I wasn’t planning to blog today, but I’m feeling motivated to mark this momentous occasion: our first fire!

Well, our first one inside. Hughie & Gareth have been building some bonfires in the garden as they tidy up the overgrown yard.

The chimney sweep came out today and cleaned four fireplaces, just in time for the cold weather.

I’ve got chicken stock on the stove and am going to try this Smitten Kitchen recipe for the Simplest Apple Tart.

All while enjoying this fire, built by Gareth.

xo,
Jess

Remember the secret room we discovered? Well, it leaks. And Sunday night it was lashing rain, so Monday yielded an adventure to the gully where two roofs meet. It was filled with moss and ferns, so water wasn’t draining properly. We filled five wheelbarrows with the debris! It was a glorious day, and the sun felt so nice as we worked. Wednesday’s forecast is heavy rain, so we’ll find out then if our efforts improve the situation.

Last week we cleared out the smaller room on the third story, which will eventually be a visual arts studio. (The larger room will be for movement, but was used as attic storage and thus is full of stuff.) We discovered the room actually had a fireplace at one time.

Because it is the most unfinished part of the house – still showing the stone walls and the rafters, it’s where I find it easiest to imagine the house’s history. I wonder if this floor is where the RIC men stationed at the barrack would have slept? It was incredibly dusty up there, and popular with spiders, but now is open and clean. The floor needs to be painted, and eventually we want to expose the stone walls.

I’m looking forward to having a place to work out on bad weather days, as well as my own home studio for making dances in. It’s something I’ve wanted for so long and now it’s happening – that reality is only hitting me now, as I write this! 

It’s been a long two-weeks since my last post. I’ve learned that slugs can be anywhere. Like in your kitchen, bedroom, or on your roof. I don’t particularly care for slugs. I discovered that we have wild watercress growing alongside the river. We got business cards printed for Greywood Arts. We are hoping to get a proper website soon though, so stay tuned. We are in the process of filling our second skip (dumpster) and it finally looks like some space is being made downstairs. People here have been incredibly warm and kind. One neighbor volunteered his van to take a big sofa set to a charity shop for us.  Another couple invited us to Sunday lunch and to watch the gaelic football. It was our first invitation in the village, and it really makes it start to feel like home!

I also learned just how small Ireland really is. People keep telling me you can’t go anywhere in Ireland without meeting someone you know. We finally got bikes, and Red Barn Strand (strand=beach in Ireland) is a 30 minute cycle from our house. After a walk along the water, checking out the myriad seaweeds and shells, we sat on a grass embankment above the beach. A family settled on the sand in front of us, and it turned to be my in-laws’ neighbors from the lane, Joe & Paula!!! If we’d left five minutes earlier, or if they had sat ten feet further down, we would have completely missed each other! Paula is also American, and she gave me some great advice about setting up house here. Running into people you know unexpectedly happens from time to time, but that was the second time that week we’d done it. We spent two nights in gorgeous Dingle (it was Hughie’s birthday present) and went to a pub with a traditional Irish music session on. A man came in, sat down with his back to us, and joined in on the fiddle. Hughie said “that’s Brian from Fitzpatrick’s [in Montpellier, Fr]– I recognize the way he plays.” I admit, I was skeptical that Brian, who is Irish but lives in France, would just happen to be sitting in the same pub as us out on the Dingle Penninsula. But it was him! And we were delighted to hear him play.

Ireland has agreed to let me stay for a year!!! I have permission to work, too. As a spouse, it is an incredibly straight forward process. We brought our passports, marriage license, and proof of joint address to our appointment at the nearby Garda (police) station, had my photo and fingerprints taken, and we were done in half an hour. No fees. In a few weeks I can go collect the Irish equivalent of a green card, less all the time, stress and expense involved in the U.S.

Our dear friend Cian brought us the most thoughtful and somewhat outrageous housewarming gift: a hammer drill with a chisel bit. Yay power-tools! And yay Cian! He’s driven down from Wicklow multiple times to help us with the house, and is sharing his engineer knowlege to help us create our plan of attack for renovations. He’s also drawing up a schematic of the house, which I’ll share when it’s finished.

I keep meaning to make these short, but I want to share everything! It’s hard for me to prioritize, but I want people to actually read the posts. I also want to create a record of how our project develops. You can let us know what sorts of things you’d like to see on our blog in the comments.

Now, back to filling the skip and chipping plaster off the dining room walls!

                                                         We found a secret room. And a door to nowhere.
                                                      We also got water, electricity and wifi. And a car.
                                                                     It’s been a busy two weeks!

The auctioneer (realtor) told us the house had been vacant for about a year – but the locals say otherwise. Damp is our biggest enemy. It rises up the walls from the ground and condensation collected from the house not being heated for so long. When we arrived, we immediately stripped the bedroom and bathroom of their carpets. Carpet in the bathroom=GROSS! The mattress and anything that might be musty had to go. We opened as many windows as possible, though many were guarded by giant flies or painted shut.

Next, we found the stopcock for the water and turned it on. Well, Hughie turned it on because I didn’t want to stick my hand in a cobwebby hole in the ground. That taken care of, we nipped off down the block to the pub, O’Mahony’s.

