WOYWW 432–More on Infusions Mini-Album

Finally managed to put in some studio time! These kittens of ours do take up a lot of time! Today we’ve had visitors morning and afternoon to see them, and needing cups of tea etc. and lots of chat! I’ve also been busy with other things and very tired in between, and as usual, art ends up at the bottom of the heap, but last night I was determined to get back to it again and I’ve made a bit more progress on the tags for my Infusions samples album.

Here’s my desk as it was last night. Not a lot of change since you last saw it!

Working on the tags, this is the front of the first tag in the “Painting” section.

I drew a rough curly shape and painted it with The Sage and Emerald Isle from Set 1, and Slime and a little In the Navy from Set 2, finally sprinkling on a tiny amount of In the Navy in the circular spaces, and then added text with my white pen.

Turning the tag holder and tag over, I made a tag to go with the “Woodgrain effect” page, but instead of going straight across with broad strokes with the fan brush, I added a bit of a curve for interest. I used Golden Sands from Set 1, and Rusty Car from Set 2 for this tag, and again added some text with my white pen, and outlining the larger text with a black pen. To the right, you can see the small square I painted with what was left of the Infusions mixed with water on my craft sheet.

Below, you can see the Tartan effect tag with its page, which is the second “Painting” page. For this I used Are You Cerise and Violet Storms from Set 1, and created the text in the same way as before. The mop-up square is on the right, and I later added some more to this one.

Turning over both page and tag, I used Lemoncello and Emerald Isle from Set 1 on the tag, to echo some of the colour on the painted fans on the page, and added text as before. The mop-up sheet is above.

Moving on to the “Stamping” section, for the front of the tag to go in this title page, I just used Rusty Car from Set 2, after first spritzing the tag well with water, and adding more water after the Infusions had gone on. There is no text on this side of the tag but I wanted it to tone with the page when it was pulled out.

Finally, the back of that tag, having turned over both page and tag, to show the page with simple stamping onto a background already created with Infusions, in this case The Sage from Set 1, with text as before. Above is the mop-up sheet, which was the purplish one from above.

These mop-up sheets will be used to make cards or be used in other projects. I hate to waste any Infusions that are on the craft sheet!

Kittens

Our kittens are 16 weeks old today. How quickly the time is going. They are growing fast, and very energetic in the mornings and evenings, and tending the crash out asleep during the afternoon, so our afternoon visitors don’t see them at their most fun!

I’ve just realised that I didn’t take any photos or videos of them at all last week! They haven’t really done anything new, except grow! They are progressing well with the clicker training but it still tends to go out the window when they’re not actually in a training session and there are other distractions. They will usually come when they are called, though, and they now understand “Jump up!” and will come on my lap. I am still working on trying to get Ruby to use the scratching post, and we’ve got as far as her putting her paws on it on the command “Scratch!” but she hasn’t actually “scratched” yet! I’ve got some stuff on order which I can put on the scratching post which should encourage her to use it properly, in preference to the carpet.

We’ve had quite a few visitors wanting to see them which is very nice – everybody is enjoying them and saying how pretty they are! Ruby continues to be my baby and always wants to come and sit with me, and if Lily is already on my lap, she makes sure she comes up higher than her, so that she can have prime position as close to me as possible! It’s very flattering, especially after so many years of watching both kitties all over my hubby and not wanting to come to me – last night my hubby looked over at the 3 of us and said, “I want a kitty…” and looked sad, and I said, “Now you know how I felt all those years!” I do spend a lot more time with them than he does, as he’s so busy and is out and about a lot.

Health Update

I had my CT scan last Friday and am waiting for the result. I am pleased that my surgeon is keeping such a close eye on me, and he’s as anxious as I am to avoid a repeat performance of my emergency surgery at the beginning of this year. I’m pretty sure that hernia repair is failing as it doesn’t feel right, but it’s all pretty inconclusive. He will continue to monitor it, and I just hope that he is available when it does fail, so that he can do the operation and put the mesh in to protect the area.

Cooking

We are in the throes of dealing with masses of apples off our tree. I can hardly keep up! My hubby, being a lot braver about creepy crawlies and worms and things than I am, does the initial peeling and chopping, and then I slice them more finely. This year, I have decided to freeze them uncooked rather than stewed as I did last year, because they will be more versatile and I can use them in apple cake and other things. Once they are sliced, they are laid out in a single layer on baking parchment on baking sheets and then frozen. Once they are frozen, they are put into big bags as separate slices, so I can take as much out as I need at any one time. It’s quite a lot of work and pretty cold, dealing with the frozen slices, too! I can’t do too many at once or I can’t get the baking trays into the freezer. I’ve now got 3 big bags full and there are still quite a lot to do! It’s all taking quite a lot of time.

I haven’t done much baking recently but we’ve got our monthly Cakeathon meeting with the cancer group this Friday, and this time I’ve decided to make scones – I’ll make 2 batches, one plain to have with jam, and one cheese. I’ll probably get some cream before Friday so we can have a proper Devon cream tea!! They don’t take long to make so I’ll probably whip them up on Friday morning.

