope you like the look of our valley =)  !!!!








S&S xx




Tuesday 23 August 2011

Suet Pud , Skinny Scabby Knees and ... we have a roof !!!

We realised that our blog has had quite a few entries in it about food ... so I guess we should carry on in that vein! 

We just fancied an old fashioned sort of Sunday nosh, so with the help of a few teacups we steamed some steak suet puddings. Tasty Top Hats !!

Yell has had its fair share of these blighters lately

Thankfully we still had tropical strength insect repellent over from our holiday and it seems to be working . However, there have been some days when they've forgetton to spray it all over. The kamakazi midges have been mad enough to go near their bare knees (about 30 bites between them!)


A prize for guessing whose leg is whose ... (no prizes for guessing Max's though, getting in on the pic!)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The boys have been working hard this week at last, truss assembly has begun !!!! YAY !!!!!!




Look at big brave Steve up on the roof !!!










This room will be our upstairs bathroom - its bigger than it looks !!!!


WARNING - GAY BUILDER ALERT.
SWING DEM DARE HIPS FREDDIE BOY !



 Manouevering the trusses into place



Enjoy the rest of your week !!!

xxx

Sunday 21 August 2011

An Important Delivery, A Social Diary update & a huge dose of Community Spirit

The Building Site ... 

Is still looking like well ... a building site, but

They've arrived !!!




Our next big milestone was reached as the 42 roof trusses arrived this week meaning work can get started on getting the house wind and watertight.

RS Hendersons of Cullivoe arrive at a sunny Cuppaster



steady as she goes ...


Funnily enough though, last weekend Steve & Fred had a little overnight ferry jaunt to Aberdeen with the trailer to collect  a large amount of scaffolding had delivered to Inverurie...





As they boarded the return ferry on Saturday night
all loaded up, they spotted a Streamline
Shipping lorry driving onto the ferry with a large
number of trusses on ... and yes, you guessed it,they were ours :-)







Meanwhile, in readiness, Fred's been busy rendering the internal stone walls to level them ready for the Foamglas insulation to be applied on top.


He's doing this now before the trusses are installed to make the rendering easier. More on Foamglas in a later blog along with pics, plus details of what it has in common with the Pyrex ovenproof dish!

PS .. the above pic is NOT Freds mortar mix, from what I'm told it's looking "all to cock" as they say in Lancashire!



The Social Diary ...

Eat, drink & be merry !

With Steve & Fred in Aberdeen last weekend, I enjoyed a girly couple of days which was nice. Dogs missed their respective owners sorely , and were only nice to me because it was me that was feeding them :(
Suffice to say that when they heard the returning Terrano coming back down the track on Sunday morning, they all but knocked me over as they raced past to get to the gate to see their Dads.

Anyway, Steve & Fred weren't too missed by me on Saturday night ...


I donned my wellies and made my way across the fields to have supper with Simon & Vera (our current neighbours).

 I was introduced to 2 more neighbours (about a mile away) called Joy & Angus who've just returned from a year in India working with a church mission. Joy is British, however her  parents where out in India for many generations during the Empire years so she spent some time tracing her ancestors whilst out there.

We got to talking about our family histories & I told them about my great great great great great Uncle William Barnes born in 1801 of whom I am very proud.



He was a writer, poet, teacher, rector, philologist (languages) and a true scholar who from Dorset. A man who did so much with his life and who in his later years could be seen walking the lanes of Dorset in order to educate and inform country people in their local halls.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Barnes








An evening row in Burravoe...

Thought you might like proof that we're still keeping at it each week, it was a lovely sunny evening when Fred took the pic from the quay  ... yes, he's on the quay as he doesn't posess sea-legs apparently.

 I'm at the front on the left in my bright green jacket with Steve at the back right next to Elsbeth.

At the stern-end (on the right in the pic) is Gordon the cox. The tiny little hooded blue shape next to him
is Sonja, our weekly 2 year old passenger - she was SO good in her little dry suit and life jacket sitting patiently as her mum and dad rowed with us.

And finally ....

August 2011 Quiz Night in Ulsta Public Hall (our local hall)  was a pretty special one.

In 2010, a young 25 year old lad from Cuppaster,Yell sadly died from problems he'd had with his heart.

In June 2011 at the Burravoe Carnival, some of his close friends dressed up as cartoon characters and travelled on their float having fun and making folk smile and laugh, in memory of Steve, all monies raised were donated to the Britsh Heart Foundation.

In July, many isles folk ran in the Yell 10k charity race with all proceeds donated to BHF.



Last Sunday's Quiz was the the first one played for the Steve Jamieson Memorial Cup that had been donated by his family.

I learnt that Steve had been the popular regular barman at the hall at the monthly Sunday quiz nights. Last Sunday, over 100 people supported the special quiz night, the hall was heaving and full to the gunnels with locals from our small community, people over on the ferry from mainland Shetland and some come down - again on the ferry - from the Isle of Unst too.

With  a raffle, loads of great homebaked food nearly £700 was raised on just that night.

In our book , this is what community spirit is all about.

http://www.bhf.org.uk/





xxx

Da Gallery