HUZZAH - our living room no longer looks like the opening frame of a Hoarders episode!
Oh dear - Paul is shocked and horrified at the size of my craft supplies stash. The stash now jumbled into ten large Simply Useful plastic storage boxes (yes, the brand is expensive - worth it and bonus: Homebase is closing the store in Dundee and we got the boxes at something like 35% off) and two file folder sized Simply Useful boxes for a total of 12 boxes of crafting material.
And I have a use for every single item in those boxes - and now I've got it all into boxes I can -
1-spend the winter sorting the boxes back into the organised system I had before Paul decided in the moving process I was wasting space so he un-packed my organised and labelled boxes and re-packed the lot before the removals team arrived. SOB - doing so, he scattered it all from one end to the other - grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr! So I will be spending the winter sorting it all back out again. dammit
2 - get going on my craft stall. I realised a while back I love to make things - useful, needful things that happen to be pretty at the same time. It took Paul nearly eight years to come around to the realisation that needful things can be functional AND beautiful. He sees that now and is mildly enthusiastic about my crafting addiction. And BONUS: now he understands other people think my needful things are the bee's knees and will (GASP) pay money to own those needful things, he's happy to load the motor with my stock to drive me to car boot fairs and local craft markets.
3 - order MY shed! Yes, the shock of seeing how much 'stuff' I have to use for making needful things prompted Paul to decide he needs me to have my own storage shed. Less than a third of the size of 'his', it should be here in two weeks and the neatly stacked craft materials boxes can go out of the corner of the living room into the craft materials storage shed. He's not especially thrilled to be ordering yet another shed but he's feeling marginally better about the size (and prospective use) of the stash...
***SIDEBAR MOMENT*** Thing is, (and I did tell him this yesterday), most other men with wives who have craft supplies stashes will ask him 'Dude, wth is your problem - my wife's stash is like 20 times your wife's, and we've only been married two years!'. Which of course he WAS asked/told by other husbands/partners last night. Online. At his F1 chat group site in the 'off-topic lounge' area. He also found out from the other men that most of their spouses refuse to part with any of their stash, even to make and sell - but the men with canny spouses say the 'egg money' the ladies generate with their crafting is rather good. So now he's more on-board with the money-making aspects of crafting.
I came to the realisation that I will always feel driven to be making things but at this point I've pretty well made all the needful things for our actual home, too. So the final realisation was I could make more needful things AND THEN SELL THEM TO PEOPLE WHO LIKEWISE APPRECIATE BEAUTIFUL NEEDFUL THINGS!
On a somewhat different note, Paul whacked down the weeping willow in the postage stamp garden under my kitchen window to the left of the front door. I'm reasonably sure the previous owners were promised (meaning they were lied to) that the little weeping willow start was a dwarf variety and would never present a problem. HA.
That thing was ginormous by the time we took possession of this cottage. Clearly the former owner would whack it to the ground every year and by the end of summer the thing would re-grow to around six foot high with copious branches weeping onto the common path sporting full sized foliage making it obvious the tree is of the 'I'm gonna grow OVER your rooftop when you stop whacking me to the ground ever year' variety.
Oh. It's a weeping willow, btw - SO THE ROOTS ARE SECURELY AND STUBBORNLY WRAPPED AROUND THE DRAINS FOR THREE HOUSES THAT RUNS RIGHT THROUGH MY FRONT GARDEN!
I feel like a murderess but we've nailed copper nails into the 10in stump+poured some drain pipe safe root poison down the middle of the stump as well. It's gotta go but digging it out at this stage of development isn't on according to the professional advice we took (plumber, gas company, water company, tree surgeon). They gave us advice I was dreading to hear but is what we've done with the nails and poison - the roots will die and decay, falling away from the pipes without needing to be dug out.
I really felt horrible about that willow. Flourishing Weeping Willow Trees are a gift from the garden faeries - by removing it we're in effect snubbing their gift. YIKES!
And I also feel horrible about the camellia also inappropriately placed, this plant in the back garden - again badly placed - right next to a thick concrete slab (originally placed by the council to be a bin storage pad) AND an auxiliary drain, ffs - how many drains are there running through our plot?!
