So it's goodbye for the summer

This blog is coming to it's natural end.

Summer is here, I have a dog to exercise, a garden to do, an enormous dog hair covered house to hoover and dust and an older daughter that hogs the computer.

I won't be here for a while.

But it's been fun, this blog.

Bye everyone.

xxx

The British Summer

We have been teaching our dog useless but diverting tricks.




Today Alice, a friend (Georgie) and I went for the windiest and muddiest picnic along the river. We took our crabnets but the tide was out so we collected jellyfish!

Upside down

Hello!

I only have access to this laptop and that's if I fight my way over boxes and piles of 'spong'. A word that has become commonplace in this house now. (Thanks Lettie)

It's amazing the amount of 'spong' one carries around. Bowls of 'crap' were emptied into boxes and now sit there in our new house with no proper home to go to. Should I just empty everything into the bin? Would I miss it all?

The camera is temporarily lost under 'stuff' so I can't take any photos of our chaos. I feel almost snowed under by the amount of stuff that needs sorting out, on top of going to work, sorting out the kids and walking the damn dog (who is ruining all my plants by walking along the back of the borders and knocking down stuff). Sigh. The only thing keeping me going right now is the thought that next week the school holidays start and that means I don't have to go to work for SIX WEEKS and ONE DAY! Oh joy.

I haven't even thought of our 'upcoming' holiday to Spain in two weeks. Last night in the wee small hours Andy nudged me awake and said 'When do we have to pay the balance on our holiday?' I do not appreciate being woken up to answer Andy's night fears! The other night he woke me up when I was really deeply asleep to say he couldn't find his mobile phone and could I ring it with my phone - I was in deep slumber and made me get up to find my own phone to ring his bloody phone! The poor guy is suffering from anxiety - I think it's only a matter of time before he drops with exhaustion. He spent all evening, and I mean all evening, in the shower cleaning off all the black gungy crap that the previous owners left us with. We didn't see him until after 10pm. He had a small sit down and then bed!

Anyway, our bedroom is nearly finished (tomorrow hopefully), Holly's room will get new carpet tomorrow so we can move her up into it. Alice's room is finished and she's in it surrounded by 'spong'. So we should be able to take our clothes out of boxes at the weekend.

Well, that's it. Day off today - back down to Ikea to find those elusive shelf thingies.

Saturday and there' no let up! (I'm not complaining)

My day off on Thursday didn't finish until after ten if you know what I mean. I had to go down to Blue Water (John Lewis) in a near fruitless search for curtain material and blinds. After that I went to Lakeside to Habitat and Ikea. I think they liked me in Habitat because I went in and bought the shop (nearly). I like spending money but the way I'm spending it at the moment is making it difficult to sleep at night!

After that I went to Ikea - how civilised that they don't close until 10pm - it was quiet (for once). Have you ever, ever known a relaxing browse in Ikea - a relaxing browse - that's an oxymoron if I ever heard one. Well, it was relaxing apart from the fact that I was becoming more and more anxious about the time I'd been out and really should be getting back to my family. Anyway, I chose what I needed - two white table tops and four leg things (with shelves in to go under for the girls' desks), and two lovely white wall shelves for Alice's room. I get to the warehouse bit to make my choice. Did they have any of that in the warehouse? Did they buggery! What a waste of f**king time! (say in Catherine Tate old lady voice).

Anyway, got home and unloaded the Habitat shopping (the rest comes on a lorry next week!) into the new house. Kevin, my brother in law (that' s Richard Stilgoe to Pod) had been round with his chainsaw and trailer and applied the 'scorched earth' technique to the front garden! Oh dear. Remedial work is necessary to make it look less like the aftermath of a nuclear attack.

I have to go up to the house this morning (at 8.30) to let the plasterer in, the decorator in, and the floor man, who has now varnished all the floors and is finishing today. I will take my camera up.

Bye for now, more later!

Blogger won't let me move my photos so scroll down for text!

The new fireplace in the 'front room'.

The new fireplace going in.

I just had to put my plants in!

New fireplace in back room - note the painted floor! That'll be gone today.

Better pic of new fireplace.

These were the sort of people who painted their floor AROUND the rug! WTF!

Once again, Rambler makes her mark!

Back view...that tree on the right'll be gone today.

The back bit of the kitchen after the floor sander had sanded off the tribal rugs! It looks much better already!

