1. I experience wordjoy. Particular favourites include: frond, effervescent, collywobbles, ignite, anthropomorphic, meringue and renege. On the other hand, I also have a list of words that I don’t like. Particularly unjoyful are: lithe, stringy, moist, invaginate and remonstrate
2. I have a love affair with brightly coloured hair, and often yearn to dye my dark brown hair pink (again) … even just a little bit of it.
3. I would love to be one of those superior intellectual readers but the truth is that I enjoy the Famous Five and Harry Potter just as much as proper grown up literature, and if you called me on it, maybe even a little bit more.
4. I’m addicted to decorating and home improvements. The potential and possibilities appeals to the creative in me. Show me a new house I could move straight into and I’ll turn my nose up at it. Show me an ancient, tumbledown old shack that’s going to involve me being on my hands and knees in mucky clothes for months on end and my joy will be uncontained.
5. I am mortally afraid of dried fruit. Phobic. There is simply NOTHING on the face of the planet more hideous. I actually have to leave the room if someone starts eating it in front of me. *shudder*
6. I rule my spending with a rod of iron, because if my naughty ‘I enjoy shopping side’ goes out armed with a credit card, I’d be in a LOT of trouble.
7. I am ever so slightly *cough* addicted to chocolate. I’m pretty sure I get withdrawal symptoms and everything.
8. I LOVE colour and texture. It’s like a new form of language to me: the way that you set and combine different pieces to create different effects. The subtlety, the statement, all the unsaid things, the subconcious effect of colour and texture on your mood, the way you can clash and combine and all of it works. Delicious.
9. I love old films and tv series and am particularly fond of a good whodunnit. Poirot, Miss Marple, Sherlock Holmes …. a surefire good night in
10. I get very bored very quickly, and constantly need new things on the go to excite and fulfil me. This shockingly bad habit of mine has led me to do many insane things that include giving up perfectly good jobs to set up businesses, move across country for no good reason, date ridiculously inappropriate fellas (well, it was interesting at the time) ….
11. I have a really hideous recurring dream that involves being eviscerated by rats in the middle of a kitchen. The odd thing is that the kitchen always changes to reflect wherever I’m living but that seems to have absolutely no effect on the rest of the dream.
12. I love to bake but I don’t do it nearly as much as I’d like to. I somehow imagine that baking makes me a more capable grownup.
13. I can never remember what I’ve done with my keys. Even if they’re in exactly the same place they normally are, I still look straight past them, panic momentarily, run around going ‘omigod, where the hell are my keys’ before finding them exactly where they ought to be. I have now started tying them to my clothes in an attempt to stop losing them. Because, clearly that will work.
14. I have a decidedly contrary character. While I tend to be a big picture person, who can’t be arsed with the finer details of things, if there’s no-one I trust to sort out the details, I become insanely nitpicky to the point that I want to rip my own head off and use it to hit people with.
15. I’m an insufferable romantic. I believe wholeheartedly in love at first sight, and will one day be swept off my feet by a man worthy of me.
16. I think the most beautiful poem ever written is Before the world was made by William Butler Yeats.
17. I like to defy expectations
18. I want a tattoo. Two actually. A star on my wrist and a floral design on my foot. I haven’t worked up the courage for it yet. But I will.
19. I like the feeling sand makes under my feet when I walk barefoot on the beach.
20. I am incapable of walking along a beach without collecting stones, shells and driftwood
21. My first dog was called Rio. He was a vast golden lab that belonged to My Godfather’s son originally. I used to ride him around the garden. Giddyup.
22. I have weirdly double jointed fingers. They scare people.
23. My favourite flowers are roses and daisies. When I have a garden of my own, these flowers will feature strongly
24. I don’t drink. I gave up entirely by accident, and don’t miss it even remotely. Nobody really seems to mind, since it means I’ll happily play designated driver.
25. I really want a goat. Yep – that’s it.