Diet and New Clothes

Getting out my clothes for cooler weather, I find that quite a lot of them are hanging off me, having lost so much weight with my diet. Several pairs of leggings won’t stay up any more (since starting my diet I’ve lost 10 inches around my waist!!) and they are all wrinkly round the legs, making me look like Nora Batty. I needed new trousers too, and new bras, so my hubby took me down to Marks & Spencer’s last week and I got some lovely new stuff! I am also no longer singing “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” and have decent Uplift from my new bras!! I haven’t managed to shed any more pounds over the past 3 weeks which is a bit frustrating but slow and steady is best, and I have every hope that I’ll lose the final 3 pounds before long.

We’ve been out for lunch with friends this week too, and I’ve had the engineer to repair a small fault on the stairlift, and I’ve been very busy getting sessions ready for my Bible study group which resumes in earnest on Friday. This Saturday I’ve got an Ileostomy Association meeting in Somerset, so it’s all go, Chez Shosh. Hopefully I’ll get time to do some more art as I really want to finish the Infusions album now.

Have a great week, everybody.

Our New House–Some New Photos

Since we moved over a month ago, I haven’t been taking so many photos because of being really busy unpacking things, getting Mum settled in, and also dealing with a bad dip in my M.E. as a result of seriously overdoing things over the past weeks – I am only amazed that I didn’t crash earlier, but I assume I was running on adrenalin during the move, and once the pressure was off, my body protested that it had no reason to keep going, thank you very much! I’ve had a few good days in between but have to resist the temptation to boom and bust and overdo things again when I’m feeling better.

I decided I should take a few more photos of the work that’s been done. Today I’m concentrating on the downstairs where most of the difference has taken place, and I will need to go out and take some more photos of the garage when energy and weather permit – my hubby has made good progress out there after the team have completed the work, and today he went over and picked up his boat from the farmer who had been storing it in his barn for him – great sigh of relief that it fits! I said I’d have been pretty disgusted with him after all this work, if he hadn’t measured it properly!!

Anyway, back inside the house. When our new boiler was fitted, the glass panel over the white uPVC back door had to be  replaced with a solid panel to allow the flue to pass through to the outside. As a result, the back passage and utility room were very dark and felt quite claustrophobic.

Andy said that a cheaper option than replacing the whole door would be to have a glass panel to replace the solid one. I didn’t know this was possible, but he said the panel is held in with a bead and a sealing strip, and it was a simple matter to replace it. I told him we needed to have a cat flap. The one in the original panel was a feature mentioned in the agents’ particulars, and as with quite a few other features, we soon found out that they did not function – in this case, the previous owner had glued it up so it wouldn’t open!

Here is Paul fitting the new panel. You can see that there is a circular hole for the cat flap. Being a double-glazed unit, the seal goes around this hole as well as around the edge of the panel.

Here is the door complete with cat flap. Having a glass door makes a huge difference to the whole feel of the back passage, and also gives a lovely view onto the garden. This idea of Andy’s was a positive inspiration, and well worth the extra on the budget!

The kitties have been quite amusing with it – Beatrice was very interested and kept peering out through the door. I held it open for her but she wouldn’t go through. In the end I went outside and opened it from there, and out she hopped! I went in again and repeated the process and in she came. She has now got to grips with it and is popping in and out whenever she pleases. Phoebe was a lot more nervous about trying it, and my hubby eventually got her to use it by putting her food bowl outside and encouraging her out, and then reversing the process! Today she’s going in and out with no problem, so hopefully soon we will be able to dispense with the litter tray and get my hubby’s bathroom civilised at last! We’ve had to shut them both in there on days when the builders were here, because they were in and out of the garage and the kitties would have had access to the road.

Shortly after Mum moved in, my old fridge which I had given her, gave up the ghost, presumably not surviving the move. My hubby bought her a new one, which is slightly smaller so doesn’t fit the space quite so well. Here it is, alongside my old electric cooker which fits perfectly in its allotted space. Mum isn’t very good at keeping the ceramic hob clean – I remember spending about half an hour on her hob in the old house after she’d moved out, so I have decided to clean it every morning for her when I go in to clean her hearing aid – this way any spills don’t get burnt on, and it’s easy to do, taking only minutes.

The white object above the fridge is a small counter-top freezer that we bought for her, so she can be independent. I have also got some food of hers in the larger chest freezer in the outhouse and she can ask me if she wants anything. The system is working very well. I also have a small freezer in my kitchen as part of the fridge-freezer and like Mum, use this for more everyday stuff, keeping the excess in the outside freezer.

In Mum’s shower, I asked Paul to fit another grab rail, which you can see on the right. I also bought and fitted a shower curtain to run along the shower screen support – it was quite useful camping out in the annexe after we moved, before the bedroom was ready, because I was able to experience the shower first-hand and noticed what improvements were necessary.

I realised that I hadn’t photographed my new stairlift. Here it is at the bottom of the stairs. You can see the rail running up the right hand side of the stairs, and in this picture the arms, seat and foot rest are folded down ready for use.