Andrew O’Mahony has been the star neighbor (and barman – best pint in Killeagh, so we’re told.) We met him in December when we first saw the house, and he gave us the hard sell on Killeagh. He fills us in about village history and directs us to anything we might need. Like plumbers and electricians. Because we needed both in the first week.

When we got to the pub Andrew asked if there’s still a leak. Assuming he meant the patched one in the kitchen, we finished our pints of Beamish (a stout made in Cork.) But when we got back to the house, there was no water coming inside – and a small fountain of it spraying from a pipe in the yard.

Once the burst pipe gets sorted, we’re in business…or so we think. Still no hot water, but that’s what the electric kettle is for. Except, when you plug it in and turn it on, ALL of the lights in the entire house go off. (Okay, they dim, but in daylight it seemed like they were off.) Your kettle should NOT act like an additional light switch. Which is how we met Colm, the electrician. Shortly thereafter we met Colm’s dad – also Colm, in the pub.

Anyway, Colm the younger discovered that hardly enough electricity was coming into the house. He said we could leave the immersion (hot water heater) on for a month and maybe we’d eventually get hot water…  So the Electric Supply Board came out and sorted that. YAY hot water. YAY showers! While we were dirty, showerless humans, Andrew’s mom Betty offered up her shower to us. For me, this gets at the heart of why you would want to live in a little village. And Killeagh has welcomed us with open arms.

One day last week, while I was stripping dank wallpaper from the bedroom walls, Hughie came in and announced he had discovered a room we’d never seen before!!! The house has an apartment attached which has a sort-of sunroom. The ceiling there has some water damage and the room holds just a wardrobe and a chair. We’ve stepped in many times – but for the first time Hughie peeked behind the wardrobe, and found a door! It’s actually kind of creepy in there. Definitely the room where naughty children get locked up. Filled with spider webs, and not much else. It also s explains why every time I try to draw the floor plan I end up with a big empty square at the center of the second story.

As for the door to nowhere, it hasn’t yet been opened. It’s covered with vines (very Secret Garden) but seems to be on the exterior wall of the Coach House’s second story.

In our short time here, we’ve managed to get a car – a 2008 Honda CR-V with only 30,000 miles on it. Automatics are harder to come by here, so we didn’t have a lot of options. It’s perfect though, and has already carted a sofa, chair, mattress and garden tools.

We also saw a dance performance, a process-discussion, and two plays as part of the Cork Midsummer Festival. Cork City is so close and is pretty easy to drive into.

The cats are adapting well enough. When we collected them at the airport, Spy had given the vet a fright by hiding under the blanket in his carrier. Both cats were just fine, though mega-antsy to get out of their cages. Now, confined to our very large bedroom, they are antsy to explore the rest of the house. Unfortunately, we have too many open doors and windows for that to be safe just now.

We are all settling in well, enjoying the best of Irish summer (today was rainy and cold, but mostly it’s been gorgeous,) and eating delicious local meats and produce. As I write this, I hear the water rushing in the river outside. It’s peaceful at the house, and at the nearby beaches where we’ve gone for walks & runs. But I’m definitely missing my family and despite all of the excitement and hard work ahead, I look forward to returning state-side in September for a few weeks.

Until soon,
Jessica

P.S. Moving forward I’d like to post shorter entries more frequently. The first two weeks in Eire have been jam-packed and largely internet-free, but I think we’re finding our rhythm now. Cheers!

2015 is the year we do something crazy. Crazier than moving across an ocean for love. Crazier than planning a wedding in three months. Crazier than living in seven different places in two years. Which are all things we’ve done since we met in the summer of 2011.

If you don’t know us already, we are Hughie and Jess, an Irish guy and an American girl that met in the South of France. We have a great story. A chance meeting, a whirlwind summer romance, moving to New York City. But it hasn’t all been sunny skies. There’s been loss and struggle, too. Of course we’ve made great friends and grown closer to our family along the way. It’s been an adventure – and it’s time for the next chapter to begin!

In 2015 we are buying a house. An enormous one. In Ireland. And it is going to completely change our lives. The plan is to open an artist’s residency program, providing lodging and workspace to performing and visual artists.

Built in 1767, our currently nameless home was formerly a guest house and a barracks. It is situated alongside the Dissour River, on the main street in the village of Killeagh, Co. Cork. The original building is three stories tall, and with a few additions over the years. There is also a sizable coach house, and about an acre of pasture and woods.

We will be 10 miinutes from the seaside town of Youghal (pronounced y’all), 15 minutes from the beach, and 15 minutes from Midleton – where Jameson Whiskey is distilled! We are about 30 minutes from Cork City, too.

As you might imagine, a house this size and age will require considerable work. Uninhabited and unheated for over a year, damp has crept in. Beyond the cosmetic, we need to install a heating system, upgrade insulation and damp-proof the ground floor. This incredible opportunity has infused our every waking moment with dreaming, designing and brainstorming. It is both an exciting and daunting task, and we invite you to follow along on our journey on this blog.

Wish us luck!

P.S. – And follow us on facebook! www.facebook.com/greywoodartsireland