Here's where I confess I am a three-state (USA) Master Gardener - fully trained and certified in Alabama, Florida, and Georgia - so I knew just by looking there was no hope in trying to dig that camellia out for transplanting to a more appropriate spot - the root ball was going to be so small I would have had to prune the drip line and top down to such a shocking degree there simply was no hope of the plant surviving the horror. Camellias are not good transplant candidates under the best circumstance and these are not the best so again, Paul whacked the thing to the ground level and we spiked it. Sniffle. I was now even more convinced we'd brought down the wrath of the garden faeries on us...
Still, we soldiered on getting the cottage and gardens ready for winter (which is trying SO hard to arrive way early - we had sleet and ice at the end of last week lasting, well, still lasting.). Planning for the crafts shed this weekend included clearing (raking off debris, and removing a trellis I knew was rotted timber under the soil level) the space - AND WHAT DID WE FIND RIGHT WHERE THE CRAFTS SHED IS TO BE PLACED???!!!
Two, count 'em, two, holly bush starts! One is barely 6in high and the other about 18in - and both small enough and well placed for digging out and putting into pots! Pots we have already!
We're hoping finding those two starts is a sign the garden faeries understand in proper land management, one must occasionally sacrifice a few to save the many.
Now, here's a thing. Before we moved into this cottage we were informed the property had never been named so the option was open to us should we choose to take it up.
I love holly, have since childhood (Paul is indifferent) and knowing I wanted to make lots of needful Christmassy things to sell, I immediately began pushing the name 'Holly House' or 'Holly Cottage'. Paul was not enthusiastic.
Until we found the holly starts. The name has gone into consideration, once we decide between 'house' or 'cottage', the name goes to the council and Royal Mail for inclusion to our postal details.
29 October 2018
23 October 2018
Settling in, slowly. I was talking to Fox a few nights ago and we both marvelled at just how long it's taking Paul and I to unpack all the cartons (unpacking cartons=settling in and we don't unpack until we work out where the unpacked items go). Fox remembers all the moves we made with Crusty's work assignments and how quickly I would get the house organised and feeling like Home.
Of course, Crusty 'let' me do all the packing, so everything was boxed according to an un-boxing plan and all that was required was for the person bringing the carton in from the moving van to read the huge label stating room to deposit said carton into so I could very quickly put things away and get the house running along well.
Paul, well, let's just leave it at Moving House With An Aspie means he/she will unpack everything the non-Aspie spouse/partner has carefully packed, disregard the labelling system, and lob everything at the moving van...I open a carton thinking I've found the bed linens and instead find antique bottles wrapped IN BITS OF MY BLOODY FABRIC STASH! grrrrrrrr
The shed arrived last Friday (19th). By the end of the 20th Paul had 4 coats of stain on the exterior (looking very good!). By yesterday afternoon he had the carpet tiles we lifted off the kitchen floor (placed there by the previous owner in an effort to prevent her slipping on a slick kitchen floor, not glued down so recycling the tiles was possible) down on the shed floor. This morning we're moving ALL the unboxed to the shed - I CAN'T TAKE THE SENSE OF LIVING IN AN OPENING FRAME OF A HOARDERS EPISODE ANY LONGER - and of course my personal Aspie (Paul) can't take it any longer either. Besides, I've found the essentials so I can now go out to the shed every day and un-box one or two cartons until the job is well and truly done - no rush. I hope.
Yesterday while Paul was carpet tiling the shed, I was washing up the kitchen items going to the charity shop this morning. I was telling Fox the things we're sending to the charity shop and that list got him reminiscing - 'You could cut up and get two whole chickens in that electric skillet!'. He's right, the one I left behind in the USA when I came to Scotland was huge, and the one I bought to replace it was actually a bit more huge - I probably could have got three cut-up chickens in that thing!
Right, here is where I confess I make a really-really-really good fried chicken dinner. The chicken rolled in seasoned flour, mashed-butter only potatoes, and plenty of sweet corn (on or off the kernel depending on the time of year). Nothing says 'Hang in there, summer will come again!' in the dead of winter like a huge plate of fried chicken, buttery mash, and sweet kernel corn.
I'll be sad to see the ginormous electric skillet go but I've been using the normal sized one (nicely fries up one cut-up chicken OR six thick breasts OR six pork medallions...) and it's easier to A-find a place for in the downsizer kitchen and B-handle, especially when washing up after.