In the next picture you can see it folded up to make room for pedestrians to pass up and down the stairs. You can also see the hinged rail, raised in this photo – this type of rail was necessary because of the door into the annexe being right at the bottom of the stairs, and it won’t open when the rail is down. The seat has to be “parked” slightly up from the bottom, not just to allow the hinge to fold, but because there is a charging point there, and at the top of the rail – it runs on a battery which is continually charged from the mains while the seat is at a charging point – this means that if there is a power cut when you are half-way up the stairs, the stairlift continues to operate.

Unfortunately when it is not on a charging point and not in motion, it makes the most irritating beeping noise and despite my protestations, Acorn say they cannot prevent this. It’s funny how on the TV adverts they never show you this feature! I go to bed much later than my hubby and am always afraid this loud noise is going to wake him!

Here is the hinge in the “down” position. To take this photo I had the annexe doors open (there is a double-door system, one door opening each way) because with them closed the light was so bad, but normally the hinge is never down when the doors are open.

The hinge control is mounted on the wall at the top and bottom of the stairs, with a button for “up” and one for “down.” The stairlift was also supplied with two remote controls, one for the top, and one for the bottom, of the stairs, so that you can call the chair from whichever end you are – I find this very useful for carrying things up and down stairs – I can load the chair, and go up or down on foot. I am fortunate that I do not always need to use the stairlift but it does save a lot of energy and on bad days it is essential.

In case you haven’t already picked it up, here’s a photo showing the new decor in the hall, which continues up the stairs and along the landing. We got rid of the awful flowered wallpaper and have a much more subtle colour scheme of cream and mushroom, which will be much better for displaying our pictures (once I finish putting them up!).

The old dark red tiles in the sitting room fireplace have now been replaced with the same cream tiles that were used for the kitchen splash-backs. Paul has tiled on top of the red ones – a very quick and dust-free job. He has done a beautiful job, arranging them in a brick formation, and using up all the small pieces in the hearth.

Here is a detail of the hearth.

We are very pleased with this. My original plan was to get rid of this fireplace altogether and replace it with something less heavy looking, but after having had time to think about it, I realised that would be a mistake as it is a magnificent original art deco feature of the house – both my hubby and Andy were very relieved that I changed my mind! It looks so much better with more contrast in the tiles – you can see the beauty of both the fireplace and the very nice gas fire, to much better advantage than with the dark red tiles.

Now for some pictures of my beautiful new kitchen in action. Looking at these pictures, my first impression is that it all looks a bit of a mess!! Let me assure you that eventually a lot of the stuff at present under the reduced height part will be put away – I still have quite a lot of sorting to do and have not yet got the utility room organised to my satisfaction.

The full-height unit is great, with plenty of power points for my various machines (bread and yoghurt makers, toaster) and there are lights under the wall units. There’s a lot of junk waiting to find homes on the peninsula but still plenty of room for laying up trays etc. Lots of storage space underneath, with my famous carousels in the corner.

The oven and hob work beautifully for me – to be able to sit to cook is awesome, and relieves my hubby of so much! The extractor hood is extremely effective with three speeds of fan (I’m pretty well incommunicado with it on as it’s so powerful and I can’t hear anything else!) and the lights shining down onto the hob make a huge difference. Paul put all my fridge magnets on the steel surface after I realised you can’t have fridge magnets with a built-in fridge! John, the kitchen fitter, made me a neat little place to store my trays, and I’ve got pans and baking tins in the cupboards above and below the oven.

I love my silk sunflower plant in the corner behind the microwave – I brought this with us from our old house. One day I may get round to putting a sunflower picture on the wall behind!

In addition to all the general storage in the kitchen, my hubby and I each have our own cupboards – his has his “man mugs” and his radio, and all his chutneys and other things he likes, and mine has my fine china mugs and my favourite tea etc.

Some years ago at a mobility show I bought a wire pull-down unit for a kitchen wall unit, and this has been fitted in my cupboard. If I am sitting down, all I need to do is pull it down to access my mugs etc.

Everything in my new kitchen works so well for me! I originally anticipated using my wheelchair in the kitchen but I have not needed to do so, as the perching stool serves me very well. I can sit to wash up, to cook and prepare food, and together with my trolley, everything works fine, and I am so enjoying cooking again!

Still quite a bit of organising to do in the utility room but the shallow base units and the wall unit in the back passage, and the sink units in the utility room proper, are proving very useful. The door to the left of the boiler covers the electricity meter, and the ropes coming down in front of it are attached to the airer which pulls right up to the ceiling. The box on the worktop contains my spice jars – once Tim the electrician has been back and provided me with another power point in the utility room, I shall get my big spice rack up and get all the jars out.

My airing cupboard is proving very satisfactory too. I still have to paint the bi-fold doors and the bit of plastering on the right. I was sad to see the original sliding window go, but it would not have been workable, and Andy has made a beautiful airing cupboard.