I downloaded the Glee Album last night (I’m an unashamed Gleek. Don’t judge me), and have been playing it incessantly since and is often the way with songs and lyrics, there was one particular song that mentally attached itself to my subconscious and found me identifying hugely with the lyrics: Defying Gravity from the musical Wicked. Strangely enough, it’s not one of the songs I liked the first time I heard it and yet it’s the one that seems to really have stuck in my head.

It has a wonderful line in it that goes like this:

“I’m through accepting limits ’cause someone says they’re so. Some things I cannot change but till I try, I’ll never know”

When you take it out of context, it’s  a sentiment I can really identify with. There are defining moments in our lives. Moments when we come to a crossroads, when our choices don’t necessarily just choose our path but define it and by extension, define us. One of those moments is the one where we choose to follow the established paths and boundaries or forge our own path.

Sometimes, it’s more than a case of pushing against established beliefs and boundaries but about pushing the limits of your mind. It’s defying the parts of your mind that tell you that it’s not reasonable or rational to want what you do and finding a way to make it real. It’s stepping away from playing it safe and finding and following the deepest desires of your heart, no matter how mad or strange or nonsensical they are. It’s letting go of the fears that hold you where you are. The fears that you’re not clever enough, pretty enough, determined enough, loveable enough to get what you want and saying to hell with it and doing it anyway.

Lauren from A Typical Atypical did exactly this in starting Basse Mode, just as Kasia did in starting HumAnima and more people I know are doing their thing of pushing accepted limits and creating  new perspectives that are beautiful, new and awe-inspiring in their boldness and truth. In thinking back at the people I have admired in my life, they are all people who’ve defied limitations, who’ve found new approaches to things we take for granted, people who challenge perceptions and defy the judgement of others to do something they believe in, who’ve known what they wanted and refused to let circumstances define their success or failure.

To borrow one of my favourite quotes (Thanks, Walt Disney) … If you can dream it, you can do it …

As I’ve begun stepping away from the parts of my mind that hold me back, good things have begun to happen. Taken me entirely by surprise, and snowballed and given me a sense of adventure about life once again. I find sponteneity resurfacing in my decisions and a willingness to take risks, because, let’s face it, what’s the worst that can happen?It’s a time for personal transformation, a time to evolve from a catapillar to a butterfly

There is a time for listening to your heart and a time for listening to your head. I might not be marching to the sound of my own drum but I am marching to the sound of my own heartbeat. I might not know where I’m marching to but I have that tingly feeling that precedes an adventure …

You know when you sign up to some social networking site or other, your facebook, or twitter or whatever and it has the inevitable box telling you to describe yourself. It’s so completely impossible to condense yourself down to a couple of sentences, or a short paragraph; to find a phrase that adequately sums you up, that’s witty or clever or quirky, that really goes some way to encapsulating who you really are. You go through a mini existential crisis and personality assessment, which is how, I ended up with:

“Nomadic, hippy, hobgoblin with a penchant for sweets”

It all starts with the question “who am I?”. What an essentially simple question. Who the hell knows but it’s a more of a question of what’s inside you, rather than a question about what you do. What drives you to be who you are and act as you do. Because nine times out of ten, who you are drives you to do what you do (Well, maybe save the nature vs nurture debate for another time, hey?)

I’d love to be the woman who stays in one place, and makes a home and a life and STAYS there, and I’m not. When I was younger, I thought my habit of moving around, leaping from one job to another, one home to another, one town to another were just a symptom of being dissatisfied with what I was doing. Maybe it was, and maybe it still is but moving around seems to be part of me. I rarely stay anywhere for more than a year before I get itchy feet and want something new and different. I like to be in different places, meeting different people, seeing different towns, different atmospheres. I’ve lived in all sorts of places: Born in South Africa and moved to the UK as a child. I’ve lived in London, Oxfordshire, West Yorks, Tyne & Wear and now Somerset and visited yet more. I enjoy travelling, the journey, the sensation of leaving, transition and arriving. It’s never stagnant, just a series of moments, like photographic snapshots hung on a washing line.