And the 6.5L slow-cooker is also going this morning. Man alive was washing that behemoth a pain - weighed a tonne and couldn't be put completely into the sink or dishwasher! The replacement/downsizer 3.5L one does as nice a beef and veg stew/chimiladas (refried beans, left-over and shredded roast beef rolled in fried corn tortillas on top and all of it smothered in extra-mature cheddar) as the gigantic one ever did, and is SO much easier to wash up. And bonus, the 3.5L takes a roast easily as well as the 6.5L one did, I just have to make sure the cut isn't as big as the ones I used in the larger pot. Jonesin - a smallish pork roast a tin or bottle of sauerkraut dumped over it for eight hours on low or a silverside beef with a nice pepper rub...dang, I'm drooling all over the keyboard here!
Several items like the two mentioned above are being 're-homed' today, and I can't wait to see the back of it all. We did a very real 'clean-out' before moving but found on arrival to the downsizer that we'd lugged along things we've no room for, or are inappropriate to our new lifestyle in other ways.
'Bye-bye-bye, baby, bye-bye!'
Winter cometh - we've been feeling the temperature steadily dropping the past three weeks, and we're just now in Day2 of a howling wind thingie - putting washing on the line is just not sensible as I don't want to be chasing my laundry through the village. Saturday was bright but not warm; Sunday it bucketed down rain all day - cold, near-icy rain. The forecast is for sleet-light snow by Saturday lasting into the coming week - so we won't be going down to Glamis Castle for the 'Bewitching Woods' light show walk, and we won't be taking the 'Ghosts of (insert town name here) walk Halloween Night, either, as neither of us wants to drive OR walk in the dark and icy weather.
If it helps any, dear reader(s), Paul and I both have never been big on being out in the dark and icy - ever at any age. I love a snowy day as much as I did when a child but I never-ever-ever liked being out in it after the sun went down. Ever. Nice that Paul is the same - his statement was 'Snowy-icy, day nicey but nae lark in the dark!' and included the admission he's held that view since childhood.
Honestly, I think Paul and I were both 'born old' - we're settling into our 60s easily as we've always been this way, really. Yeppers, cardi-wearing, sensible shoes, and nothing too 'flash' has always been both of our way so growing older just ain't a thing:)
We're going down to Dundee at the weekend to buy some new duvets for the bedroom. Now, I loathe duvets ordinarily but I now am the proud user of a 9kg washing machine that will happily wash a 15tog duvet and that makes all the difference. Before moving here we would have had to take the duvets to the laundry at £15 per duvet per washing-drying-fluffing. ERK! £15 a week to have hygienic duvets, I bloody well do not think so! I moved us to hand-crocheted blankets and bed sheets thinking I'd never agree to having another duvet again...until I got my new washer and now duvets are looking pretty much required now:) We're buying three so I can spend the winter quilting one whilst alternating the other two on the bed.
I still really hate duvet covers. A lot. I just don't have what it takes to change those covers (residual and likely life-long mobility issues after the fall in the front hall nearly three years ago). So we're buying three duvets and plain covers and I'm going to quilt the covers to the duvets - one duvet at a time. I love to quilt and the machine will take the quilted duvets as well (if not better) as if not quilted together. Win-win-win. We do have proper central heating in this house but we also live a bit higher in the glens than previously (we were in the vale in the old house so it was marginally warmer down there) and Piers Corbyn is predicting a hellacious winter for us this year - better prepared with warm covers should the cold make the central heating anaemic, or worse, the power to go down.
Mobility. As the cold settles in around us faster than I am so far settling us into this new house, my collarbone, biceps, and elbow ache unless I am very careful to keep warmly dressed. But I can ALMOST tie an apron behind my back now - well, ok, that's probably never going to happen but I can move around well enough to grab the tie-ends so I can slide the apron to the left and then tie the strings at my right side. Not that is going to be all that important soon as yesterday I got my sewing machine up and running so new tie-less aprons are soon to be hanging in the kitchen and off me:)
Mobility. I realised, yesterday afternoon as I stood in the back garden admiring Paul's hard work tiling the shed, that I've been outside more the last month than I have in the last several years (too embarrassing to count but it's more than the three since my disastrous fall in the front hall).
WOW - WOW - WOW is being able to 'nip down the shops' or across the street to the library a fabulous thing for so many reasons! First, I'm losing weight. Second, owing to the level nature of the area we now live in, I can carry home a sack full of moderately heavy shopping without worrying the pain in my chest is signalling imminent heart attack. No more breathlessness unless I try to walk too fast before properly warming up. Owing to the only two easy steps out the front and back means I can go in and out of the house just as much as I want - I love being able to get out to the washing line with a basket of washing, I love go outside at night and look up at the stars.