The bi-fold doors were working fine until Mum arrived. Then I noticed that they kept popping open, letting the heat escape. It became clear that every time Mum opened the door on her side of the cupboard, it was creating a small pressure wave in the air in the cupboard that was sufficient to open my doors. I didn’t know what the answer was, and until Paul returned, I kept them closed with a box on the floor. He came up with this very neat little catch made out of a simple piece of bent metal. In the closed position, it extends up into a slot cut in the wooden frame of the door, preventing the doors from popping open.

When open, it allows the doors to open freely.

Such a simple solution, and so easy to use! Here are the doors open, showing the shelves inside – the interior was constructed to my own design, with a hanging rail on the right, where I keep several hangers ready for use.

Another very neat thing they have done for me is Andy’s ramp between the utility room and the kitchen, made from some surplus laminate flooring from the kitchen. There was a small step here which was a nuisance for my trolley. He has matched the pattern so that the join is invisible.

Next time I’ll add a few more photos showing the finished work, and the renovations in use as we live in the house and enjoy all the improvements! Now that we have paid the balance and the builders are “signed off” it feels very strange, and I miss them all so much! It’s been such an adventure from beginning to end, watching the transformation of the house from not very satisfactory through a horrendous mess with dust and builders’ rubble and tools everywhere, until gradually we began to witness the beauty emerging as the plastering and painting began, and the final touches which brought our beautiful house to light. With the new roof and other essential work (e.g. replacing a lot of cowboy-installed stuff) and the practicality and luxury of a truly workable kitchen and a bathroom that is pure indulgence as well as being accessible and easy to use, we feel that we have future-proofed the house for many years to come – not to mention my beautiful new ARTHaven where I anticipate spending many happy hours being creative! In addition, we’ve made a safe and comfortable home for Mum in the annexe, and once she realises we mean business as far as establishing proper boundaries is concerned, we hope that she will be content, knowing that we are just the other side of the door, but enabling her to have her independence, and us our privacy as we live our own lives.

Our New House–Gradually Getting Straight

My second posting today – it has been so manic here and even though we’ve been online for a week now, I simply haven’t had time to do anything much on the computer.

I cannot believe that we have been in for over a fortnight! The time has simply flown by, and lots has happened since my previous post.

First of all, I was beginning to get really stressed about the imminent arrival of Mum, because I knew I wouldn’t be ready for her, and my hubby phoned my sister and arranged a postponement. She is now due to come down on Wed. 9th Oct. (a week today) which has certainly taken the pressure off. The annexe is still not ready, but at least I’ve got most of my boxes out of there now and it will be a lot easier to get Mum’s stuff straight.

I have ceased camping out in there, too, which is absolutely great. I wasn’t enjoying sleeping in Mum’s bed much and couldn’t wait to get back into my own bed again, and eventually Paul said he could clear most of the bedroom and confine his tools and equipment to one corner, and my hubby and I assembled the bed. What bliss to sleep in it again! The rest of the furniture isn’t yet where it should be, and I can’t really get at the wardrobes, so there’s still an element of camping out, but at least the end is in sight.

Huge progress has been made on the bathroom, and it is all but finished. Last week Paul arrived coughing and spluttering with a cold, and announced, “I’ve got the grout!” Very painful. Andy said it was more likely too many late nights and too much to drink… As of today, Paul still has a small task to finish on the loo (there is a tiny leak in the pipe leading down from the high-level cistern to the bowl) and the silicone has to be applied around the shower tray, so I can’t use the area beyond the arch yet, but today he completed the drainage from the bath and basin, and on Monday Tim fitted the cabinet, and all the tiling and grouting is now complete, so great celebrations this afternoon after they’d all gone – at last I managed to get my hair washed and have a real soak in my fabulous new bath! We have arranged it so that I can reach the tap with my foot, so I can add more hot water without having to sit up! How decadent is that? It is utter luxury and I am more thrilled with the whole bathroom than I can say.

In the bath is Boris (my bath lift) lying on his side drying after my first bath! I am delighted with the non-slip floor tiles, and when the winter comes, I shall really enjoy the underfloor heating. On the bottom right of the above photo, you can see that Paul has constructed a small platform on which the tap is mounted. This was created from an offcut from the utility room worktop (a brilliant idea of his – it blends so well with the tiles, being a very similar colour and texture), and it is extremely strong. It covers the access to the plumbing and drainage for the bath.

The tiled counter with the basin and cabinet above. We had some fun with the cabinet. It has lights down the sides, and these are turned on by passing your hand over a sensor on the right hand side of the cabinet. It was a bit annoying, because when I bought it, I knew the exact size of the space, and chose one which would fit perfectly, and only when we opened it up and read the instructions did we discover that there was supposed to be a 150 mm gap between the sensor and the wall in order for it to function properly. There simply isn’t enough space to allow for such a gap, and there is just room to pass your hand between. Both Tim and Paul were able to get it to work (albeit intermittently) but I couldn’t get it to work at all. I did a bit of lateral thinking, and decided it was my rings that were causing the problem. We tried with a piece of card, which worked after a fashion, and when we tried a piece of black card, it was perfect every time. I have now discovered that my black hairbrush handle works just as well!

