Dear readers, are you still there ? Still eager to hear about any shenanigans and crazy moments on our restoration history in the last couple of months?
Or do you want to hear of the days I’ve spent in bed , resting, or better, looking dead and unkept like this lovely lady ? :
Without further due, here’s the chronicles of the procrastination of the tired lady of the house:
Have I been cheating on the house with the garden?…… yes
Have I become exhausted of painting and sanding with no end ?…….yes
Is my list of jobs piling like the tower in Babel ? ( and we know what happened to that tower ) ….yes
Due to money restraints, and due to the fact that I need to buy ludicrously giant pieces of furniture to sooth my soul, I haven’t been working in the interior of the house as much as I would have liked to.
Or at least this is the excuse that my dark procrastinating soul is choosing to believe.
Our finances are underpinned by the amount of money we can spend in the house and (the-amount-of-unnecessary-things-I-need-to-compulsively-buy) ( but you don’t need to tell daniel this, it’s just a secrete in between you and me , ok? ) shhhh 
Hence why Working in the garden has been a great relief of pressure.
After spending £160 on soil and £80 on hiring a rotavator, we’ve managed to make the lawn look slightly healthier.
Bye bye salary . 
But fortunately this has made gross improvement compared to the dog poo ridden valley of the despair we used to own, it was literally full of holes and resembled quite amazingly the swimming pool In poltergeist. 
For those who may not know, a rotavator is a giant evil machine that will get stuck in every root that is present in the garden, and that drives you around like a manic dog running around in the park. 
One of the good things of digging a meter down and rotavator has the lawn is that it gave us the opportunity o make some urban archaeology that threw some light on the store of the house.
So as a result the soil has been reconditioned and I could on the hunt of some several hundred free bricks to create national trust style garden parterres.
( one can just dream no? )
Luck stroke as a local couple was knocking down several walls in their 50s house and we managed to get 340 weathered FREE bricks that we had to carry in 12750 journeys in the back of our poor twingo. ( I know full well that the car will explode on us one day ) 
It’s true that they were heavy and it was very labor intensive to remove all the cement to make the bricks clean, but it was totally worth it as the look of older bricks can’t be replicated. 
( there you can see all the rubble rubros from the cement in the brick s)
My dear husband had the pleasurable job of digging the pond while I looked like Debbie jellinsky on the edge of the pond, using all my charms so I didn’t have to take part in such unglamorous job . 
After a substantial amount of cash spent in Garden centres ( those places were the elderly go to play the walking dead) we set our minds on planting bast amounts of perennial plants that will look good all through the year and will make the garden look more mature slightly quicker.
After my feet resembled Frodo’s in his journey to Mordor I decided that I had enough of gardening and that it was time to go back to woodwork.
So after having a brainstorm of Storage kitchen ideas, making a pantry on the side of the fireplace and scoring a housekeepers cupboard are in the forefront of my evil money spending-near-future operations. 
( I need this ) 
(and this )
I’ve started this project by creating a plate rack from scratch using my grandparents plate rack as a base . 
I also ser myself the goal of carpeting the staircase for less than £100 and imagined the best way of doing it was by repurposing some coffee sacks and using the striped design to center the runner . 
Et voilà! The smell is still absolutely beautiful and will act as a deterrent for several species of critters that might of may not live under our subsoil.
On a bright color note, after finishing the spared bedroom we soon realised that the first forest green colour wasn’t working and made all the room look too Severe, hence we went and repainted it with bright teal Paint.
( it wouldn’t be a room decorated by me without the obligatory frame collage in the wall )
All the surrounding and furnishings suddenly became alive and it passed from a soulless room to another quirky masterpiece of magnificence that no one else but me will understand 
Now is when the ludicrously big and glorious mahogany-ness came into our lives in the form of a gorgeous linen press that came from one of the country state of the cavendish family, thanks to a local antiques dealer . Jackpot ! 
Got this, in order for dear husband to have somewhere to have all his clothes in one place ( preferably wavy from our bedroom) so i can enjoy my beauty rest without any disruption . ( and so he can forgive me for not digging) 
As my nieces birthday is apporaching and we promised her a Wendy house in the back garden, I’ve repurposed our old shed and in cladding it to resemble a little house, with proper glazing, tiling and a little bed.
Still working on it, but for an old metal storage unit, it’s acquiring a certain depression-era-centralpark-chic jenesaisquoi .
Ps,
We’ve adopted three goldfish which I’ve named Alexis Krystle and Blake. Due to them living in a lily pond, I though it was quite fitting that they would be named after the three main characters in dynasty.
So thanks for your patience. I promise not lo leave another 5 months without posts and to keep you all more updated in our decorating adventures. !
Stay tuned,
Ben
The 1903 house 