It is just now 0745h and still dark out.
Winter cometh.
Of course, Crusty 'let' me do all the packing, so everything was boxed according to an un-boxing plan and all that was required was for the person bringing the carton in from the moving van to read the huge label stating room to deposit said carton into so I could very quickly put things away and get the house running along well.
Paul, well, let's just leave it at Moving House With An Aspie means he/she will unpack everything the non-Aspie spouse/partner has carefully packed, disregard the labelling system, and lob everything at the moving van...I open a carton thinking I've found the bed linens and instead find antique bottles wrapped IN BITS OF MY BLOODY FABRIC STASH! grrrrrrrr
The shed arrived last Friday (19th). By the end of the 20th Paul had 4 coats of stain on the exterior (looking very good!). By yesterday afternoon he had the carpet tiles we lifted off the kitchen floor (placed there by the previous owner in an effort to prevent her slipping on a slick kitchen floor, not glued down so recycling the tiles was possible) down on the shed floor. This morning we're moving ALL the unboxed to the shed - I CAN'T TAKE THE SENSE OF LIVING IN AN OPENING FRAME OF A HOARDERS EPISODE ANY LONGER - and of course my personal Aspie (Paul) can't take it any longer either. Besides, I've found the essentials so I can now go out to the shed every day and un-box one or two cartons until the job is well and truly done - no rush. I hope.
Yesterday while Paul was carpet tiling the shed, I was washing up the kitchen items going to the charity shop this morning. I was telling Fox the things we're sending to the charity shop and that list got him reminiscing - 'You could cut up and get two whole chickens in that electric skillet!'. He's right, the one I left behind in the USA when I came to Scotland was huge, and the one I bought to replace it was actually a bit more huge - I probably could have got three cut-up chickens in that thing!
Right, here is where I confess I make a really-really-really good fried chicken dinner. The chicken rolled in seasoned flour, mashed-butter only potatoes, and plenty of sweet corn (on or off the kernel depending on the time of year). Nothing says 'Hang in there, summer will come again!' in the dead of winter like a huge plate of fried chicken, buttery mash, and sweet kernel corn.
I'll be sad to see the ginormous electric skillet go but I've been using the normal sized one (nicely fries up one cut-up chicken OR six thick breasts OR six pork medallions...) and it's easier to A-find a place for in the downsizer kitchen and B-handle, especially when washing up after.
And the 6.5L slow-cooker is also going this morning. Man alive was washing that behemoth a pain - weighed a tonne and couldn't be put completely into the sink or dishwasher! The replacement/downsizer 3.5L one does as nice a beef and veg stew/chimiladas (refried beans, left-over and shredded roast beef rolled in fried corn tortillas on top and all of it smothered in extra-mature cheddar) as the gigantic one ever did, and is SO much easier to wash up. And bonus, the 3.5L takes a roast easily as well as the 6.5L one did, I just have to make sure the cut isn't as big as the ones I used in the larger pot. Jonesin - a smallish pork roast a tin or bottle of sauerkraut dumped over it for eight hours on low or a silverside beef with a nice pepper rub...dang, I'm drooling all over the keyboard here!
Several items like the two mentioned above are being 're-homed' today, and I can't wait to see the back of it all. We did a very real 'clean-out' before moving but found on arrival to the downsizer that we'd lugged along things we've no room for, or are inappropriate to our new lifestyle in other ways.
'Bye-bye-bye, baby, bye-bye!'
Winter cometh - we've been feeling the temperature steadily dropping the past three weeks, and we're just now in Day2 of a howling wind thingie - putting washing on the line is just not sensible as I don't want to be chasing my laundry through the village. Saturday was bright but not warm; Sunday it bucketed down rain all day - cold, near-icy rain. The forecast is for sleet-light snow by Saturday lasting into the coming week - so we won't be going down to Glamis Castle for the 'Bewitching Woods' light show walk, and we won't be taking the 'Ghosts of (insert town name here) walk Halloween Night, either, as neither of us wants to drive OR walk in the dark and icy weather.
