a brief hiatus….

…mostly due to this….

Our house move is taking a little longer than we anticipated, mostly due to the rental agent refusing to fix absolutely anything, a brief meeting with our landlords, and the green light to do ‘whatever we want’. Some people consider spending money on a rental property a complete waste, but we intend to be here for a looooong time – and why wouldn’t I want to make our home right for us? So the Husband has been despatched to paint everything white, there’s been new carpets, new floor tiles, a re-sealed bath, ripping out shoddy cupboards and rather a lot of digging in the garden. The last tenants were, shall we say, not the homely type – as soon as the DIY is finished, I’ll be donning the rubber gloves and getting happy with the cleaning fluid as well.

We’ve been staying with my parents, which has been lovely (we get on wonderfully, anyone who knows me knows how close I am to my lovely Mum), but also means that we’ve hardly seen the Husband, as he spends all his time either at work or wielding a paintbrush. It’s been massively frustrating not to be able to a) get onto the internet (my parents are techno-phobes, and live in an internet black-hole) and b) not be able to join in with the DIY and painting due to having two mini-Owls to look after. I’ve had a couple of hours digging in the garden, preparing the soil for planting (have I left it too late? I must consult my Alys Fowler gardening bible) and wondering why anyone would plant a fir tree in a metre square flower bed, but I’m practically chewing my own arm off with anticipation of actually being able to get the labour over and done with and the growing started. I’m also pretty desperate to get all our things in and sorted – I have a secret fear that it’ll get to Christmas and we’ll still be finding things that need fixing before we can move in….

The other thing keeping me busy is being Mama to two, rather than one. Any first-time Mums reading this – enjoy it, cherish every moment, revel in it, because you will never have the time to sit and stare at a newborn again. You’ll be too busy jiggling a baby with one hand, and building a lego garage with the other….

PS – For any of you who edit images online and are mourning the death of Picnik – Picmonkey is like it’s bigger, better looking brother. I’m addicted to the ‘Dusk’ effect. As you can see. Ahem.