At a guess, anyone that knows me would happily describe me as quirky (often for want of a better word) or a bit of a hippy at heart. You physically have to pour me into a suit and ‘corporate wear’ is my idea of effective modern day torture. I don’t fit in with business culture, and I’d rather be outside in the fields, or woods or wandering by the sea. If I can get away with wandering around barefoot, I’ll happily toss my shoes to the wind. I have a habit of collecting driftwood and pebbles from the beach and regard them as a greater art than any you could make or buy.

A friend of mine, a number of years ago described me, on separate occasions, as both ‘stumpy’ and a ‘hobbit’. He’s quite a charming that way. It was kind of on account of my being short and curvy, with an intense love of mealtimes and a slightly ethereal sense of the day-to-day. When I was a student and just venturing into the world of Shakespeare, I stumbled across A Midsummer Night’s Dream and simply fell in love with Puck. Far more than any of the other characters, I totally identified with him. He’s mischevious and amuses himself for the sake of fun and nothing more. He sits squarely between the crassness of the mortals and the saccharine sweetness of the other fairies. He’s odd looking, unglamorous and doesn’t quite fit in. He’s capricious, clever and a walking contradiction.

… And penchant for sweets is fairly self evident, and a sweet tooth would desperately understate the matter. Much like a hobbit, I do love my food. I’d be happy with a life that involved a first and second breakfast, elevenses, lunch, high tea, dinner AND supper. God. Heavenly. Just enough meals to fit in all the wonderful flavours and textures I LOVE to eat. Just think of the variety…

So, if YOU had to sum yourself up in a sentence, what would it be?

The studio had suggested wearing and bringing along props that were reflective of your personality and interests. So as I was dragging on my clothes this morning, I automatically reached for a pair of odd socks (can you say that?) for good luck and that got me thinking of the small, almost unconscious, things that we do that make unique in ways we don’t even notice.

My odd sock habit has its depths in my University days, when I would catch the bus in to lectures when the weather was grim and I didn’t fancy a four mile hike in the rain. The bus stop was a five minute walk away across a field, and the buses were often double deckers or bendy buses that jammed us together like sardines. At any rate, I had a spate of bad luck on the buses in my first year, when I consistently fell down, got pushed over or some other calamity (see reasons why I hate buses, many of these ocurred during that fortnight) would befall me whenever I was on a bus. It lasted about 2 weeks, and at the end of the fortnight, I had bruises on bruises and could cheerfully have done without seeing a bus ever again. I was, in fact, on the verge of turning in my bus pass completely.

One fine day, I overslept and when I woke up and realised the time, I grabbed whatever clothes were to hand (I must have made a fine sight!) and threw them on including a pair of odd socks and headed for the bus stop and found, to my undisguised delight, that I had not only an uneventful journey but that I made my lecture with minutes to spare. I could only put this unlikely ocurrance down to the odd socks (or blind luck) and ever since, if I’ve felt the need for a little extra luck, I’ve worn mismatched socks. (Clearly I should have remembered to do that on evil, everything sucks Tuesday, shouldn’t I?)

What quirky habits do you have?

I had a rough few weeks a couple of weeks ago, and I’ve been feeling a little sorry for myself on and off ever since. Self-pity just isn’t my bag. Like flourescent yellow, it just doesn’t suit me. Some things I wanted didn’t turn out how I hoped and because I really DID want them, I grumped about it. ‘I want’ piled on top of ‘I want’ and the wants got drowned in the ‘you can’t always have what you wants’. Life became an emotional laundry hamper, and I was all set for a turn through the wringer… until I woke up.

The wake up call was a couple of friends who were going through respective tough times, and it made me realise that whatever was going on in my life, I only had to look back a couple of years to see how far things had come for me. Financially, emotionally, spiritually. It had all changed, and for the better. Myself of three years ago was a shadow of who I am now, and an even fainter imprint of the me I will be in a couple more years.