If it helps any, dear reader(s), Paul and I both have never been big on being out in the dark and icy - ever at any age. I love a snowy day as much as I did when a child but I never-ever-ever liked being out in it after the sun went down. Ever. Nice that Paul is the same - his statement was 'Snowy-icy, day nicey but nae lark in the dark!' and included the admission he's held that view since childhood.
Honestly, I think Paul and I were both 'born old' - we're settling into our 60s easily as we've always been this way, really. Yeppers, cardi-wearing, sensible shoes, and nothing too 'flash' has always been both of our way so growing older just ain't a thing:)
We're going down to Dundee at the weekend to buy some new duvets for the bedroom. Now, I loathe duvets ordinarily but I now am the proud user of a 9kg washing machine that will happily wash a 15tog duvet and that makes all the difference. Before moving here we would have had to take the duvets to the laundry at £15 per duvet per washing-drying-fluffing. ERK! £15 a week to have hygienic duvets, I bloody well do not think so! I moved us to hand-crocheted blankets and bed sheets thinking I'd never agree to having another duvet again...until I got my new washer and now duvets are looking pretty much required now:) We're buying three so I can spend the winter quilting one whilst alternating the other two on the bed.
I still really hate duvet covers. A lot. I just don't have what it takes to change those covers (residual and likely life-long mobility issues after the fall in the front hall nearly three years ago). So we're buying three duvets and plain covers and I'm going to quilt the covers to the duvets - one duvet at a time. I love to quilt and the machine will take the quilted duvets as well (if not better) as if not quilted together. Win-win-win. We do have proper central heating in this house but we also live a bit higher in the glens than previously (we were in the vale in the old house so it was marginally warmer down there) and Piers Corbyn is predicting a hellacious winter for us this year - better prepared with warm covers should the cold make the central heating anaemic, or worse, the power to go down.
Mobility. As the cold settles in around us faster than I am so far settling us into this new house, my collarbone, biceps, and elbow ache unless I am very careful to keep warmly dressed. But I can ALMOST tie an apron behind my back now - well, ok, that's probably never going to happen but I can move around well enough to grab the tie-ends so I can slide the apron to the left and then tie the strings at my right side. Not that is going to be all that important soon as yesterday I got my sewing machine up and running so new tie-less aprons are soon to be hanging in the kitchen and off me:)
Mobility. I realised, yesterday afternoon as I stood in the back garden admiring Paul's hard work tiling the shed, that I've been outside more the last month than I have in the last several years (too embarrassing to count but it's more than the three since my disastrous fall in the front hall).
WOW - WOW - WOW is being able to 'nip down the shops' or across the street to the library a fabulous thing for so many reasons! First, I'm losing weight. Second, owing to the level nature of the area we now live in, I can carry home a sack full of moderately heavy shopping without worrying the pain in my chest is signalling imminent heart attack. No more breathlessness unless I try to walk too fast before properly warming up. Owing to the only two easy steps out the front and back means I can go in and out of the house just as much as I want - I love being able to get out to the washing line with a basket of washing, I love go outside at night and look up at the stars.
It is just now 0745h and still dark out.
Winter cometh.
04 October 2018
Well this is depressing - my favourite day planner has been discontinued and I've had to choose a new style planner. I don't mind growing older (beats the alternative!) and I'm actually quite interested in trying new tech but I have never liked electronic calendars and day planners and have happily used two types of 'old school' methods for years - one a 'pocket diary' (BritSpeak for day planner) and the other the now discontinued desk day planner that even Paul liked and used faithfully. Sniffle. I'm going to miss that thing!
It's early October and owing to the house move, things I normally do in September were pushed back to October. This morning I was caught up enough to go online and place my order for the usual diary and day planner refills. To my shock, however, I couldn't find my day planner refills ANYWHERE - not even on the publisher's website!
So I emailed the publisher and one of their customer service reps promptly replied the refill in question has been (SOB!) discontinued. She very politely refrained from saying the discontinuation was owing to near-total lack of interest in that particular style but I knew she was only being polite as the style is VERY 1950s - doubtless interest and use has dropped off severely especially over the past few years.
For those curious as to the style, it's one of those two-ring base things with pen/pencil crease at the foot. Marvellously useful - compact, each day having a two-page spread with weekends sharing (Saturday to the left, Sunday to the right). Terribly 'old school', retro, vintage, Grannie stuff - we loved it.