Under the counter, on the shelf, I have put my rectangular basket – this is only temporary, and I may eventually try and get some more of these, preferably a better fit, for storage of bathroom supplies.

The shower is now installed in the section beyond the arch, but not useable until the tray is sealed all around.

Both this shower, and the bath tap, have a secondary, smaller shower (I never thought I would end up with 3 showers in my bathroom!) – I tried the one on the bath tap today and it is very powerful. I was able to sit on Boris and wash my hair with ease. You can see it sticking up to the right of the tap in the next photo.

Looking back towards the doorway into the bedroom from the arch, you can see the towel rail radiator now in use. It is a dual function one; when the heating is on, it will come on with the other radiators, but when the heating is off, it can be operated electrically. Tim has installed a timer so that I can set it to come on and off automatically.

You can see that Paul has installed a grab rail for me over the bath. He is not happy that the supplied screws are long enough so he will finish the job tomorrow. Lying in the bath, I suddenly remembered that we haven’t installed the large circular mirror over the bath, and I have an awful feeling the grab rail is too high… If Paul moves it down, the upper holes will be covered by the bottom of the mirror, but the lower ones may have to be filled, but hopefully they won’t show too much. I have three more of these grab rails; one will go beside the loo and the other two in the shower.

Final house picture taken today – the Three Wise Monkeys in the man cave on their tea break!!

It was so nice having the three of them back on site together again. Both Andy and Chris have been off doing other work, and Andy was on holiday too.

I have not posted all the photos I’ve taken since the move. If you want to see them all, you can follow any of the photo links which will take you to my Photobucket site, where you can access the full set. I am afraid that the photos in each daily sub-album are out of order – I have been communicating with Photobucket about the problem of custom organising of albums since they revamped the whole site, to no avail; naming the photos is also a problem, so I am afraid they are just “as is” – all muddled, but at least the sub-albums are arranged in date order so you can follow the progress.

My hubby’s man cave is almost complete, and you can see that he’s installed some shelves. The garage doors were delivered yesterday after a fortnight’s delay, and today my hubby started bringing garage boxes over. Our old house is going to be let, and the new tenants are arriving on Tuesday, so the race is on to get all the stuff over before then. He has enlisted some help, and tomorrow when we go to Totnes we will be picking up a few more boxes.

Although progress is being made on all fronts (building work, unpacking, getting organised), everything is taking me three times as long to do as expected, because with every job I attempt, I can’t find half the stuff! Things have a habit of appearing and then disappearing again, too, which can be very frustrating!

My joint and muscle pain became so bad shortly after the move that for a few days I could scarcely put my left foot on the ground – it felt as if I had sprained it. Both ankles and knees have been very swollen and painful and I haven’t been able to get down on the floor at all until today, which has been a real nuisance with everything that needs doing. My ankles and feet feel extremely tender. This is what they look like tonight.

My hubby has made an appointment for me to see the doctor tomorrow morning, but I don’t expect him to be able to help much – I am sure this is all the result of being on my feet far too much, and with sufficient rest, as the pressure diminishes over the next weeks, I shall return to normal. My once shapely legs are looking like tree stumps at the moment! We’ve got to go back to our old doctors’ surgery in Totnes because we won’t be registered at the surgery here for another week or so.

My stairlift was eventually installed – five days late. All that time the understairs cupboard stuff was all over the hall and sitting room cluttering the place up, and I couldn’t progress with box unpacking during that time. I could have done with the stairlift earlier, given the state of my legs, but it has been extremely helpful since its installation. My one complaint about it is the incessant beeping it makes, which is driving me nuts! I spoke to the company (and mentioned my gripe about Andy having to drill the hole) and told them how I hated the noise it makes, but of course they were not prepared to do anything about either complaint. I am sure there must be a simple connection which could be disconnected to prevent the beeping, but it’s the usual nanny state stuff, covering their backs and dumbing down the equipment – I do realise there are people who are not able to understand the working of it and need the beeping to warn them when the lift is away from its charging point etc. but I wish there was the option of having a choice. Anyway, I shall just have to live with it, and hope the racket doesn’t wake my hubby when I come up to bed in the small hours – it certainly makes enough noise to wake the dead!!

My wonderful kitchen is now fully operational, and I have had 2 big Tesco deliveries since being back online, as I attempt to restock my food cupboards after firstly running everything down for the move, and secondly having reduced stocks anyway because I haven’t been able to cook for so long. The reduced height, easy-access worktops, sink and hob are nothing short of brilliant, and I can prepare food, cook, and wash up in comfort, and am enjoying beginning to cook again.

My first attempt at “real food” after so long surviving on takeaways and ready meals (my dear hubby has done his best and I am so grateful to him keeping us going all this time, but my time has come again and it is lovely to take the pressure off him, especially as he now has to do so much more driving) was a firm favourite with both of us – liver and bacon. I was a bit worried that I might have forgotten how to cook, but I stepped back into it after all this time, as if it had just been yesterday! The extractor hood over the hob is so powerful that I was able to chop onions over the sink, using my wonderful sliding chopping board which fits over the sink, without shedding a tear or even smelling the onions! Cooking them was the same. It is absolutely amazing.

