Amblesides new Kitchen

We went to visit my Auntie who was having a new kitchen, we swapped stories of upheaval and workmen. She told us the kitchen she'd had for twenty five years was going in the skip but it was still good as new! My Auntie asked me if I wanted it and I realised it would fit into my little kitchen a treat, it was very exciting.

We hired a van and went back up to load it in as the workmen dismantled it. It was a big job, especially unloading it all into the house when we got back as what had been a fully functioning kitchen was now units and doors and plinths and assorted bits that took up every inch of floorspace downstairs in the house.

Worn out I went to bed with it all dumped everywhere and next day began to lug it about and organise it into some kind of order to enable me to measure it all and draw plans for my carpenter to follow. He was coming in a few days to piece the jigsaw together and I was going away for a few days break whilst he did it so it was a case of being super organised.

It was chaos and very nerve racking to walk away from it wondering if he would be able to follow my drawings and how it would look when I got back. I was so grateful to have landed a free kitchen but I knew that a badly fitting shoddy kitchen would put a buyer off faster than anything as new kitchens are normally a big expense in a new house and I'd seen enough poor DIY jobs in my time to know that this would either be a mini miracle or a major disaster. I'd had a good reference for the carpenter but I'd made a mistake years earlier when I'd paid a man advertising himself as a carpenter £2,500 to put skirting boards and dado rails into a house I was renovating and it turned out he had clearly never done any woodwork in his life. My husband was furious as it had supposed to have been a lovely surprise when he came back from a work trip, it was a disaster.
So it was a very nervous hand that I unlocked the front door and smelling the sawdust I walked alone and scared into my new kitchen...it was perfect! You just could not tell that it had come out of another house and apart from a couple of little bits of wobbly cutting, I was absolutely thrilled with it. I went off next day to buy tiles.

To Sign or Not to Sign...

So to sign or not to sign, that was the question. I didn't sign, I fought. I told them that I wasn't prepared to hand over any more money, that I wanted a reduction in the rent and that future payments would come out of the bond I'd paid. I told them if the bond money ran out and there were still no Deeds, then I was off. I ment it, I was sick of being messed about.
I had a strange half dream that night as I was falling to sleep, the old man who had lived in the house was saying to me how sorry he was, that he hadn't wanted the house sold, that he'd been cross with the people he'd left it to for selling it. I woke with such a start and said out loud in the dark that I'd take good care of his house and he didn't have to leave if he didn't want to, that I wasn't afraid of ghosts and he was welcome to stay and keep an eye on proceedings. I hoped the neighbours didn't hear me but I suspect they might have as the lady next door asked me if I'd felt him in the house a few weeks later. I didn't get into it.
Hey presto the Deeds were found and the long awaited e-mail came from my solicitor "please come in to sign the contracts" Yipeee!
I couldn't get down there fast enough and on my Mothers birthday, I bought a house, Ambleside was mine.

A Bit of Emotional Stuff

My true friends and my family got me through those weeks and I love those people more than I can ever say. Friends would remind me why I left, sat sobbing on their sofas they would piece me back together and gently push me back through my front door. I couldn't let them down. My family were there with endless words of praise for my talents, reminding me of my inner strength and always on the end of the phone when I was wobbly. The internet was my friend, Facebook and my photography blog followers were there to reach out to, popping positive and humourous posts of my progress and getting positive comments back kept me sane.
It really is very very important to take kindness where its offered, one day you will be stronger and you will be called upon to be their shoulder to cry on so you can pay them back but now, lean on friends a little, build a community around you that has nothing to do with your ex.
I also wrote in my diary, endlessly, just wrote and cried and cried and wrote and sobbed and wrote and most importantly of all, I found a good counsilor. On my first session she asked me why I was there and I told her that I just wanted to make sense of it all, that everything was wirling around in my head and I just couldn't find any logic to all the things that happened. I knew I was broken and I needed someone other than me to help fix it.
I didn't want to go into another relationship so damaged, I couldn't bare another person telling me how rubbish I was at everything, critising me personally, physically, mentally and I knew if I wasn't careful I was doomed to attract another person like that as my self esteme was so low or worse still I was so paralised that I was doomed to live the rest of my life alone and scared to try again.
I had been a different person before, years previously I was so sure of myself, in my abilities, I was confident and I had lived with a man who thought the world of me and I wanted that back. Some people find themselves again by seeing themselves reflected in a new loves eyes, who in the first throws of love can only see the good in them but that just wasn't for me. I had loved very very deeply the good bits of the person I'd been with and the thought of living any kind of life with someone new was abhorant to me. But I didn't want to go back so there was only one thing for it, to declare that I would remain single and heal for at least a year. This was a brave choice considering the shaky ground I was on but now looking back I am prouder of myself than I could ever have been if someone had helped me and after a year of counselling and decorating I've got the me I was before back. Wasn't easy.
One of my favourite scenes in any movie is Will Smith in 'The Persuit of Happyness' when he is finally offered a job after months of unpaid trial at the firm, whilst living rough on the streets with his little boy. His new boss asks him if it had been easy and with tears rolling down his cheaks and the pain of an almost beaten soul on his face, he says "no sir, it wasn't". Some things arn't easy, after watching my father die a slow, painful, undignified death from a desease that ravedged his body for twenty years, I was under no illusions that there are many worse things to have to endure than a broken heart and a change of circumstances but I was determined to fight my demonds, to conquer. Its a work in progress but I'm definatly getting there.

