Wednesday, March 25, 2009

We're In!!!!!

It seems like years.....probably because it is...........since we first decided to move house, and finally, here we are! We're now part of the Cofton Hackett Set darling!! They have their own newsletter discussing the painting of lamp posts and articles from the local wine club...it is soooooo posh!!! Ok, was posh....now they've let in an Essex Girl and a Black Country Boy..what were they thinking??!!!

The move went OK and was massively helped by my parents visiting for 3 days to help, especially with occupying the little man while we packed and unpacked boxes! Day after moving was a little hectic as the brakes on Criag's car had gone, so he found a local garage and left it with them to sort. The Sky man came to re-connect us (and gave us Sky +!!!) but found the scart connector on our TV was broken so no picture! Great! Anyway, Dad offered to buy us a new TV so off we trotted to buy one. Have since found extended warrenty on old TV so hopefully we'll get that one fixed....can we take back the other one after using for a couple of weeks??? We returned from buying TV to find Craigs sister, neice and great nephew on the doorstep, and then followed a procession of most of Craig's family for the evening, which was really lovely. Shame we don't have any sofas at the moment, so most had to sit on the patio and dining chairs!


The house is not looking too bad now, after a few days of sorting. Main tasks in next few weeks are to board the loft. Some bright spark has re insulated the loft....lovely new insulation....but put it across ways rather than lying it between the beams, so now Craig will have to remove the old insulation, relay the new stuff before he can put down the boarding! Oh well. Then we can get rid of some more boxes to the loft.

Another fairly urgent job is to have a shower fitted. Can't have it over the bath as the bath is under a sloping roof. Our plan is to remove the hot water tank in the bathroom, and put a walk in shower there. We'll replace the boiler for the heating with a combi boiler in the kitchen, but all a bit complicated. In the meantime we're making do with silly shower head thing in the bath and involves being a contortionist.....not easy in the mornings!!! :-)

Anyway, off now to have some tea. Boy in bed asleep, husband attempting to shower after being at the gym and wife hungry!!

Hoorah...Apprentice starts again!!

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

That's the thing with babies...sometimes you are right in the middle of things and then you have to stop to deal with them, hence abrupt end to last post. Tonight the little man is in bed, so we should be fine for a bit.

As I was saying, moving date is currently 20th March, but the lady we're buying from is apparently keen to complete as soon as possible, so maybe earlier, depending on what our buyer thinks. Can't really believe its all happening! The house is not hugely bigger than where we are now, but it does have 2 separate reception rooms rather than a through lounge. The main benefits are the area it is in, much nicer than where we are, good schools etc (have to think about these things now!) and the property has planning permission for a 2 storey extension. There is a separate garage (which we'll probably re-build this year for Craig's workshop) so the downstairs of the extension will be a good size office and we'll extend the kitchen, knocking through to the rear reception room to make a large kitchen/diner/family room. Not sure when we'll actually be able to afford to do that, but hopefully no too long. Be good to make the most of cheaper building quotes with most of them being desperate for business! Hopefully we'll be able to receive guests soon, although we won't have a sofa when we move. We're leaving our cat torn one here (cause to take it out we'd have to have the lounge window removed...that's the way it came in!),and clearly it's been shredded and we'd like new ones for a new house.

Buying the sofa's has caused almost more discussions than the house...and then after choosing the ones we liked from Lee Longlands, we discovered we wouldn't be able to get into the lounge when they were in there....so looked at smaller ones in the same range.........then found out (Thanks Sarah!) about Lee Longlands having a clearance place in Cheltenham which is having a sale starting from tomorrow.....guess where we'll be in the morning. Sure Lucas is getting as bored as us with our indecision on the matter!! Anyway, with the lead time on the original suite being 4-5 weeks, we could be seattingless for a while!

I'm starting now to contemplate the return to work. It's my last day of mat pay from work tomorrow, then I go onto the statutory pay. Can't live on that for long, so going back at beginning of May. Going to be hard, so just trying to make the most of the days we have. Least my job is somewhat flexible, so fingers crossed we'll be OK. Not looking forward tot he first time I have to stay away though...that will be really tough!

Lucas is lovely, although he was a whinger today when Aunty Kaz came to visit. Wish everyone could see him when he's smiling and giggling and blowing raspberries! He's trying to sit up, and is much more alert and interested in things, and can grab his toys too! We are trying to be a bit 'green' when it comes to nappies, and are using re-usables now. They will hopefully save quite a lot of money in the long term, especially if we have another child, but rinsing them through when they are full of runny poo takes a bit of getting used to!! Today's turned Craig green in a distinctly non-environmental way! Ah the joys of parenthood!

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

OK... so promising to keep up with a Blog lasted about as long as still being pregnant! Since Lucas arrived on Nov 9th things seem to have been a bit busy!! It's not just getting used to a little man in the house (few weeks of sleepless nights and seemingly constant feeding and changing!), but then of course there was Christmas, busy for everyone. On top of these, we accepted an offer on our house on the Monday before Christmas, the 2nd one as the first buyer had pulled out just a few days before. While the rest of the country aren't selling houses, we sold ours twice in a matter of weeks!

Anyway, as we'd had the previous offer, and the buyers supposedly wanted to move quickly, we spent many days looking for houses and doing viewings, not easy with a newborn baby! We could never seem to get out of the house much before noon!! When the buyers pulled out (they changed their minds apparently!) we called them some names I can tell you, especially as we'd seen a house we really liked and on the day they pulled out, we'd just put an offer in for it...all hopes seem dashed. But then up popped the next buyer, we put in another offer on the house we liked, and now we are well into the buying/selling process. Fingers crossed we'll move some time in March.