Taking a Step Back

Our living room revamp is done and now we've had a few weeks to get used to it I can honestly say it's the best thing we've done for a while.

The old look was crisp and fresh and suited us at the time, but this new look suits the house and how we use it day to day.  You don't know this when you first move into somewhere but you learn and adapt as time passes. 

As you can see from this selection of photos we didn't rush the process, deciding instead to do it in stages.  The chimney breast was wallpapered with our bargain buy brick effect paper.

The rest of stage one was a quick coat of white paint on the ceiling, walls and woodwork.  It didn't need doing anywhere except round this window where the rain had poured in the other year, but you can't do one spot and leave the rest .... unfortunately  ;-)

The large low bookcase that used to stand under the pictures on this wall was no longer needed after our big book sort out of last year so that went out into the workshop leaving us an expanse of floor space temporarily occupied by this diddy lamp bearing table.  We had a plan for the space but we had to wait for just the right thing to come along.

While we waited we used our car boot sale profits from last year to pay for a fitted carpet, the chilly laminate and ever shifting rug just had to go.

But it wasn't too long before just the right thing appeared in our local second hand shop. 

A small drop leaf table that holds the lamp we have lit every night.  It can be used for one or both of us to work on with one leaf up or for impromptu meals in the cosy living room if we don't want to eat off our laps.  It also matches in perfectly with the age of our cottage ... and with my Nana's little bedroom chairs that I have always loved.

The next piece of the puzzle was a new comfortable sofa and matching chair. 

Not to the age of the house this time but bought to add a lovely retro pop of colour to the downstairs, which luckily fits in quite well with our beloved green at the back of the fireplace and on the built in cupboard doors.  As you can see from this photo and the one on here the other day, the animals approve of the new cosy furnishings, although if you look closely you will notice we have bought some cheap matching fleeces to put on the seat cushions to protect them from moulting furry bodies. 

The fireplace wall was finished off with the return of ...

... the flying Pugs.

Now resprayed a more Pug coloured creamy colour instead of their former brilliant white which jarred with the new 'brickwork'.

  Our overall plan was always to go back to the age of the house a little bit more, it is a relative youngster compared to a lot of our neighbours houses but at well over a hundred years old it's nice to give a little nod to it's past with some cosy touches.

Sue xx

The View From the Loo

I'm going to miss this ... 'the view from the loo'.

Using the toilet and having a bath in the bathroom over the last couple of weeks has been nice with some of our books to look at on the shelves, but now in the living room the carpet is laid and over the weekend it's been nice to get the room looking a lot more normal, if slightly fresher and with that 'new carpet smell'.

This morning it was time to empty these shelves and lose the 'view from the loo'.

The books once laid out on the floor in the same order they were to go back looked a lot more than they had on the shelves ...

... and the magazines stacked on the chair in the bathroom just didn't look like they fitted easily into the cupboard under the shelves.

But it all fitted back together nicely after the shelves were slid the five foot to the right from the bathroom to the living room.

It's nice getting things back where they belong.

Oh, and I might have bought two more books to add to my collection  ;-)

Sue xx

What We Are Doing With Our Car Boot Earnings This Year.

At first we couldn't make up our minds what to do with our earnings from this years car boot sales,  what to do with over £700 requires careful consideration, then over a coffee and a slice of cake we hit on the perfect thing.  Two Winters ago we had a lot of water ingress into the house, last year it was sorted out and the exterior painted and we've been waiting ever since for things to dry out so we could sort out the internal damage

All above this window was originally a sodden mess, now at last it is dry, so Alan's first job was to patch things up, then we carried on and redecorated the whole room, which is pretty easy to do when your colour scheme is white ceilings, white walls and white woodwork.

Of course we needed a flash of colour on the chimney breast to keep things cheerful and that's where our two rolls of bargain wallpaper came in.  We thought a brick effect would look good and as we are going for a slightly 'older' look for the room it fitted in nicely.