Tonight I cooked a rice pudding (complete with lurvely brown skin!) and I am looking forward to doing some baking again, too. In today’s Tesco delivery was some stewing beef, and I am looking forward to doing a casserole. We have also had cottage pie, and I’ve got some salmon and chicken in the freezer waiting to be cooked. And pasta… sooo many lovely things to look forward to!

The kitchen is a dream, and I’ve got it organised how I want, with everything to hand. Once the utility room is finished (tiling still to be done around the sink, and finishing off around the airing cupboard), I will be able to get that area cleaned up and we can be civilised again! My airer in the back passage, and the airing cupboard, are now fully functional, although the bottom of the airing cupboard still has builders’ supplies being stored in it, and they will keep leaving the door open and wasting all my heat, despite a post-it note on the door asking them to keep it closed!

The kitties are settling in well, although they greatly resent being confined to my hubby’s bathroom during the day while the builders are around. Up until today, the garage has been open at the front, and the builders are in and out, leaving the side door open, so the kitties could easily escape onto the road. Phoebe is pretty freaked out anyway, having them around. As soon as the builders have left each day, we let the kitties out and they have the run of the house and seem quite settled now. They’ve been in the garden a few times at the weekend and in the evenings, and Phoebe manages to get herself lost each time – but always in the same place, so I said to my hubby he should look there first, instead of panicking and asking the neighbours if they’ve seen her!

Just a few odd jobs remaining to be done now – Tim the electrician will be back tomorrow to finish the power supply to the garage and outhouse (for the main freezer) – he couldn’t install the consumer box until the doors were fitted, because it was vulnerable to being stolen. He has also fixed a few more bits of cowboy wiring that we’ve discovered since we moved in, and all now seems to be well. He is going to fit a double extractor fan in my bathroom, probably on Friday – with a vent over the bath and one in the shower, being served by a single powerful fan in the loft and venting out through a soffit. I can then be as steamy as I like in my girlie bathroom!!

I shall try and get back into the swing of things online over the coming days, but there’s a lot to do and lots of catching up to do. I will be following up on all your lovely comments as soon as I can – I know there were some pending from before the move. You are not forgotten, and your comments are very much appreciated.

As for my poor ARTHaven, it is a massive dumping ground at the moment and I can hardly get in there. At least the office is workable, although there is a lot of sorting and putting away to be done. I’ve got most of the bedroom boxes out of the ARTHaven proper now, but I really can’t tackle the rest until we’ve done a lot more in the rest of the house, and got Mum installed. It will all come straight eventually – I’ve just got to be patient and keep plugging on with the unpacking, and try not to do too much at once but factor in lots of rest times. Hopefully this will eventually restore my shapely ankles and the tree stump legs will be a thing of the past!!

Our New House–The Move at Last

We have moved at last! The date of writing is Thurs. 19th September, but we will not have Internet access until Tues. 24th, when hopefully I shall be able to publish this, and any subsequent posts during the coming days. [Now posting on the evening of 2nd Oct.]

I worked absolutely flat out for three successive days – not a good move in my state of health but unavoidable if we were going to be ready for the removal men at 8 a.m. on Monday 16th. I am now suffering the consequences with a great deal of muscle and joint pain but fortunately not the overwhelming and paralysing fatigue that usually accompanies payback after overdoing things – I think I am still running on adrenalin! The past couple of days I have factored in some rest time and this afternoon did very little but watch TV and doze.

The move went without a hitch. The firm sent two vans and a team of five strong young men who were very efficient and careful – nothing went missing and so far we have discovered no breakages. Two medium sized vans are better than one huge pantechnicon in our neck of the woods with the narrow country lanes.

It was a very busy day and they didn’t finish until mid-afternoon. We had labelled all the furniture and the boxes still remaining to be taken over with the room of their destination, and a few days before the move, I labelled the door of each room with a post-it note so they knew which room was which. In each room I put a rough plan of where each item of furniture was to go. All this advance preparation was extremely helpful and enabled the move to be efficient and straightforward.

When packing banana boxes, I listed the contents on the side of each one and when my hubby brought them over, I asked him to stack them with the list at the front so I could easily see what was in them. This helped immensely. However, my hubby only labelled his boxes with the destination room and no list of contents, and before the move, when we needed to find certain things that were already packed, it involved going through dozens of boxes to find what we wanted! You can imagine what this was like with his garage stuff – he packed everything and marked all the boxes “garage” so when I asked for a specific tool for a job, it took about an hour to find it. The only problem I have experienced with my system is that every time I want something from a specific box, it always seems to be at the bottom of the pile!

Our move has been complicated by the continuing presence of the builders, although the entertainment value is worth a guinea a minute, and I shall really miss them when they’ve gone! I have spent more time over here than my hubby, and have got very accustomed to having them around, making cups of tea and sharing banter and laughter.

