[This is by Sarah, not Jemima, in case you think she's gone mad]
When I think of pebbledashed walls, and how they are made, I envisage a machine of the sort that fires tennis balls over the net so people can practice their strokes. I imagine people spreading soft concrete on the side of a house then hiding round the corner as someone very strong fires a pebbling machine, rather like a super-sized machine gun, waving it about until the whole wall is covered.
When I mentioned this picture to Jemima the other day, she laughed.
Well, I have looked up pebbledashing in our DIY Book (the sort that you could knock out burglars with), and discovered this advice on repairing a patch of pebbledash:
“Mix 1 part cement-paint powder with 3 parts plasterer’s sharp sand. Stir in 1 measure of bonding agent diluted with 3 parts water to form a thick creamy paste. Load the banister brush and scrub the paste onto the bare surface… while this is still wet, fling pebbles onto the surface from a dustpan.”
Not so silly afterall, eh?