"Movin' In"

Moving Day at The Roost

Here's a shot of the big moving day!  Roy was in York  Harbour on June 19th when the big United Van lines moving truck pulled up at the front door of The Roost.  The unloading went smoothly and much quicker than the loading did here in North Augusta. That took a full two days! The truck arrived at The Roost about 8 AM and everything was finished by 2 PM.

It was a pretty exciting day. Now the building is full from one end to the other!  There are literally two pathways through the furniture and boxes, one to the bathroom and one to the kitchen.

The Roost packed with furniture

I know what you are thinking - what about the cafe/gallery?  Well no worries, the plans are still "a go" but a visit to the public health inspector left Roy on a search for the septic system.  It was still not found when he headed home to Ontario last Sunday.  We now know that any plans for the cafe are dependent on having an operating septic system, as well as any plans for living quarters in an apartment downstairs but we are definitely not going to let this little setback discourage us!

The good news is that Roy has found a company in Cornerbrook, the nearest city to us, who are very willing and able to install all of the necessary venting for my lampwork studio and my restaurant stove (which made it safely to Newfoundland and was much easier to move in to The Roost than it was to move out of our house!)  So the gallery and the lampwork studio can go ahead as planned!

My temporary studio

In the meantime we are working away at getting our house in Ontario up for sale so that we can all get to Newfoundland this fall. The empty hole in my kitchen (where my beautiful stove used to reside) has now become my temporary home studio. In my spare time, under a large stove vent, I am happily making lampwork beads which Jessica (the Je in JaJeJems) has already started to use in combination with her wire wrapped sea glass to design some beautiful new pieces.


More good news - my mother's little house in Lark Harbour will be ready for her by September and she is already getting excited about seeing it.  Our cottage will be our home as an interim measure until the snow flies.  Hopefully by then we will have found the septic system at The Roost and renovations can begin!    We plan to update this blog as often as we can so that you can keep up to date with our progress.  Let me leave you with another pretty scene from the cottage "harbour steps".

View at dusk from the cottage

Necessary steps in a long Journey east!

Yes I know that I promised a weekly update on The Roost and a progress report on the future home of JaJeJems!  However, when reality sets in, as a family, we have two homes to sell and a major move to face before we can start the fun of setting up The Roost. So like it or not we have had to step back a bit from the excitement over the new business venture and set to work on getting ourselves out of Ontario and into Newfoundland.  As you can see from the picture above, my mother has sold her home. It all happened in 3 days, if you can imagine, and her closing date is June 14th.  Needless to say she will be "camping out" with us for a while as her new place in Lark Harbour won't be ready until the end of August.

Here is a picture of the cute little green house that she is buying, right down in the harbour.
All of the furniture that we are taking from both houses will be shipped to Newfoundland in two weeks, arriving on June 19th.  Then once we have downsized our house and staged it adequately, it will also be going on the market with the hope that we will all be able to be settled in Newfoundland in the early fall.

Well back to The Roost for a moment. As promised when Roy and Blake finally arrived back in Ontario after two ferry cancellations, they had lots to share including some lovely pictures of the inside of the building.   The main area on the ground floor is 30 feet by 50 feet and as you can see by the pictures below is bright and spacious with lots of possibilities.  That's the up side of things!  

Blake in action scrubbing the floor

Trying out the view from behind the counter

Lots of floor space!

In reality, in 3 weeks this lovely spacious room will be filled with all of our worldly possessions (well at least all that we are taking with us).  We will store everything in The Roost until my mother's house is ready for her.  Once she is settled, we will be renovating an apartment for ourselves in the basement of The Roost, living in the cottage as long as the weather stays nice. After that we can start to think about setting up our little business!  But never mind, it will all come together in the end and if all goes as planned The Roost will be operational in the Spring of 2014.  So with that positive thought in mind, let me leave you with another glimpse of the beautiful province that we will soon call home.

Springtime view from the cottage