Yet Another Rock Bottom

 

At first I was trying to strip everything back around all the packing boxes as I thought I could get it done quickly and then unpack everything into nice clean rooms but I had underestimated how much time sanding all the skirting boards, picture rails and doors and frames would take. I ended up having to lug every box into my bedroom which made it feel horrible in there, when exhausted I really wanted a lovely luxourious bedroom to sink into after a day of labour but it was not to be, it was just a case of suffering it and thinking one day, one day I will have a lovely bedroom again.I still haven't yet but it will come.
There was no quick way to do sanding. I bought a little hand held sander but it couldn't get into the little noocks and cranies and there was nothing for it but to labouriously sand it all by hand. The amount of dust was unbelievable and my hands were red raw from the sandpaper. It takes self disipline to keep at it, its tedious boring work but now looking around at all the lovely white painted woodwork, it was so worth those weeks of toil. Initially though it was so depressing because I was making the condition of the house even worse. My children were pretty fed up, property developing wasn't their dream and they didn't have the experience to see how it was going to be eventually. I had done all of this 'stuff' before when they were little, when they didn't care about their enviroment as long as mummy and food were in the mix somewhere but two grumpy teenagers in all this mess and upheaval was no joke and there were several occasions when there were cross words when I came home to find piles of washing up in the sink and empty food cupboards after a long days work.
Nothing for it though but to keep plodding on and as the three month rental deadline loomed with still no deeds to be seen and no word from the sellers solicitor, the nightmare of what to do raised its ugly head once more. I didn't want to pay anymore rent, it was such a waste of money, six months down the line and I still didn't own Ambleside and I was being threatened by the estate agents with eviction if I didn't sign another three month lease. I sat down on the smelly floorboards in all the dust all alone and cried my heart out. This wasn't a better life, what the hell had I done. 

First Steps

Everything I'd bought was due to arrive over the next few days so I spent a lot of time at the house scrubbing the floors to try to get rid of the smell and cleaning the bathroom and the bit of kitchen that there was. In between this I was backwards and forwards to my old home fetching the boxes that had been packed in the garage for weeks, no mean feat in a two seater car but paying a removal firm was out of the question. My ex was putting pressure on me to have our cats, the kitten I had bought a few weeks before I left was being a nightmare and he wanted rid of him. The cats couldn't come to my mothers with me as her dog is a hunting dog and to her the cats were prey so that wasn't possible and the minute my new bed and matress was delivered he insisted on bringing my daughter's bed to the house. I had left so I was in it alone and no help was offered to move any more of her stuff or the many many boxes. I could have done with a few extra days as the house wasn't really habitable but I was too tired for more upset and also ready to bring things to a conclusion so we spent our first night in the house. Not the usual excitment of moving into a new home, far from it but it was a relief to finally be getting somewhere in my quest for a better life.
My daughters friends father had a van and I was so so grateful when he offered to move my daughters wardrobe and the boxes that my ex had packed of her things. He'd cleared out both the kids bedrooms within days, turning my sons room into his office and my daughters all fitted out as a guest room, goodness knows how that made her feel. So it was my job to make a new home for them, to rebuild their security and I began by stripping off the lovely woodchip wallpaper downstairs. The ceilings were yellow so cleaning down and painting those made a huge difference. A couple of sentences does not portray the hours that doing these two jobs took. That wallpaper had been up there for years and it was reluctant to move, the mess, the smell, the crumbling plaster, it was grim!

I suppose in hindsight it would have been better to take a few weeks just to get straight and rest from it all and it wasn't really sensible to spend money doing up a house I didn't yet own and had no garuntees of actually owning. But living in those conditions was grim and I figured that doing the prep work of stripping back, sanding paintwork and putting up lining paper wouldn't cost any more than I was prepared to loose and besides I wanted to make a start on improving the house. The hard work had begun and boy was it hard work!