I’ve regained much of the strength I had and lost. The strength that is perhaps still missing has been patched with courage, and perhaps holds stronger as a result. I once again have faith, and hope. I have belief, in MYSELF where once I had none and my patience and tolerance grow incrementally every day. Slowly I am finding my voice. Sometimes it’s more raucous and louder than I mean it to be, and sometimes when inside my head is screaming for a witty riposte, my voice is less than the quietest whisper, but somewhere in the Universe I’m finding my place.

There was a time in my life, where I was the eccentric one. I wandered about with flowers in my hair and cameras in my hands and little else seemed to matter. I turned up to parties in bare feet. I wandered streets at night because they were different then and I needed to SEE. But my inner and outer selves didn’t mesh. I was a walking example of Cartier Bresson when he called artists liars by omission. My life was a lie of omission because what I was on the inside wasn’t what sat on the outside. My exterior was creative, interesting and eccentric but it didn’t begin to express the complexities that sat under the surface, waiting for a voice.

For a period, at my lowest ebb, I denied those complexities not only their voice but their existence. I was told that I couldn’t be that person and for a while I tried to forget that person I’d been and those things I’d felt and known so deeply that they were a part of me. But I couldn’t always deny them and sooner or later they would surface again and needle at me until one day early on last year, I made a conscious choice to express the elements of me that had lain so far under the surface, and to have faith in myself and my direction in life. I’m now a qualified Reiki Practitioner and I practice all the time. I’ve never had so much fun and being able to express myself in a new way is a constant surprise and delight to me. I speak about experiences and emotions I would never have touched on before. I’m not afraid to try things that are a little unusual.

My current profession, with all it’s irritations and frustrations has also been an eye opening experience for me. It has opened me to people who believe all sorts of things with varying degrees of vehemence and cynicism. It has given me time and space to realise that my own perceptions are not so far removed from reality as I feared and I have learnt to speak of them in a way that is approachable and balanced. Slowly as a child building a vocabulary for the first time, I am building my own vocabulary and learning to speak without fear of mockery but with confidence, assurance and faith in myself.

Last week, I was looking at my life and wondering why things never seemed to go my way, but when I look back and see how far I’ve come, I have to admit that my life is pretty damned amazing right now. No, it’s not perfect. I don’t have much money and I’d rather be working for myself doing something jaw-dropping but all in all it’s good. It’s somewhere I can be happy and something I can build from to make my dreams, gigantic as they are, a reality. There is magic in the air and beginnings sit like a fizzing taste on my tongue. I wonder what this year will really bring?

Image borrowed from here

Sometimes, right out of the blue, something happens that forces you to open your eyes to yourself, and when that happens, sometimes what you see isn’t what you’d like it to be … and sometimes that hits you like a fist in the solar plexus. It’s not a good feeling.

Yesterday I got sucker-punched by the Universe (and by Christ, it packs a punch, I can tell you!) which reminded me that sometimes, I really suck as a friend. Oh sure, I remember birthdays, I turn up when we hook up as much as I can. I offer a listening ear and occasionally, when asked, a bit of advice. But there are times when a friend has to be more than that. Sometimes a real friend looks behind the calls and texts that go unanswered and instead of assuming that  you’re busy, follows hunches and connects the dots, knows that you’re not as ok as you claim and stands up and calls you on it. And that’s what I forgot to do.

I got blindsided by my own worries and troubles and forgot to look out at my friends and see how they were doing. I became blinkered inside my own head and left my friends to fight their own battles, without picking up the phone and BEING there. It doesn’t take much, it’s a small thing to pick up a phone and let a friend know that you’re there and you care, and sometimes it’s the smallest of things that make the biggest difference.

We all have our highs and we all have our rough patches, it’s life and we deal with it but sometimes the highs are exceptionally high and sometimes the lows are so low that they almost require a new word and those are the times we most need a friend … to hold out a hand, to give us a hug, to just BE there.