The tree that's going and blocking all the sun (sorry, rain clouds).

Rather overgrown dontcha think? Brother in law coming round with trailer and chainsaw in next few days!

Can you see our house under all that undergrowth?

Note to Self: Never get a new house when you have PMT!

We got news in the morning that we had completed, the house was ours and that the keys were with their solicitors.

At lunchtime I went to the solicitors to be told all they were all at lunch and the secretary was on her own and didn't know anything about any keys. I had to go back after 3.30pm when they had finally been located.

Anyway, got myself into the house past the full skip they had left, overflowing with rubbish and mattresses and office chairs and 'spong' and into the house. My god, they had left it filthy with a note saying how the tenants should have cleaned it before they left but hadn't, they hadn't had time to clean it and so, basically, tough shit. I was so mad (and had PMT) I just couldn't be happy/elated/relieved that we had finally got a house.

The next day, yesterday, much much better. (Auntie Martha arrived, as my friend Elen would say, (hi Elen)) and I was feeling more positive. Not only that, the fireplaces went in as planned and the floor sander is on the job!

Today, the tree surgeon is coming in to cut down the big tree at the side (see picture) which should allow much more light into the place. Also, the decorators are coming.

Here are some pics I took earlier. Note that all the floors were painted with 'tribal' rugs painted on! It was nice to see them go!

Today's the Day!!!!!

I'm off to work today so won't see the NEW HOUSE until 4pm!!! (That's if we get the bloody keys). I'm going to load up the boot of my car with plants before work today in readiness. It's going to be my first act of moving in!

Still can't quite believe it.

Off to walk the dog. (I think he's eaten something stringy and it's caught in his throat - he keeps making strange hiccuping noises as if he's trying to clear his throat)

One day More

I CANNOT listen to that without crying my eyes out. I just can't control myself when I hear anything from Les Miserables. I don't know if it's because of the memories it has for me or just that the melodies are just so sweet, when they hit that 'sweet' note, tears come.

Recently, I have been to two concerts, both of them Flamenco guitar, singers and dancers. The first was Juan Martin - only one of the best flamenco guitarrists in the world! As soon as he started, and his swarthy singers did the clapping and that very distinctive singing, the tears started streaming. Both concerts, the same. The second was a troupe from Seville who spoke no English and just rambled on in Spanish. I was transported. I took Holly along to try and instill a love of Spanish Flamenco. I did wonder whether she might be too young for this type of music, it might have put her off Flamenco for life, but she loved it! But, how can I stop this crying when I hear music from my past?

When I was sixteen I spent a month on the Costa Del Sol on my own. Well, my parents were somewhere but I didn't see much of them for the whole month. They'd just bought a house there and were busy furnishing it etc and I was busy going down onto the beach and getting brown. A lovely guy asked me 'Tienes fuego?' Luckily for me, I smoked back in them days so I lit his fag and we made friends. He was English but lived in Spain and played the Flamenco guitar for a living every night. There followed a month of hanging out with this guy and all his Spanish friends and his 'troupe'. What a great summer that was. I'll never forget it. For a sixteen year old girl from a village near Swindon, this was Nirvana. Now though Flamenco makes me cry. It's not that I mind getting old, it's not even that nostalgic button being pressed, it's just my subconscious doing something odd.

Anyway, back to Les Miserables, I went to see the first production of this at The Barbican many moons ago with my friend Caroline. We had front row seats, we were so close to the 'action' it was wonderful. At the end we cried so much (it's very sad) that we had to stay in the auditorium until everyone had left because our faces were puce with crying. It was like the floodgates had opened - that cathartic blubbing you do when you just can't stop and if you don't get a grip you'll become hysterical. Ah, yes, that's maybe what it is, hysteria. As I write this I'm crying, I'm not sad, I'm probably stressed, so yes, I'm hysterical. Thank you, I've just analysed myself! What a great thing a blog is.

Well, back to the title of this post. ONE MORE DAY until we become the owners of our new house. The current owners had a party there last night, I drove past on my way back from 'Shrek 3' (not as good as the others) and saw all the lights on and a skip in the drive - I wonder what they are throwing away - I don't mind as long as it's not my plants! Every time I think about tomorrow my stomach does a flip. We still don't know how we are going to get the keys to the place, they are ignoring our emails and the solicitor can't get hold of them either. I'm not too worried about it, we'll get in somehow.

This is a long post and I've just about stopped crying now.