Bargin hunting

I spoke earlier about the folder of clippings that I'd got together and when my son and I walked into the charity shop that morning it was all sat there waiting for us, everything we needed. The table and chairs was perfect and cost £125 yes it had a little damage, scratches from its previous family, it looked like a grandchild had got a little over enthusiastic when drawing a picture but that was fine Ambleside was a cottage house and furniture with a bit of character and history would fit in just fine. There were several sofas to choose from but there was only one choice for me, a lovely two seater and three seater set with lovely wooden legs and little wheels. It was quite saggy in places but I loved that 'been in the family for years' look it had. It was £135 what a bargain!
I needed a bed and a wardrobe and preferably wooden so that I could sand and paint it all white. A new mattress was essential but the bed and wardrobe at the back of the shop were perfect and totalled £200 The thrilling part of the whole treasure hunt was the old typewriter just sitting there waiting for me and this brought tears to my eyes.

I had lost my Dad the previous year and my Grandma three months later, perhaps it was that my emotions were running very high but I really was beginning to think that they had met the old couple up in heaven and they were all helping me back on my feet. How else do you explain that everything I needed to make Ambleside a home was just sitting there waiting for me!
With the £10 delivery charge the total was £470, can you imagine what it would have cost to buy all that new! So to the kitchen, I needed a washing machine, an appliance I cannot live without with two teenage kids, a cooker and the very important fridge freezer. I went to the showroom of a chap I had been using for years but it was all more than I could stretch to with so much still left to get so I decided to get a new cooker, the cheapest he had and second hand everything else. A local bed shop came up trumps when I went to get the mattress, a washing machine for £99 and an American style fridge freezer all reconditioned and sparkly for £125!! They were up there smiling at me again!
With the new cooker coming in at £199 the kitchen appliances totalled £423 plus delivery. In the teeny tiny kitchen there was no room for a dishwasher, naively I thought this wouldn't be a problem whats a little washing up? Turns out this was a bad decision for a dishwasher princess with my previous routines of unloading first thing in the morning and obsessively re-filling all day long, picking up cups, plates etc etc from around the house left in a trail by each member of my family. The washing up piles up next to the sink and drives me CRAZY but at the time it seemed an extravagance.

The only thing missing now was the TV and the sun was really shining on me when I walked into the shop and found the exact TV at half price!

The House on Moving In Day

These pictures were taken on the day I got the key, its a shame the pictures arn't scratch and sniff as it really did wiff inside the house! There was still the old couples things piled up in the living room that the sellers hadn't moved out yet and my son found some books from the war that kept him quiet whilst I did some measuring and then we went off to get the essentials, a TV and a fridge. I'd asked the kids what they wanted most in the house, my daughter said she need exactly the same TV that she had had at 'home' and my son said he couldn't live without his amarican style fridge/freezer. Great, £2000, that wasn't going to happen! Ah well positive thoughts.....

Moving In

It was a catch 22 situation, I could find another house but the surveys and faffing would all begin again and take as long as waiting for the Deeds on Ambleside. I needed to get my family back together. The initial momentum of making the break had gone and it now felt like I had blown my whole family apart. The only thing to do was to rent somewhere whilst I waited. I had begun to look at property to rent but it was a very depressing thing to contemplate moving twice and of course you couldn't sign a rental lease for anything less than six months, I felt utterly trapped.
Then in the early hours of my sleepless night I came up with a cunning plan, why didn't I rent Ambleside? It was empty and it would mean only one move, sure it smelt of wee but at least I could begin the work on making it livable so first thing in the morning I very shakily sat down and made the call to the estate agents. She said she would contact the seller and get back to me. Unusually the call came came straight back, the sellers were all for it. I found out later that they were really worried they'd loose me as a buyer and they just wanted to get me in there, although I heard later still that they were also worried that if I lived there for a bit it might put me off buying. Everyone was very nervous and very strained it seemed. Once all the hoo-ha had settled down I met the sellers a few times and they were lovely people and had great affection for the old couple that had lived in the house.
So a rental agreement was drawn up, I had to sign for three months but the agreement would terminate before that of course as soon as the Deeds were sorted out and I would get my bond back. I handed over quite a large amount of money up front to rent a house with no kitchen, bare floorboards and a hideous bathroom, you couldn't have got further away from the standard of living my children were used to and I'm sure my friends thought I was nuts. They didn't say it but you could see it written all over their faces when they first came round. Even the rental agent from the estate agents looked shocked when she let us in that first morning as that was the first time she'd seen it. Obviously I'd told them I wasn't prepared to pay the going rental rate for a terraced house considering the condition that it was in and we had negotiated an amount. It really irked me that I was having to pay the sellers unnecessary money as I was perfectly able to buy but at least we were in, three months after my offer had initially been accepted but we weren't out of the woods yet.

How long is this going to take!

