Thursday 29 March 2007

Screwing around

I admit it, I am no good at screwing. I have spent the last couple of hours trying to fit two new internal door handles. There must be a knack to it, men seem to manage. It didn't help that I couldn't find the right attachment for the electric screwdriver or the bradle to make the marker holes (Dave has organised the tool cupboard) even when I found them I was still no better off. Very frustrating, I hate being all girly and asking for help to do something that looks so simple. Maybe you just need brute strength. Oh well you can't be good at everything...........

Lesley has been getting her rucksack ready for her trip to Morocco. It only weights 8.5 k but when you are only 8 stone dripping wet it looks huge. I hope that she manages to lug it around without pulling her back out.

We spent a lot of time tiding up the front garden last weekend, hoping to improve the 'kerb appeal' (note to self....must stop watching relocation programmes!) and hopefully it now looks so dam fine that we will have buyers beating a path to our door.

I have been having great fun this week with the online soap plot and here is a little excerpt just to wet your appetite

This hall is meant for beautiful young women in elegant evening dresses, not a slightly overweight, sweaty, middle aged woman in baggy shorts. Well bugger it, there is nobody here to see me, and five minutes under a cold shower should help............

Thursday 22 March 2007

Ladies who Lunch

I have had a very enjoyable and productive week. Am still investigating new website hosts for the business and online soap ( working title.... Spanish Steps) and have got down to some serious writing ( have even used the spell check!) It is going well if a little slowly, I am having to ration my time on the laptop otherwise the house , cooking, gardening etc would just go to pot.

It has been lovely having Lesley at home until her trip to Morocco. We have been shopping for 'essentials' for the trip and general catching up on all the gossip. Nothing beats a good girly chat.

Talking of catching up, the one problem with working from home is that you don't have any colleagues to to bounce things off. But it is great to meet up with friends and be 'a lady who lunches'. Met up with James and Phil today and they had a great ideas for Spanish Steps, thanks guys. All I need now is the wherewithal to be able to create the website! I am in serious danger of becoming a techie - Ahhh!!!

Tuesday 13 March 2007

Selling up

There are so many programmes on the TV about selling your home that I have been in an absolute tizz.

Since the New Year I have spent a lot of time getting our home ready for selling. It is amazing how much "stuff" you can accumulate. I have had to be ruthless, decluttering is not for the faint hearted! I have kept clothes for years, I even have the first formal dress that my Mum made for me when I was 17, admittedly it has seen a few makeovers in its long, long life, my daughter has even worn for a fancy dress outfit.

Trying to look at your home through a potential buyers eyes is a sobering experience and all those little jobs that you have put off for months now become must do jobs. All the woodwork has been painted, the garden fence has been replaced and everything else has been steam cleaned within an inch of its life. The house looks so damn good now it seems a shame to move!

Where shall we go?

With the whole the the UK to choose from this was always going to be the biggy. Initially we fell in love with Anglesey. The island is so beautiful and we have spend many happy times there, but deep down we have both had a hankering to move South.

Dorset is a dream but the property prices are so high we would never be able to afford to buy anything down there!

In January we spent a long weekend touring Cornwall, even though it was a wistlestop tour, we were bowled over by the county and much to our surprise there are areas that we can comfortably afford to buy in. So that is plan. We have put our house on the market and as soon as we have a buyer we will be on our way.

I have a dream

Isn't it amazing what a birthday will do to your head. Mine, last year, was not a momentus number, not one of the big 0s, but it did make me question why, when experiencing the "empty nest syndrome" what we (Dave and I) were doing our lives.

We have always dreamed that we would at some stage, move to the coast and, hopefully, be in a position to run our own business.

Well both our kids are now at University, infact James is due to graduate this summer, so now it is going to be our time. We are going to live the dream.