It doesn’t matter how we make them but those connections are what make our lives, rich, fulfilled and wholesome, regardless of whether those connections are friends, family or lovers. They brighten our days, inspire us, support us, define us and occasionally frustrate the bloody hell out of us but for all their intangibility, they are the most REAL things we possess and we owe it to ourselves and each other to remember that and to put our friendships ahead of all those other distractions we indulge ourselves in, because one day long after our jobs are a distant memory, our friendships will remain and our memories of them will be more precious than any amount of money could buy.

LinkedIn enables me to share my professional history and achievements with past colleagues and associates, and enables me to help people connect with others that may be of use to them in a professional sense. I consider it a valuable professional resource.

My Blogs and Myspace accounts are places for my thoughts and creative outlets. They aren’t exactly a medium where I interact with my friends, although I often do but often allow me to share my thoughts with an online world that has often provided me with inspiration, whether it be in a creative, spiritual, emotional or physical sense. I am often careful what I say on my blogs as I am fully aware of the implications of leaking intimate details of my private life all over the web.

Facebook is for me a fun medium where I can connect with my real-life friends and interact with those I don’t get to see enough of. But it is for FRIENDS. It is not a professional network for me, and I am intensely careful who I add as a friend on Facebook. My privacy settings are very high and as a general rule, I find other people rather than them finding me.

I don’t add people I met fleetingly once several years ago, or people who want to know me as a friend of a friend. I regularly skim through my facebook friends and trim out the people I don’t consider friends, which is why it astonishes me when someone I have clearly not added as a friend or have previously removed tries to friend request me again. Perhaps they think it might have been a technical error, or perhaps that I don’t remember them and that bombarding me with friend requests will remind me of all the reasons why I really want to have them as a friend in my life. Maybe they realise that my answer to their request was DENIED and just think I’m wrong.

Whatever your reasoning, just stop and think before you hit the button. Once you do, there may be no going back.

I’ve had an inspirational couple of weeks that I can’t really talk about for legal reasons, but that involve me following and hoping to fulfil a long term dream of mine. I don’t know if it will come off, but what has happened so far gives me a great deal of hope, confidence and impetus that I was lacking and that in itself is cause for a big, face cracking smile.

It got me thinking about the different sorts of friends I have in my life and how each of them fulfils a function or a role in my life to make it a brighter and happier place to be. Some comfort and support, some crack jokes so inappropriately that it makes me grin despite myself, some inspire, some create, some guide and assist and some listen. But each and every one of them have faith in me to achieve my dreams and to be the best person I can be.They don’t doubt, criticise or pick away at my confidence. They might joke and tease and call me a hippy they’re genuine friends I admire and trust. So to all of you, for making my life a great place to be, thank you.

Conker championships

Now, I must goand undertake my domestic chores for the day so that I can go out tonight to celebrate the autumnal season by joining in the Conker Championships at Wedmore (No Health & Safety spoilsports to be had in these here parts!). Oh yes, and for our American friends and those who had such a sheltered upbringing never to have pataken in the game, Conkers are prepared by drilling a hole through the centre of the conker and threading it on to a lace. Various techniques are employed for hardening your conker such as soaking in vinegar or salted water, although the effectiveness of these techniques is debatable. Once prepared, you and your opponement take turns in hitting each other’s conkers with your own until one breaks, leaving the other the victor. I doubt I’ll ever beat my seven-er from 1989 though.

Love and fallen leaves…

I’ve been quite bad about updating this blog, haven’t I? SO much to do, and I’ve spent the last couple of days just feeling incredibly drained and tired. I don’t know why, I haven’t really been pushing myself too hard of late but there you go.