Every New Years Day I would go through and mark the day (and which) the bins went to the kerb. Also useful for noting medical/dental appointments, birthdays and other important dates, it served as a superb message centre for the household in so many ways including jotting down telephone-email-snail mail details. It sat on the front hall table at the old house and has been temporarily sitting on the electric fireplace mantel in our new home, and it was the one and only place in the house I could rely on the pen remaining with it. It worked ever so much better than the wall calendars and e-calendars - worked well with my pocket diary and Paul's personal one as we do carry those with us but always made sure to update the desk one on returning home.
Honestly I think I will have a serious cry 31st December 2018 night knowing the next morning a bound A5 'page a day' diary will be taking its place of organisational honour. The day planner will go on the sideboard, both soon-to-be retired one and new completely unsatisfactory one, once the living room is free of what seems a gajillion boxes needing to be stored in the eagerly anticipated weather-tight shed. Next to the landline, of course - the day planner, not the shed:)
A LONG MOAN/WORD ABOUT DOWNSIZING:
Sigh. I'm beginning to despair of the shed ever arriving - it's been what seems months (but really is only weeks) since we ordered it.
At first we thought Paul would use the shed as his 'man-cave' - OH! Excuse me, his 'study'.
But then the movers brought in his desk and set it down in the bedroom and he decided 'Hey, this is much better than spending the money to have the shed wired (for computer and heat)!' - meaning 'Hey! The bathroom and kitchen are a lot closer now, and wow think of the money I'll save on wiring and heating the shed!'.
Boy howdy did Paul's eyeballs light up at the thought of that savings and followed up that thought of money saving to 'persuading me' it would be so much nicer to keep our two remaining 'we won't have room for these' storage pieces for use in our new downsizer, storage units we had on Gumtree and he promptly removed once I was 'persuaded'...now I have the sideboard (can't complain too much as it's a GORGEOUS Art-Deco with two drawers and two under cabinets) in which I shall now be storing first aid/health and beauty (hahahahaha) and toilet roll. yea - or should I nod to modern times and write 'yay'?
And the 'vintage' (and not really my cuppa) 1970s era oak wall unit with three doored under cabinets and a glass-fronted three glass shelves upper. To store kitchen over-flow in the wall unit including spare kitchen roll - which is about all it's going to hold.
So as a consequence of his money-saving thinking, it was good-bye to my dream of floor to ceiling bespoke cabinetry along ALL the walls in the living-dining room that was to have been closed doors over drawers on the lower half and glass-fronted book-shelving on the upper in which I'd planned to use part of for kitchen and bathroom 'overflow' and the glorious rest for all my craft supplies.
Where are all my crafting supplies to be stored? Why out in the new shed, of course - in plastic boxes he's happy to 'splash out on' if it means the bigger save on bespoke storage cabinetry. So once the shed arrives I'll have to go out to the shed and gather ALL the supplies for a single project at one go. None of this convenience of having everything in the nice warm house where I can walk over from the sofa or sewing machine, no, I'm going to have to go out there in all weathers for supplies.
Meanwhile Paul is happily doing his computer thing in the bedroom - all his wants and needs are neatly stacked/shelved all in one place. 'Because I don't have much so my stuff should be sorted first' he claimed without one whit of a hint of shame.
Meanwhile the living-dining room is awash with cartons and honestly the place looks like an episode of Hoarders.
Luckily we hadn't bought a dinner table and chairs before moving in because there isn't anywhere for that to go just yet. I'd post a photo (yes, I'm a before/after photographer) but it's really just too embarrassing despite knowing this is all temporary and in a month the place is going to be cosy and lovely and organised and...OH GOD PLEASE LET THAT BE TRUE!
I need to go through every single box and reorganise EVERYTHING as Paul in his Asperger's logic decided my method of packing everything together (as in all the sewing fabric on one box, all the sewing minutiae like needles and thread and...in another, and the sewing patterns in yet another and the cross stitch, crochet thread, yarn according to weight in yet more boxes...) was wasting space.
OMFG I can't find a bleeding thing! Looking for yarn and crochet hooks I found the hand mixer, five drinking glasses, some casserole dishes, and his fly tying tools wrapped up in bath towels. Looking for the sieve (colander, strainer, whatever) I found some of his drill bits and bolts, my unmentionables, the gluten free flours, several tins of tomato soup, and the television remote control for the bedroom telly (which I still can't find but it doesn't matter since I can't watch late night telly in the bedroom while he's on the computer. dammit). I sadly STILL can't find the sewing machine!