Tomorrow a carpet will be fitted, we have had enough of the laminate flooring that was here when we bought the house.  The dogs are skidding round the living room for the last time today and hopefully by tomorrow we will have a cosy warm carpeted floor with no need for rugs that slide around to try and keep things warm underfoot.

And then next week the final piece of our living room makeover will be delivered, a brand new sofa and chair to add a real flash of colour to the room ..... and no it's NOT green  ;-)

The good thing is we have lots of the paint left over to redecorate our bedroom which is directly above the living room and suffered even worse damage above the window.  But that can wait a little while.

Our car boot sale money has done us very well ... paints, wallpaper, curtains, a new lightshade and almost all the cost of the carpet, the sofa is our Christmas present to each other.

While I was busy cleaning the floor ready for the carpet fitting, I spied our regular little peeping chicken at the door ....  

... Suky spotted her too and went over for a closer look  :-)

Sue xx

Books, Books, Books and More Books .....

Mission accomplished !! 

One completely empty bookcase ready to be moved out of the living room ready for it being redecorated, and the even better knowledge that there are no books to go back onto it once we have finished the room.

Seemingly back in February 2015 we had 619 books in our entire collection, as documented and pictured over three blog posts starting HERE.  If you want to read all three posts just click on 'Newer Post' at the bottom of each day.

After sorting through and tidying up each bookcase ...

... and each ledge ...

... and shelf downstairs, I worked my round the upstairs rooms.

Mostly fiction in the spare bedroom,

... an astonishing amount of books in my bedside cabinet.

Including one on top that I nearly forgot!!

Some more on Alan's side of the bed.

There were even a few lurking behind the computer screen.

And to the left of the desk in the office, another selection of Alan's books.

I drew a little plan so I could write the number of books on each shelf down in case I lost count, and as you can see in the end there was a grand total of 569.  So a lower number than two and a half years ago, but still a large number of books considering how many we have sold over the car boot season.  I guess there have been a few new ones in and lots of old ones out but luckily more out than in  :-)

So my plan over the Winter months is to hopefully read lots and jettison even more books ready for selling next year, and if possible whittle down the collection to a nice round 500 .... or even lower.

Hands up who else is a bookaholic  :-)

Sue xx

Hands Up

Hands up if you walked on the newly painted grey floor in Dad's workshop.

Yes Suky .... we know it was you!!

Sue xx

Time to Step Away from the Creosote .....

It's done!!

The workshop is now clad with hardwood on the two sides that get the worst of the weather.

We have two corner strips to go on ... when we buy them ... to protect the joins,  but apart from that my creosote brush has now been abandoned and the clothes I wore while I was doing it have all been added to the bonfire.  I wore my oldest, most torn work jeans and t shirt to do this knowing that I would never be able to get rid of the smell.  Luckily the fleece I had to throw on over the top when the temperatures plummeted has washed up pretty well, and it was only one I wore in the polytunnel anyway.  Another trip through the washing machine and I hopefully will have eradicated the last of the pong!!

The devil is in the detail, and the little strips that Lovely Hubby fitted around three sides of the window have made it all look lovely and neat.

We're both really pleased with it.

One day soon we will have to tackle the inside ..... now there's a job!!

Sue xx

And as it is ...

Gosh it's been a busy day today, but I just had to jump on the computer and record for posterity and as promised, show you what the house looks like now that the painting is all finished and the scaffolding is down.  I even managed to stand in pretty much the same place as yesterday's photo  :-)

The first one is from the front  (sorry it's a smidge blurry) .....

... then this one is the side ....

... and then round at the back it looks like this.

This wide shot shows the conservatory side of the house.

Now it's the fun for me bit of adding back all the things that I like and softening the edges of this new grey look.  The first step after hosing down and sweeping all around the house yesterday was putting the plants back by the front door .... there, you can't beat a bit of green  :-)

Sue xx

The Pretty .... and the Not So Pretty

I stopped for a break between planting row upon row of little Spring Onion seedlings earlier on this afternoon, sitting on the patio in the blazing sunshine is so much cooler than working in the polytunnel and this little 'weed' caught my eye.