So things are cracking on at the cottage. The kitchen arrived last Thursday, which could only be described as a massive relief. Originally, the kitchen company told me that the kitchen would come flatpacked, one of their guys would assemble it and then my chap could fit it. What they meant to say was that they’re a lying bunch of toerags, who you wouldn’t want to leave your Grandmother with, who would try to screw me over the minute they laid eyes on me. Bad luck for them that they didn’t know who they were dealing with *wry grin*. So this leaves us with a set of flat packed boxes, no instructions and a customer helpline that would be better run by a group of mentally deficient pigeons. My builder and his good lady, being the good people that they are, take a deep breath and tell me not to worry, they can deal with it, not a problem at all. (Here’s a pic of the dynamic duo in progress)

So, on they go, assembling units, oiling my worktops and so on until we realise that the kitchen designer (who most definitely needs psychiatric attention) has not ordered any drawer handles but instead used the door handles for both, which would have been fine IF they were multi-purpose handles, which they clearly are not. So I ring up the mentally deficient customer care line to be told that we cannot do a straight swap, I have to pay for the new ones (and bankrupt myself in the process) and then post the others back before being refunded. So … slowly now so that we can all understand … I am paying because their designer messed up. Yes, it makes perfect sense to me too.

However, my bookshelves arrived on Friday evening – A day early! I thnk I might have frightened the poor chap with my rant about poor customer service and how customers shouldn’t have to pay the price for their incompetence. I dare say I might have gone off the deep end a bit, but I’m not in the slightest apologetic about it. If you take someone’s money to provide goods or services then they should get what they ordered in good condition within the timeframe specified. In basic language – don’t make promises you can’t keep! But anyway …

They arrived, and the delivery chaps were the same two lovely chaps who delivered my bedroom furniture (pictures to follow once the final piece arrives…), veyr pleasant young Irish chaps in their mid-twenties, who were the epitome of ‘amenable’. God bless them. and found that they look spectacular in place, and fit like a glove and I couldn’t be happier with them. So here come some photos of the living room with the lovely bookshelves.

It sounds ridiculous really, but I feel so much better with the bookshelves up and the books out of boxes. It really makes a difference and the place starts to feel a lot more like home, instantly. It has been suggested before that I could be addicted to books. There is a strong possibility it could be true. I love stories, no matter whether they’re old stories, new stories, poems, songs, they’re all stories in their own way. In the same way that we’re all stories in our own ways, and we use these stories as a way of connecting with one another … weaving ourselves into each other’s lives and sharing our thoughts, and dreams and opinions. So I suppose you could say that they’re almost like old friends, that you can connect with any time you like, and it DOES make me feel better, seeing them there.

So, feeling a bit inspired at the weekend, I decided to do something with the bits of driftwood I picked up in the US when I went to see my friend Dragonboy and figured that since I could use somewhere to store various bits of jewellery, I could perhaps get started by creating somewhere to store my necklackes … so here’s what I came up with:

Right, now I must away as I just sliced open my finger when I went to make a cup of tea. Long story but drawer got stuck and I sliced my hand open trying to open it. Now I’m dripping blood. I CANNOT wait for my new kitchen!!

In a slightly more pain free and altogether brighter state of mind, I’m happy to bring you all up to date with the happenings at the cottage

The bathroom is nearly finished. The plasterers are in there at the moment covering up a few holes caused by ripping out some outdated boxing, and then all that’s left is to create the tongue and groove panelling that’s going to box in the pipes, replace the current light with a waterproof light and extractor fan and get to grips with the painting, which is not especially difficult or a lot to do. Here are some pics of it before the final finish:

The bath, with tiled splashback (the bath is the size of a small pool and just wonderful…)

A slightly more closeup view of the bath and tiling

I do wonder sometimes if getting this excited about bath tiles and paint is slightly tragic. Either the fumes are going to my head or I need to get out a bit more. Perhaps both

The plasterers have been at work in the kitchen as well as the bathroom (and still are) and here are some photos of them at work. Lovely chaps the both of them, while Martin and Sue, my lovely builders have been insulating the loft and getting the first section of kitchen tiles in and ready for the kitchen to arrive any minute now. Hopefully, providing they haven’t messed up again (fingers crossed) so here are some pics of what’s happening now:

On a not so cheery-making note, the company who’s supplying my furniture ‘forgot’ to make my bookcases so they’re a week late and the kitchen company apparently had no record on their system that they were supposed to be delivering tomorrow, and have had to delay until Thursday AND the guy who was supposed to be replacing the boiler apparently didn’t get my acceptance email and now can’t do anything until the end of the month.