I have given up and am just opening boxes as I get to them and trying to find places for everything we need in the house whilst finding a holding place for things we don't need in the house every day but need enough to keep from being rid of. And all the while Paul walks through the living-dining room shaking his head and clucking and telling me he can't take much more of the clutter and I should be better organised and really, he's lucky as hell I don't clock him one. Or two or three.
But...non-violent payback is a far more satisfactory mo-f...er, well, if you don't know that one I'm not going to explain it. Suffice it to say PROPER plastic storage boxes ain't cheap and I am not scrimping on those - if I have to brave the weather to make something I want to be in and out of that shed quicker than lightning and cheap boxes are not a real money saver in the end!
To make things that much more 'fun' - the kitchen sink is spewing water (into a bucket I have to empty during and after washing up or rinsing veg or running washing machine) and the plumber can't get here until Thursday next (a full week away) owing to huge number of call-outs to sort gas boilers people are switching on without having had an engineer in to check first. Yep, the weather has turned, it's full-on autumn and winter looks to be close on its heels as a particularly harsh one according to sun-spot history. I'd call someone else but this plumber is worth the wait (and the emptying of the bucket several times a day).
Right. On a happier note, we are settling in slowly but surely. Yesterday the window blinds went up in kitchen and bathroom windows and the living room and bedroom windows. The kitchen floor now has a lovely slate-effect sheet vinyl floor covering and the steam mop is working wonderfully to keep it looking as lovely as when laid.
Real bliss is being able to nip out to the shops or to the library or just for a walk, and WOW, the stars show so much better in this low-light-pollution zone, WOW!
Downsizing, not without its 'issues' but worth it in the end.
It's early October and owing to the house move, things I normally do in September were pushed back to October. This morning I was caught up enough to go online and place my order for the usual diary and day planner refills. To my shock, however, I couldn't find my day planner refills ANYWHERE - not even on the publisher's website!
So I emailed the publisher and one of their customer service reps promptly replied the refill in question has been (SOB!) discontinued. She very politely refrained from saying the discontinuation was owing to near-total lack of interest in that particular style but I knew she was only being polite as the style is VERY 1950s - doubtless interest and use has dropped off severely especially over the past few years.
For those curious as to the style, it's one of those two-ring base things with pen/pencil crease at the foot. Marvellously useful - compact, each day having a two-page spread with weekends sharing (Saturday to the left, Sunday to the right). Terribly 'old school', retro, vintage, Grannie stuff - we loved it.
Every New Years Day I would go through and mark the day (and which) the bins went to the kerb. Also useful for noting medical/dental appointments, birthdays and other important dates, it served as a superb message centre for the household in so many ways including jotting down telephone-email-snail mail details. It sat on the front hall table at the old house and has been temporarily sitting on the electric fireplace mantel in our new home, and it was the one and only place in the house I could rely on the pen remaining with it. It worked ever so much better than the wall calendars and e-calendars - worked well with my pocket diary and Paul's personal one as we do carry those with us but always made sure to update the desk one on returning home.
Honestly I think I will have a serious cry 31st December 2018 night knowing the next morning a bound A5 'page a day' diary will be taking its place of organisational honour. The day planner will go on the sideboard, both soon-to-be retired one and new completely unsatisfactory one, once the living room is free of what seems a gajillion boxes needing to be stored in the eagerly anticipated weather-tight shed. Next to the landline, of course - the day planner, not the shed:)
A LONG MOAN/WORD ABOUT DOWNSIZING:
Sigh. I'm beginning to despair of the shed ever arriving - it's been what seems months (but really is only weeks) since we ordered it.
At first we thought Paul would use the shed as his 'man-cave' - OH! Excuse me, his 'study'.
But then the movers brought in his desk and set it down in the bedroom and he decided 'Hey, this is much better than spending the money to have the shed wired (for computer and heat)!' - meaning 'Hey! The bathroom and kitchen are a lot closer now, and wow think of the money I'll save on wiring and heating the shed!'.
Boy howdy did Paul's eyeballs light up at the thought of that savings and followed up that thought of money saving to 'persuading me' it would be so much nicer to keep our two remaining 'we won't have room for these' storage pieces for use in our new downsizer, storage units we had on Gumtree and he promptly removed once I was 'persuaded'...now I have the sideboard (can't complain too much as it's a GORGEOUS Art-Deco with two drawers and two under cabinets) in which I shall now be storing first aid/health and beauty (hahahahaha) and toilet roll. yea - or should I nod to modern times and write 'yay'?