Isn't it just so delicate and with such a lovely combination of colours.  I have no idea what it is but in my eyes it is the most perfect little flower I have seen in a long time :-)

Not quite as pretty to look at but also a thing of beauty to me is this old chest.  We found it when we were emptying Mum and Dad's garage of Dad's hoard of old things.  Buried deep amongst all the other 'treasures' it was full of bits of junk, I couldn't see it thrown in the skip when it had obviously meant something to Dad, so it's been languishing in one shed after another of ours for the last couple of years.  I suddenly had the urge to finally do something with it.

As you can see it's made out of really old and rough offcuts of wood, the sort of thing a woodworker would knock together to hold his bits and pieces, rather than a chest fit to grace the best rooms of a house.

Rather coincidentally it has exactly the same handles as the old drawer I use to keep all my seed stash.

My seed drawer, bought from a car boot sale for £1 off an old guy who was selling tools that were in it .... he was amazed I wanted it, but I thought it was just lovely.

Inside it has the same little ledge on one side that you find in many old blanket boxes.

A neat little touch I thought to make something so rough and ready in the style of fashionable blanket boxes of the time.

I have just started on it's renovation, unfortunately due to the miss match of the wood and the state of it, I can't just sand it down and keep it in a natural state so it will be painted.  And as the handles, hinges and catch are so firmly attached with old completely rusted up screws they will have to be dealt with in situ.

I'll let you see it when it's finished  :-)

Sue xx

Finished Chair and More Freebies

I finally got my little green bedroom chair finished the other day.  

It was a relief to get it done, I felt like I was going round in circles, so many 'sides' to it and three coats of green paint on each one, but it was worth it, and as Ginger is currently sleeping on the table on his new favourite cushion I think he's glad to see the back of it too and have Mother, the Christmas cacti back for company.  He's fickle that cat, the wigwam on the freezer is now deserted and he loves the table ... he moves from pillar to post and of course because he's just so gorgeous we let him  :-)

This chair has history.  It's one of a pair that was my Nana's (my Dad's Mum) wedding present off her Dad.  He also made her and three of her five sisters a full suite of bedroom furniture as the rest of the gift.  He was a Master Cabinet Maker but as he didn't make chairs he bought my Nana two pairs of bedroom chairs.  You can see from the seat that it has been replaced, many years ago the fancy rattan that made up the seat fell to bits and was replaced with a punched out piece of plywood.

Great Grandad had his workshop above a couple of blokes starting out in the motor car trade, whenever he made a large piece of furniture he would lower it through a trapdoor into their garage space rather than struggle down the stairs and they would help him move it out.  The guys were called Mr Rolls and Mr Royce, they got a little bit more famous than my Great Grandad ever did .... but back in the day they all shared a building and no doubt a lot of laughs.

I used this chair to stand on while I did all the painting when we first moved into this house, I don't do ladders and find a chair a much sturdier and safer option.  I'm sure it's not the use my Great Grandad had in mind for it when it was bought, but I'm also sure that he would have approved of it still being used and loved to this day.

More freebies arrived the other day.  A copy of a sister magazine to the one I got as a subscription to for Christmas and ten packets of seeds to add to my free seed stash tin.

I'm not taking them up on the other 'free' offers as each one only comes free if you pay rather a lot of postage!!

But not a bad little haul.  

A folder to keep the magazines in, a free magazine, a wall chart of when to plant what and £19.28 worth of seeds.  Of course all through the year the magazine will also come with free gifts so it will be interesting to see what it all adds up to over the course of the year. 

 I have kept a record of my Kitchen Garden freebies all through last year, that subscription runs out with the March issue so I will be seeing what that total adds up with that one as well.

Sue xx