I find it ASTONISHING. Is bad customer service par for the course these days or is this just bad luck? Clearly a delayed Friday 13th effect. Humph.

“Minimalism is a kind of emotional bankruptcy … a refuge for those who do not understand the grammar of ornamentation and the symbolism of colour”

Wherever you are in the world right now: Mark Wilkinson, I take my hat off to you.

At a time when I am making these decisions, defining my space and creating my home, I naturally found that I resonated with this. I am the sort of person that doesn’t want to come home to clean lines and minimalist perfection, where I have to take my shoes off at the door. I want to come home to a place that says “Bloody good to see you love, kick off your shoes and have a cuppa”.

I want a house that doesn’t mind if there’s the odd pile of books piled higgledy piggledy on the coffee table, or that the dog thundered in the door with muddy paws but is more concerned with whether you can sit down for a cup of tea. Where it doesn’t matter if all of the seats match as long as they work together, are fun and you enjoy them. My home doesn’t have to be perfect, in fact, I think a large part of its charm is that it ISN’T perfect but it’s comfortable.

I was chatting to my builder and his wife today as they were having their lunch (post demolition of half a wall) and I seem to somehow be coming to the conclusion that I’m not a keep everything varying shades of cream sort of person. I’m not sure I could afford to be with two dogs that like to go romping in muddy puddles before careering into the house, muddy paws and all, and even without the dogs, I’m far too messy and clumsy for it. I’d be petrified of spillages, which are an inevitable part of my life. Even now, I’m courting disaster by perching a cup of tea on the arm of my brand new sofa as I type. Does that stop me? No, of course not.

And so it leads me to inevitable thoughts of colour schemes and paint. I am excited by colour. It’s articulate. It speaks where I don’t, in its subtlety and boldness. And there’s so much choice I barely know which way to turn. Do I keep the walls plain and rely on accessories and furniture for colour or go a bit wild? Decisions, decisions.

In the meantime, the bathroom is now fully functional and tiled (despite the wonky walls) and is just awaiting the shower door and bath panel, and for the pipes to be boxed in and that’s that sorted. Even more excitingly, demolition has begun, and you just wouldn’t credit how much bigger the place looks and feels with half the wall down. Photos to follow shortly.

Toodle pip.

My kitchen table and chairs arrived the other week. That is to say, being strictly accurate, that my table arrived, along with some sticks of wood. The chap who sold it to me doesn’t seem even vaguely interested in sorting it out (I feel like I ought to be suprised, but somehow, I’m not) so in the meantime I picked up a few lovely kitchen stools at the Wells trading post for a mere £8 each and painted them aquamarine, which you can see below.

I’ve also been busy, putting up mirrors and generally picking up lovely bargains and digging things out of boxes and hanging them on walls. Lots of fun, especially when I end up covered in paint. There is something about being covered in paint that irrevocably takes you back to childhood …

An old picture frame I painted aquamarine and framed a very good friend of mine’s art

The rather sweet rocking chair I picked up at the Trading Post. Eventually, it’s going to go in the bathroom

A slightly fabulous find, again from the trading post. It’s a vintage 40′s cabinet and the colours go perfectly with my colour scheme.

This used to be a really dull old corkboard. I think the fruity fabric really livens it up – it looks so cute, I almost don’t want to hang anything on it!

