Stone Fireplace, Stone Staircase, Limestone Fireplaces

I wish we had a good one!

Beautiful morning here in the stone yard. Quite cold and frosty, but lovely sunshine. We started early as we want to finish a bit early. We’ve already loaded and despatched a customer who’s been and collected his stone fireplace, and is now on his way back to durham. We’ve got a mechanic here sorting out an oil leak on the forklift, and the farmer is making loads of noise because the exhaust appears to have fallen off his biggest tractor. The Horses in the livery aren’t enjoying all the noise by the look of it, and are racing round the field like lunatics!

I’m going to a small ‘game fair’ on sunday with friends. It’s all about country pursuits, and there are normally some great characters there.  Mind you, if it rains or is too horrible weather wise, then we could have a change of plan.

Have you got a pension? The masons had a little discussion last night about what they’ll live on when they retire, and the general concensus seemed to be that they’d all have to work until they drop (unless they won the lottery)  None has got any significant pension, and those that did have a reasonable one, say that Gordon Brown’s actions have decimated its value.  Basically they were all under the impression that they would have to work to survive. It’s no great surprise really as we’ve felt that for a long time. It’s probably all right for bankers and politicians with big income and gold plated pensions, but the man-in-the-street whether he be dustman; shopkeeper or stonemason, seems to have very little chance of building sufficient a pension fund to survive in this expensive world. So it seems we’ll have some very old stone masons working here in the next few years, so I hope they can stay fit!

The forecast rain hasn’t arrived yet, so we’re all working out in the stone yard, and it’s not even that cold. By the look of the skies, perhaps it won’t be so wet after all? We’re laying out the stone for some gate piers this morning, and also making some mullion windows for an extension to a house that we supplied stone for about 15 years ago.  The current owner has just bought it, and wants to add a bit of length to the drawing room and the bedroom above, so they’re tracking down all the original contractors so that the extension can hopefully be as close a match as possible. We can still get the stone that we used originally for the house, so hopefully we can do a very close match, although it will take a couple of years for the new stone to weather to a similar colour to the old.

What a lovely material we work with. We’ve just had some new stone delivered from a little quarry in France, and it is really lovely. A nice open grained whiteish limestone, yet really hard and smooth. It costs a bit more than our normal limestone as it is quite a lot harder to work, but it is a nice althernative, if perhaps you’ve got a requirement for something different.  Our forklift-driving mason has loaded up the stone staircase onto the lorry and that is now on its way to site. It took a bit of loading, as the lorry was actually a bit too small. Plenty of weight capacity, but not enough area. The trouble is that stone stairs are hard to pallet up very compactly as all the parts are fairly irregular in shape, so we end up with a lot more pallets than we do for say a fireplace, or mullion windows for example. Also we can sometimes stack window and stone fireplace pallets two high, but we can never do that with stone stairs, as the pallet full never has a flat surface! So, the lorry bed was completely full without an inch to spare.

Well, it was a rainy old bank holiday yesterday, and although we’re now all back working in the sunshine in the stone yard, apparently it’s going to be the only good day of the week. It seems Easter got all the DIYers in action, as we now have a lot of customers wanting their stone fireplace as soon as possible!  I’ve just loaded a van to take two stone fireplaces and some stone stairs to Berkshire, and we’ve got a lorry coming in an hour to take some stone stairs to Oxford, so it’s all a bit hectic here at the moment.

The masons have all had good weekends as most of them went to the wedding of an old friend. Apparently it was a very riotous do, and they were not feeling too good yesterday, so it’s a good job it was a bank holiday, as I suspect they would not have been that productive, and that they’d have needed lots of coffee breaks!

The farmer is busy next door. All the ewes have lambed now, but he says he’s lost more lambs than normal, so is not very happy. Lambs are like that, you just turn your back and you’ll find one dead! Very sad, but it’s sort of the way with sheep. They just seem to decide to die for no apparent reason!

It’s good Friday, but we’re still working as the masons have said they’d prefer to have monday and tuesday off rather than friday and monday, and that’s ok with everyone. It’s also very sunny today in the stone yard so a  good decision. I’m just waiting for a customer to arrive in a van from Lanark (scotland). He’s coming to fetch his stone fireplace, and then is driving back to fit it in his house this weekend. Good old Easter DIY!

The council are sweeping our lane this morning, and mowing the verges. One of the men noticed some of our stuff in the yard and has come in for a chat. He’s just bought a little cottage in a village not far from us, and has always liked the idea of stone fireplaces. The cottage currently has an awful 70s fireplace at the moment apparently, so he thinks we can make just what he wants. He was so happy that he spotted us, as he didn’t know we were here, and he’s lived in the area for years. He’s going to come back next week with his wife so they can decide what they’d like us to make for them.

All active in the farm animal world.  Lambs springing about in the sun, and the ducks and chickens are pecking round our stone blocks again. It’s strange how some days they seem to think we’re the place to find a few tasty crumbs!

