ooooof!

It is Sunday afternoon. Neal is roasting a chicken. It is just the two of us in the house for the first time in many days. It feels like a long beautiful exhale, like snuggling into your duvet when you know you're going to be able to go right back to sleep. Like pulling on perfectly fitting hand knit wool socks when your feet are cold.

It has been a delightful summer, but boy howdy has it ever been busy. All year, really. Family visits, work, music projects, birthday parties (oh yes!!) - all great stuff (really great stuff!), but non-stop. For once, I am looking forward to slowing down. To weeks with less juggling. I have been realising that I cannot do as much as I have been doing (can you hear Neal rolling his eyes? He is rolling them so hard it is audible). 

So as we head into what I always feel, affectionately, is the new year, I have some resolutions. Some more intention around activities done and not done, chosen and declined. Prioritisation. Triage, if you like.

And I will finally, DEFINITELY finish painting the front door which I started in July!

Brass band snippet

Tuesday evenings are brass band practise. 2 hours, sometimes with a break for tea and cakes, if it's been someone's birthday. Our conductor, Graham, often gives what he calls "notices" between songs - upcoming dates, information, etc. Tonight, he told us that we needed a new band photo. Everyone groaned. Last time we did two photos, one in our full suit and bow tie uniform and one in the more casual polo shirts. It was a bit chaotic, everyone trying to change in the two small bathrooms in the practise hall.  "No - no," Graham said, "Just polo shirts this year!" A shocked pause, broken by Jo - "gosh I'm glad I'm at the back!" and the whole room dissolved into laughter.

Sunday afternoon

 It's Sunday afternoon - it's 530 and it is not all the way dark which feels like real progress until you remember that it is still February and nowhere near spring, yet. But I picked loads of bright sunny daffoldils in Pauline's garden this morning, and I've planted chilli seeds this afternoon, so there's lots to look forward to.

I should be knitting. I have a test knitting project that is due next Monday which means I have to post it on Saturday which means technically I should have knit it by then, you know, in an ideal world. Maybe not this world which is full of so many other more interesting things. 

Yesterday, as we stepped out of the house, our neighbour was walking by and said, "Hey - I have to take the boat out to the end of the creek and back to run the motor - do you want to come along for the ride?" I have a life rule: whenever possible, say yes to being on or in the sea. We agreed in a gleeful heartbeat and it was amazing. It started out sunny and then the clouds rolled in and we were very cold and fairly damp by the end of it and it was worth every shiver. 

Isn't his boat beautiful? She is called the Nancy Grey and she is charming and welcoming.

Started off sunny but....

The Shipwrights from a different perspective 

A happy sailor

and so it begins...

It was the first brass band Christmas carolling gig tonight. You could tell because the temperature has been unseasonably warm until this morning when it checked its calendar and promptly fell 10 degrees and kicked in with an eye-wateringly vicious north easterly wind for good measure.

it was COLD.

But - I love this, despite the discomfort. People are happy (er). That's nice. And the music is really beautiful. Those carols. Those harmonies. Some of these songs are OLD old. even some of the newer ones are crunchy and beautiful. Have yourself a merry little Christmas. The minor-major modulation at the end of Coventry Carol. And the little kid, who shouted "Not likely!" when our conductor, Graham said that perhaps Santa will visit their house soon.

We are well - settling into the house and figuring out how it all works and what goes where. The alcove bookshelves are up and I'm really happy with them. They're made of scaffolding boards and cast iron brackets and I think you would never know that this is hands down the cheapest way to shelve anything!

(yes the clocks are still leaning against the bookcase on the floor. Maybe we'll put them up one day.) 

The mirror is from my friend Rose who assured me that Victorian terrace houses need mirrors and she had a few from her old house that we were welcome to - and - wow what a difference. These are workers cottages - the rooms are small - the mirrors are amazing. 

I do love the house - but I can't quite relax into it yet - I worry about things even though I know intellectually there's no point; that the worry is worse than the event - which in any case is unlikely. I feel the weight of responsibility for a structure that may require more resources than I have. I think I will get used to this and it will fade but I find myself staring at ceilings and walls with a vague feeling of unease.

But one thing I am looking forward to with no ambivalence at all is a two week holiday that will involve no painting, no DIY, no packing and unpacking - just the first Christmas in our house and a proper rest after a tumultuous year. Pubs with roaring fires, brass band carols, knitting, wine, cheese, puzzles - we are on the home stretch now.

mini-update

 I am sitting in our house on a sofa for the first time in over two weeks and oh - does it ever feel good!

SOFAS FOR THE WIN!!!!!!!!!

that is all.

More soon promise x

PS all good, just chaotic and busy xxxxxx

turning a corner

 It was a good day today. I thought it was going to be (that often - but not always - helps). Roger the carpet man (his name not an instruction - but hey whatever floats your boat) came at 8 to fit the carpets in the 2nd bedroom, the stair runner, the cellar stairs and the cellar. And lo did the heavens open and glorious light shone around and there was a parking space right outside the house which never happens. And the carpets look great and my stair runner is the bees knees so phew.