And the 'vintage' (and not really my cuppa) 1970s era oak wall unit with three doored under cabinets and a glass-fronted three glass shelves upper. To store kitchen over-flow in the wall unit including spare kitchen roll - which is about all it's going to hold.
So as a consequence of his money-saving thinking, it was good-bye to my dream of floor to ceiling bespoke cabinetry along ALL the walls in the living-dining room that was to have been closed doors over drawers on the lower half and glass-fronted book-shelving on the upper in which I'd planned to use part of for kitchen and bathroom 'overflow' and the glorious rest for all my craft supplies.
Where are all my crafting supplies to be stored? Why out in the new shed, of course - in plastic boxes he's happy to 'splash out on' if it means the bigger save on bespoke storage cabinetry. So once the shed arrives I'll have to go out to the shed and gather ALL the supplies for a single project at one go. None of this convenience of having everything in the nice warm house where I can walk over from the sofa or sewing machine, no, I'm going to have to go out there in all weathers for supplies.
Meanwhile Paul is happily doing his computer thing in the bedroom - all his wants and needs are neatly stacked/shelved all in one place. 'Because I don't have much so my stuff should be sorted first' he claimed without one whit of a hint of shame.
Meanwhile the living-dining room is awash with cartons and honestly the place looks like an episode of Hoarders.
Luckily we hadn't bought a dinner table and chairs before moving in because there isn't anywhere for that to go just yet. I'd post a photo (yes, I'm a before/after photographer) but it's really just too embarrassing despite knowing this is all temporary and in a month the place is going to be cosy and lovely and organised and...OH GOD PLEASE LET THAT BE TRUE!
I need to go through every single box and reorganise EVERYTHING as Paul in his Asperger's logic decided my method of packing everything together (as in all the sewing fabric on one box, all the sewing minutiae like needles and thread and...in another, and the sewing patterns in yet another and the cross stitch, crochet thread, yarn according to weight in yet more boxes...) was wasting space.
OMFG I can't find a bleeding thing! Looking for yarn and crochet hooks I found the hand mixer, five drinking glasses, some casserole dishes, and his fly tying tools wrapped up in bath towels. Looking for the sieve (colander, strainer, whatever) I found some of his drill bits and bolts, my unmentionables, the gluten free flours, several tins of tomato soup, and the television remote control for the bedroom telly (which I still can't find but it doesn't matter since I can't watch late night telly in the bedroom while he's on the computer. dammit). I sadly STILL can't find the sewing machine!
I have given up and am just opening boxes as I get to them and trying to find places for everything we need in the house whilst finding a holding place for things we don't need in the house every day but need enough to keep from being rid of. And all the while Paul walks through the living-dining room shaking his head and clucking and telling me he can't take much more of the clutter and I should be better organised and really, he's lucky as hell I don't clock him one. Or two or three.
But...non-violent payback is a far more satisfactory mo-f...er, well, if you don't know that one I'm not going to explain it. Suffice it to say PROPER plastic storage boxes ain't cheap and I am not scrimping on those - if I have to brave the weather to make something I want to be in and out of that shed quicker than lightning and cheap boxes are not a real money saver in the end!
To make things that much more 'fun' - the kitchen sink is spewing water (into a bucket I have to empty during and after washing up or rinsing veg or running washing machine) and the plumber can't get here until Thursday next (a full week away) owing to huge number of call-outs to sort gas boilers people are switching on without having had an engineer in to check first. Yep, the weather has turned, it's full-on autumn and winter looks to be close on its heels as a particularly harsh one according to sun-spot history. I'd call someone else but this plumber is worth the wait (and the emptying of the bucket several times a day).
Right. On a happier note, we are settling in slowly but surely. Yesterday the window blinds went up in kitchen and bathroom windows and the living room and bedroom windows. The kitchen floor now has a lovely slate-effect sheet vinyl floor covering and the steam mop is working wonderfully to keep it looking as lovely as when laid.
Real bliss is being able to nip out to the shops or to the library or just for a walk, and WOW, the stars show so much better in this low-light-pollution zone, WOW!
Downsizing, not without its 'issues' but worth it in the end.
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