The farmer’s poor chickens, (and the lambs) just didn’t know what to do yesterday: last week they were basking in beautiful sunshine, and yesterday, they were trying to find somewhere to hide from the driving snow!  It didn’t really settle on the roads, but there was about 2 inches over the farm yard and the stone yard and it was very cold and very windy. Actually I think the stone masons were as bewildered as the farm animals, and because it was so cold so suddenly, we weren’t really very productive yesterday, as we just couldn’t get everything we were working on under cover, as we just don’t have the space and we are working on several quite large stone fireplaces, and one large stone staircase, so we were a bit cramped.

At least today the snow and the wind have gone, so we’re working out side again, although it is still very cold!  I’ve got to go to a funeral today. Very sad, as a good friend and not very old. He found he had cancer just before Christmas, and now, only 3 months later he is gone. Far too quick and far too young. Another reminder to us all, to live life to the full as you never know what’s round the corner.

We’ve got a lot of site work going on at the moment. Two masons have to go and fit a lovely stone fireplace in a modern 2nd floor apartment in Nottingham. It overlooks the river (trent) and is all stainless steel, glass, and stone. It’s stunning. I used to think I didn’t like ‘modern’ buidlings, but when you see places like that one it’s hard not to be impressed.

Snow forecast tomorrow, but hard to believe it at the moment. The weekend was very sunny up here again, but still cold in the wind, and the wind is cold today, but we’re all out in the stone yard working on various stone fireplaces and some stone mullions. We’ve got an artic coming down from Lanarkshire early in the morning, and we’re just packing the stone fireplace onto a pallet now, and the driver wants to come very early in the morning so that’ll be an early start for me then! We’re just making some stone ‘bits and bobs’ for a garden designer too. Some stone balls to put oak boards onto and make into little benches, and also some lovely little copings to go on some raised ponds. All very simple, but very attractive, and a bit different from what we do normally.

We’ve just set up another stone firepalce in the office. A standard small original in St. Max limestone. We haven’t had one of the std ones in the office for ages, and it’s a reminder how our simple ‘original’ design is so timeless, and versatile, in that it looks good in almost all environments.

The farmer came to see us over the weekend, and said he can now find us room the extend the stone yard a bit. He’s demolished the rear part of a dilapidated old farm building, and the resulting space adjoins our current yard. He says we can use that new space for a little bit more on our rent, so we’re going to do it, as it will just give us a bit more breathing space particularly when we’re very busy.

Who needs to fly off to the sun when we have weather like this? Roll on global warming if this is what it means… other than the fact that the drought won’t stop our massive population from dying of thirst! We’re basking in unbroken sunshine out in the stone yard, and in fact it’s too bright for me with my delicate  skin! We’re very busy, as I think the good weather means everyone has restarted their building and renovation projects.  We’ve got a lot of stone fireplace orders that had been sort of dormant for a while, and now of course everyone wants them at once. We’ve also got quite a lot of stonework to do for garden projects. I suppose that too is due to the good weather and people getting out in their gardens. We’ve got a couple of fountains to make, and several small flights of stone stairs for garden projects.

The lambs can’t believe their luck (or it seems that way) as they are just basking in the sun when they’re not suckling from their mothers, whereas often in march they can be getting rained on in cold weather, and sheltering under any bit of hedge or tree. It’s at least nice to think that their relatively short lives are spent in lovely weather.  (I’m way to soft to ever be a farmer.)

We’ve got one interesting site job at the moment: A big conversion of an old village hall: It involves all sorts of stone work, from stairs to mullions to copings and stone fireplaces. It’s been a slow project, as the owner has only done it in stages as and when he saves up enough money to complete each stage. (a very sensible, if slightly slow process).  Anyway, he’s got his latest ‘chunk’ saved up, and so he’s doing the next stage, and so he’ll have one of our masons permanently on site for about the next 3 weeks.

Who needs to fly off to the sun when we have weather like this? Roll on global warming if this is what it means… other than the fact that the drought won’t stop our massive population from dying of thirst! We’re basking in unbroken sunshine out in the stone yard, and in fact it’s too bright for me with my delicate  skin! We’re very busy, as I think the good weather means everyone has restarted their building and renovation projects.  We’ve got a lot of stone fireplace orders that had been sort of dormant for a while, and now of course everyone wants them at once. We’ve also got quite a lot of stonework to do for garden projects. I suppose that too is due to the good weather and people getting out in their gardens. We’ve got a couple of fountains to make, and several small flights of stone stairs for garden projects.

The lambs can’t believe their luck (or it seems that way) as they are just basking in the sun when they’re not suckling from their mothers, whereas often in march they can be getting rained on in cold weather, and sheltering under any bit of hedge or tree. It’s at least nice to think that their relatively short lives are spent in lovely weather.  (I’m way to soft to ever be a farmer.)

We’ve got one interesting site job at the moment: A big conversion of an old village hall: It involves all sorts of stone work, from stairs to mullions to copings and stone fireplaces. It’s been a slow project, as the owner has only done it in stages as and when he saves up enough money to complete each stage. (a very sensible, if slightly slow process).  Anyway, he’s got his latest ‘chunk’ saved up, and so he’s doing the next stage, and so he’ll have one of our masons permanently on site for about the next 3 weeks.