I got this mirror from ebay from a guy who does this sort of work down in Cornwall. It looks great in the evening with the candles balanced on the sticking out bits and the flames reflected in the mirror

This is my bedroom mantelpiece, with the lovely mirror that my sister got me hanging on the wall, and some of my favourite photos in the frames she got me on the mantel. Awe

The bathroom suite has now been mastic-ed in place and has been drying over the weekend so here are some photos of how it looks at the moment – not painted, tiled or decorated yet but there’s plenty of time…

Tuesday and Wednesday were caught up with the bathroom floorboards. As I mentioned last time, we discovered the original boards under the carpet in the bathroom and thought cheerfully ‘oh what-ho, original floorboards, won’t they be teriffic?’ HA! A bit of thumping and heaving up floorboards to access pipes and we discover that actually quite a few of them aren’t actually safe because of an old woodworm infestion (thankfully no longer) so with a bit of ingenious sawing and shoving, the wonderful builder and his good lady have managed to salvage enough boards for the floor and will put the bath on hidden moisture-proof chipboard so we’ll all be happy.

Of course, that wasn’t the end of it. Because of the worm holes, it made the sanding of the wood far more difficult than you would credit and they’ve spent the last couple of days sorting that out, and oiling and waxing the boards – for preservation and strength. Hopefully the last coat tomorrow and then they can start the bathroom installation. Goody!

Naturally, today’s house improvement installation has been equally dramatic. I would have expected nothing less. Today, we drilled a hole through from the study through the outside wall to accomodate the soil pipe from the bathroom next door (relatively smooth) and then the lovely builder started digging holes in the courtyard for something to do with the drains – and uncovered a drain that had been covered over with paving slabs that nobody knew was there, which has slightly thrown a spanner in the works. So we’re waiting on a chap from building control tomorrow to come and advise on what to do, and until then everything has ground to a halt. So here are some photos of the disarray.

The living room & entrance to the house has turned into an obstacle course. What fun – you should see the state of us when someone knocks on the door

This is the floor in the (soon to be) bathroom as it was being sanded. What a difference, eh?

This is where the the bath’s going to go. Sadly no floorboards here but better that than several tons of bath falling through the floor!

The good news is that we’ve discovered original floorboards under the (soon to be) bathroom, so the carpet’s getting ripped up and we’re going to treat them. I’m so pleased as I’ve always loved original floorboardsand hoped that I’d be able to have them, and now I can

And here are some photos of the bathroom after a bit of labour ….

Tomorrow, they’re removing the extractor fan vents from the downstairs bathroom, replacing the tiles on the roof from where the vent exits, doing all the underfloor plumbing for the bathroom, replacing the floorboards, sanding them down and treating them.

Oh isn’t it exciting?

Well, I was in a job I hated, in a house I didn’t want to live in, in a small village where many of the people were somewhat less than friendly. My friends were scattered far and wide around the country, and indeed, the globe and there was nothing much pulling me anywhere, apart from instinct. Whispers inside me that said … ‘go on, try it, see if you can be happy there’. Lord knows I’d tried a lot of other places and so why not? I dragged myself from place to place, waiting for somewhere that felt right. I stepped into Wells and found it. Perhaps it was nothing more than instinct, and perhaps it was destiny that called me here. I don’t know. All I do know is the moment I stepped out of the car and into the house, it felt like home and where I had to be. I gave up the job and everything that went with it and moved.

There are people, I suppose, who would look at this from a distance and say ‘well she’s just running away’. Perhaps so, but it depends very much on what you’re running away from. I wasn’t running from myself or my own unhappiness but from a life that didn’t suit me. I was running towards my dream, towards a home, towards a future. And to my mind, there is precious little wrong with that. What’s wrong with risking a little to chase a dream? New jobs can be found and friends can be made if there are like minds about.

And I suppose it leads us to the fact that I am sitting in my living room on a Sunday morning, on my new sofa, with a bath propped up angainst one wall, over 25 square metres of tiles along another, a massive box of fabric that a lady down the road gave me. There are carboard boxes everywhere and newspaper spread out over the floor to protect the carpet from the attentions of my poorly new dog who has kennel cough. I still don’t have any work, but I’m working on some promotional stuff and crossing my fingers. I still don’t have a cooker but somehow it seems not to matter overall. Somehow, I’ve never been happier.

So, here’s to chasing your dreams … and long may it continue.
xx

PS – Builders start tomorrow. I am soooooo excited

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