We stopped in one of the charity shops in town that often has furniture and saw, in the back, a really good sideboard/dresser type thing which we really need as we have a lot more kitchen than kitchen. We snapped it up and that solves another big problem.

Our friend Kerry did the first moving load for us in her camper van and now there is stuff - our stuff in the house - our house! 

And I did the first coat of wax oil on the ground floors which took forever but was veeeeeeery satisfying indeed.

Today, for the first time, I actually felt the excitement that everyone jeeps asking me about. "OOOh isn't it exciting?" they ask, or "aren't you excited?" and I think - well no. Scared, most definitely. Bored (pulling nails, anyone?) often. Exhausted? Always. But today - I was excited. 

Good thing too because I have a huge blister on the palm of my hand, what I think might be bursitis in both my index finger knuckles, and although I can be down, or up - the in-between bit is getting very difficult indeed. 

Also exactly 1 week left.

gulp.

Buy a house, they said. It will be fun, they said

 Well. It turns out getting the nails out of floorboards is the easy part.

Sanding them is no fun at all no no no not even a little bit. And it has not gone smoothly (see what I did there?!)

We've had to get a young whippersnapper in to help us as it is just too much. And then to top it all off the bloody sanders keep breaking! Nothing more can really be done until the sanding is done as it looks like the Sahara in there. 

ARGHHHH

"It's just a floor" I keep telling myself.

It's just a floor.

(2 floors are done and they look lovely. The dining room, however, is not going down without a fight)

And I've had to spend £100 on floor wax oil. £100!!!!!!!!!!! What's in it, the wisdom of the ages? Gold flakes? 2.5 litres of holy water? 

Not like I'll ever find out at this rate. 

Sisyphean

 If you buy a Victorian workers cottage in the UK, and if you are reasonably lucky, chances are that buried underneath the "progress" of linoleum and laminate and hardboard and carpet you will have fairly decent floorboards. Usually pine, but maybe oak if it was a posher house. 

We have been lucky. 3 of the 4 rooms in our new house have pine floorboards, in - salvageable - reasonable - condition. 

Whoo hoo we thought. Quids in. Hurrah. 

But wait.

The boards must be sanded. And to sand them, every nail must be either removed or pounded down so it won't catch. Looks easy from standing height, but you get down on your knees with your eyes on the floor (where - spoiler alert - you will be for what seems like the rest of your life) - and you will see that these boards are infested - positively lousy - with nails. Some small, some large. Some bent over and hammered in, some so rusted when you try to pry them out the head just pops off and you have to pound them in instead. 

You will go over the boards and pick out every crappy bit of metal. Then you will look again and see six more, laughing at you. You will do those. Then you will decide to be systematic and go through board by board and you will find so many more you wonder if perhaps you must have some sort of sight deficiency that is hampering your efforts. That's got to be it, you think, trying to stand up - stumbling on your numb and aching legs, and hearing the distinctive rip of denim on yet another bloody nail. 

I have visions of previous inhabitants. "Oh I say, Elspeth, it is a quiet evening. Why don't we pound a few more upholstery tacks into the floorboards?" "Oh John, you are terrible you are! Oh you hound - well go on then - pass me the hammer!"

oh hi!

Just popping in quickly to say it's going well but it's very very busy! If we're not sanding it or painting it, we're ripping nails out of it or scraping paint off of it. Kitchen worktops arrive Tuesday, and the floor sander on Friday (we're going to attempt to sand the boards in three rooms - wish us luck). Juggling all this with work is as fun as it sounds, but it's all good so far :)

Here's some pics:

 Bedroom floorboards uncovered

Partner in grime

some of the rubbish

It's a busy street! This cat runs the roost and i came in one day to see him sitting in our kitchen looking at me as if it were me in the wrong place!

And back at the oast the packing has begun...

 I'm actually quite enjoying this. Or at least, I'm finding it interesting. It's another puzzle, really. It's very hard work though. 

The kitchen is half gone - 

Neal has been prepping and Terry has been painting and it is really coming along. I have been uncovering the floorboards in the dining room for the last two days and miracle of miracles they look decent enough to sand and paint which is good news indeed as the alternative is either nice flooring (WAY out of budget) or cheap crap flooring (still out of budget but what can you do?).

I have a favourite tool now and that is a prybar. It is the bees knees and i love it. I am going to go buy my own. This thing is amazing. The floor boards were covered with a very nasty carpet, and even nastier underlay, and then a nailed down (all nails rusty, of course) boarding. It has to be pried up and then the nails pried out. It is dirty and dusty and I love it.

The house seems light and bright and we've met quite a few neighbours and they are all lovely. It amuses me that all the new people we are meeting find us very Canadian while I myself have never felt more British.

We work from about 8 till 430, then go for a pint that tastes about as good as any pint I've ever had. We come home, shower (and that too feels utterly fantastic), and make something to eat. A quick prep for the next day, and I'm in bed sleeping by 9.

Here's the man of the hour - our hero - 

Terry the Magnificent

 

Two more days - and we'll take stock and see where we are.

Now to eat - and sleep  - hopefully in that order.