Bedroom 1 is absolutely full of stuff. The removal men had to put most of its furniture in there because there wasn’t room on the landing for more than a couple of pieces, and the rest of the room is full of Paul’s tools and equipment, stacks of tiles, my new bath, radiator and other bathroom things, while he completes work on the bathroom. This means that at present I am camping out in the annexe, living out of a suitcase and unable to find the things I need – with the weather suddenly getting cooler I was in need of some warmer clothes and it was a struggle to find the right box as most of my personal stuff is scattered around the house in different piles of boxes. My ARTHaven is just a dumping ground at present, and it’s quite hard to get in there! I can just about plough a narrow path to the desk, which is important as there is some office stuff to attend to, but as for getting my ARTHaven up and running, that has to be bottom of the list of priorities at present.

I am really jealous of my hubby. His two rooms are now more or less unpacked, and early on, he even unpacked his teddies. I don’t even know where my teddies are…

Various things have been happening over the past couple of days since we moved. First of all, the Sky engineer came and set us up – I am extremely impressed with Sky, who offer a home moving package where they transfer you from the old to the new house, and provide new equipment (dish, cables etc.) as required, all absolutely free of charge! They were also prepared to come on the day I specified, and on my choice of either morning or afternoon. However, when it comes to the phone and Internet, it’s a different matter – because BT owns the infrastructure, our connection to the system has to be at BT’s convenience, and they couldn’t provide an engineer until a week after we’d moved! Says it all, really, doesn’t it.

Once we are connected to the Internet we shall have such super-fast speeds that we shan’t know ourselves. I read recently that people in rural areas were complaining that they were only achieving speeds of about 4 Mbits/sec. Four!! We have had to be satisfied with 1 or less. On the fibre-optic system we will have access to in the town, we should expect to get speeds of between 30 and 40! We’ll be getting our downloads yesterday.

My hubby arranged for an aerial specialist to call, and he checked the system and proved what we’d thought – that this was just another example of cowboy wiring and nothing worked properly! It is all now connected up correctly, and after buying my hubby a cheapo freeview box, he can now watch TV in his study. We are going to get another for his other room. Mum’s TV is now all ready for her to watch when she arrives.

I am getting a little concerned about her coming as soon as the 28th, as I haven’t even made a start on sorting her annexe, which is at present full of our stuff because I can’t access various parts of the house owing to the builders’ presence. I had hoped to have a few days of rest and peace and quiet before her arrival, but now it will be pretty amazing if I actually manage to get her annexe half way straight before she comes.

The engineer called yesterday to fit my stairlift, but the call had to be aborted because the straight rail would not turn the corner at the end of the hall in order to go up the stairs. The engineer was quite annoyed because he said the salesman should have spotted this problem and ordered a rail in sections, and he had to go away without fitting it, and it will now be done on Monday. This is a major bore, not just because I could do with the energy-saving benefits of the stairlift, but I am not putting everything back under the stairs only to have to get it all out again, and the place is cluttered up with even more stuff than necessary.

Our electrician has installed a fused spur switch on the outside of the understairs cupboard and said all they needed to do was drill a hole on the other side and run a cable inside the cupboard behind the bottom stair to bring the power to the wall side of the stairs where the lift will run. However, the engineer said (get this), “We are not allowed to drill any holes”! How can they fit a stairlift without drilling any holes? The rail has to be mounted on brackets all the way up the stairs for starters! He said there was too much risk of hitting a cable or something, and proposed running the cable from the fused spur, along the surface, on top of the stair carpet on the bottom stair! How utterly ridiculous. This morning I asked Andy to drill a hole for me, and he did so, but said he resented doing their work for them – if they are employed to fit a stairlift, they should do it properly and not expect customers to get in third-party contractors to do half the job for them! He said I should charge them £10 for having to do this ourselves! I said that if they give me a £10 discount, I would certainly give it to him! (When the Sky man came, he had to drill a hole in the wall of our house in order to screw in a bracket to hold a strap to brace his ladder. It seems nobody can be trusted to use common sense any more to do the simplest job. Andy said I should insist he fill the hole afterwards or water would get behind the rendering and it would crack off if it froze. He said they always cap the hole so that any subsequent Sky engineer who needs to examine the dish in future can use the same hole.) I am so sick of this nanny state we are subjected to. One day they’ll say they aren’t allowed to climb ladders at all, in case they fall off and hurt themselves.

Not only can I not access any of my personal stuff, but the kitchen is not fully operational yet because all the contents of the utility room have been cluttering the place up, preventing me from getting to my food cupboard (not that there’s much in there yet!). Today, after Andy finished some more work in the utility room, I was able to put the cleaning stuff in the cupboard under the sink, and put my first load of washing on this evening. Everywhere I look, there are things I want to do, but am prevented from doing so by ongoing work, or waiting for certain things to happen. It’s very frustrating, and I can’t even use the time to get Mum’s annexe sorted because there’s so much of our stuff in there, and I’m camping out in there too.

The sitting room is my only refuge really! It’s cluttered with some remaining boxes, and the fact that my original furniture layout clearly isn’t going to work, but until the hall is clear of understairs cupboard stuff, I can’t move the table from the sitting room to the hall, and until that’s gone, I can’t move the second armchair into the bay window. It’s like one of those little puzzles where you have to move the squares around, with only one space, to create a picture.

