The first of several bird boxes

Today we made our first bird box out of wood scraps from the house. The young master cut the wood in a somewhat unmasterly fashion, and I hammered the bits together. The result is reminiscent of a Normandy pillbox, but I hope the little birds won't be bothered by its stark lines.

We stuffed some straw inside in the confident expectation that birds who are happy with a jerry-built home also have no objection to pre-installed straw.

We'll have to find somewhere a bit higher than this stump to install it.

It occurred to me that a free bird-box with every home purchased would be a surefire, environmentally-sensitive marketing tool for any builder, so I took the liberty of branding our box.

Something with a nice sloped roof and a cute little round hole would obviously be better suited as a sales draw. And it would probably appeal to more customers if it didn't have the root of a thornbush nailed crudely to the side of it as a perch.

Inside the house, the carpenters have done an excellent job with the built-in fixtures. (Although I'm sure I heard one of them snort when they saw our bird-box...)

My office. A huge slab of wood for a desk, with holes for cables, a slot for two computers, and a raised dais for my monitor. The architect seems to believe that I consult a lot of books in my daily work, so generous provision has been made for a library.

The young master's room. This one isn't half bad either. It faces south and seems to be the sunniest room on the ground floor.

I keep showing pictures of this. I guess I'm just really pleased to have a chin-up bar in my house - I can't fathom why every house doesn't have such an obviously essential feature. Now I'm especially tickled by the fact that my head-slot has elegant casing running round it. This is the view from the little shoes 'n coat room next to the entrance. I'm sure it'll become a habit just to bang off a few chin-ups when entering and leaving the house.