Amidst all this chaos, we have two very confused kitties who are having to spend a lot of time in my hubby’s bathroom. We are letting them have the run of the house during the time the builders aren’t around – we can’t risk them letting them out into the garden, especially as my hubby can’t kitty-proof the perimeter until the garage is secure. They were very confused and clearly upset on the first night, but they seem fairly content in the house now – it’s amazing how quickly they settle. However, we’ve been having problems getting Phoebe to use the litter tray and not anything else she takes a fancy to – I am determined that we don’t get into the pattern we had before, where she peed on the landing carpet at the first sign of stress… When we let them out, they are very clingy with us, and full of affection and purrs. Today Phoebe was playing, which is a good sign that she’s more settled, and of course Beatrice is enjoying doing what she does best – being nosey.

Anyway, to practical things – the building work is progressing well. Here are some pictures from the past few days, starting with the bathroom.

Paul has now more or less completed the tiling in the main part of the bathroom.

Here he is constructing the counter. On the right, between the window and the arch, my counter-top basin will be installed, and the bathroom cabinet mounted on the wall above. You can see the electrics installed ready for it. Under the rest of the counter will be some shelves for storage.

In the next picture you can see the basin placed in position, and progress being made, tiling around the arch. Paul has decided to tile up to a tiling bead about 4 inches in from the edge of the arch, which will make a nice feature, and solve the problem of what to do with the cut edges of the tiles.

The counter is looking great now that Paul has tiled it, and along its front edge. That’s as far as we’ve got with the bathroom to date.

Moving on to the utility room, Andy has been busy. He has installed the new sink. Before he went on holiday he was pretty fed up with B&Q because they didn’t have the smaller sized base unit in stock, despite it being a stock item, and on his return from holiday he was really annoyed with them because they still hadn’t got it in! In the end he bought one elsewhere, and the sink is now in, and working – in this picture it’s still got its green protective film.

He has installed some units in the back passage, which is really part of the utility room, through the arch. There is a wall unit, and underneath, two wall units mounted as floor units – he needed to keep them shallow to allow access, and this was an ideal solution.

Here is the base unit as it stands today, with its worktop. It doesn’t show terribly well in this photo (the space is pretty confined and it’s hard to get good photos) but the work top extends to the left of the unit, up to the boxed in pipe-work to the left, giving a bit more space and a corner for storing something or other!

To the left of the boiler, under the electricity fuse board, he has installed another 400 mm door to match (it now has a handle) to cover the electricity meter and various other rather unsightly bits and pieces. There is no bottom to it – it is hinged onto a piece of wood mounted inside, and the hinges are self-closing so it does not need a magnetic catch to keep it closed. To the left, you can see the bi-fold doors installed in front of the airing cupboard.

In addition to fitting the units and finishing the worktops etc., Andy also completed the airing cupboard today. In the next picture you can see him completing the construction of the first slatted shelf.

Here it is, installed in the airing cupboard. You can see the supports on the right for further shelves. Beyond them is a gap, into which he will install a hanging rail at the top, to enable me to air things on hangers rather than folding them onto the shelves. The construction of the shelves in our airing cupboard in the old house enabled me to do this, and I refined the design by asking Andy to install a short length of wardrobe hanging rail which I found lying about, complete with its fittings.

Andy has done something very clever which I would never have thought of – he has made each slatted shelf so that it is removable – “in case,” as he said, “You want to wash the elephant – you will need room to air him.” How thoughtful!

The next job was to assemble and suspend the airer in the back passage. Here is Andy, with Chris looking on, wrestling with the airer, installing the slats into the cast iron mountings.

He and Chris had a long discussion about how to pass the ropes through the pulleys in order to hang it correctly. The airer came complete with instructions but unfortunately (like many other things) the instructions seem to have disappeared, and they were trying to work out how best to do it. This morning Andy was very shamefaced and said he’d found them, but wasn’t prepared at first to admit where – in his lunch bag “for safe keeping”! Paul said, “You prune!”

However, the instructions were no use at all. This is what that particular part looked like…

Somewhat less useful than a chocolate teapot. I am going to send a picture of this to the supplier and suggest they make some better copies of the instructions!

The airer finally installed. There is a double rope at the left hand end with which to pull it up, and a cleat to wind the excess around. I shall be trying it out as soon as my first washing machine load is completed. I have always wanted one of these old-fashioned airers as I’ve always loved them, and they work so well. Pulled right up to the ceiling, the washing shouldn’t impede progress along the back passage too much, I don’t think.

Finally, this is the state of the garage now. Here is Chris installing the lining panels over the silver insulation material. This is space-age technology – extremely efficient insulation, and we were teasing Chris and saying we thought he was making himself a space suit when he was cutting some rather curiously shaped pieces! This material will make my hubby’s man cave extremely comfortable summer and winter. It lines the roof too.

I will try and compose further posts over the next few days with more photos, and hopefully I shall be back online by midweek next week.