I'd had the offer accepted, the surveys done, the price renegotiated, finances were in place and contracts were ready at my solicitors to sign. Nothing. I kept going into the estate agents who promised to chase the sellers solicitor and three more weeks went by, it was so frustraiting and I desperatly needed a space of my own and to begin to make a new home for my children. I could have screamed, in between the crying. It felt so cruel, Id left for a better life, for peace of mind and this was agony.Thank god for a new job and friends that kept me sane.
I pushed and pushed and after a few weeks the sorry news came back that the deeds to the house were lost and new ones would need to be applied for. This would take a minimum of six weeks. I was devistated, really really low, I missed living with my daughter so much, the family members I was living with lived a very different way to me and all of this uncertainty was almost too much to take. I began to look around at other houses that were empty, it felt like I had waisted so much time and money. Six weeks doesn't sound like much now but at the time it felt like forever. I was spending so much on petrol and picking my daughter up from the house that used to be my home knowing that my ex now had a new life in it was killing me. Why wasn't he having to suffer when he was the one that had done wrong, it was tourture. I was still paying bills for that house, hundreds of pounds worth of water, gas, electric as I had been paying monthly and once the accounts are closed you owe the balance. Leaving mid winter when the biggest bills were in wasn't a smart move but of course we can never time these things!
I waited and waited and when I rang one day to find that the new deeds hadn't even been applied for yet I blew. I was withdrawing my offer, I was pulling out, I'd had enough but after a night of very little sleep I had a plan and I rang the estate agents first thing in the morning.

Negotiations

Trying to work up the enthusiasm to finish the wallpapering in the living room today, its all neat and tidy after Christmas and once I've packed away the decorations the thought of getting the pasting table back out and making a mess isn't thrilling me much. I wrote a plan so that I would get the downstairs finished this month, a schedule of works, I can't find it....

So the Structural Engineers report came back and it was good news...ish. There had been movement of the front wall caused by inadequate bracing of the roof trusses, basically if you think of playing cards leaning against each other with nothing in between, they collapse and thats what had begun to happen with the roof at some point and this had pushed the front wall away from side walls by about two inches. Fortunately this had been spotted at previously and some beams had been inserted between the trusses so there was no danger of more movement. This was good news as it saved me the expense of doing it and made the need for work to be carried out much less urgent. What was needed was some metal angles to anchor the walls back together. Also the ceiling joist between the living room and bedroom floor had warped and this would need replacing or securing.
I rang the estate agents and arranged an appointment to go back with my builder and have a look, another week went by.
The owner of the house and his builder said the report of movement was nonsense and they were at the property having a look when we arrived but scurried off without saying a word to us which felt very suspicious. My builder was very negative about the property, telling me I wouldn't make any profit on it. The estate agent gave me the owner's builder's phone number so I could call him as he wanted to reassure me that there was no movement. I was beginning to feel a little indignant that everyone assumed I didn't know what I was doing, I'm not saying they were being sexist but my hackles were up and it took some guts to stand up to them all. All in all I felt very alone and scared. It had been a long time since I'd had to make these kind of decisions on my own and I felt terrified of making the wrong decision, I rang my ex. Not a good move for my heart but a smart move with my head as, also in the building game, he thought the same as me that Ambleside was worth the risk and that the risk wasn't that big. He gave advice on what to say when re-negotiating the price to take into account what I would need to spend on this structural work and with a racing heart I made the call. A few phone calls flew back and forth over the next few days until they finally agreed to drop the price and we agreed on a figure that everyone was happy with. My ex was surprised at my strength, the estate agent was more than a little fed up with me and I was totally drained, I cried a lot that week.
Buying a house can be very stressful and unbeknown to me it was only going to get worse.

Wobbly bits

Soo back to the story, after I put in the offer and had it accepted it was the sensible thing to do to get a survey done to ascertain if there were any problems. This is absolutely fundamentally necessary, DO NOT skip it to save money, it can end up costing you dearly. The RICS Home Buyer Survey should be thorough enough to pick anything up, mine was booked for the following Wednesday and cost £300 which I was to send in advance of course. I didn't have £300 so I had to borrow it.
The seasoned house buyers amongst us know never to get your hopes up and begin to think of the house as your home as a gazillion things can go wrong and your heart is in a fragile enough state as it is without more loss to cope with. Its tricky but keep non emotional about the whole process, not easy when your desperate for somewhere to live.
The survey didn't go well, the dreaded word 'Movement' was used and I was devastated, never very good at taking my own advice but I needed a home so badly, I needed to get my children back under the same roof and I needed to begin my new life. This was a really difficult time, coping with heartbreak, missing my partner so much, it took every ounce of strength to keep going. I had a new job to get used to and I was travelling a lot between my old home, where my daughter was still living to be near school and my mums where I was living with my son, which wasn't ideal as their lives didn't run on the same time clock as mine. Every setback felt disproportionately unfair. I felt powerless and desperate, it was horrible. I didn't want to just walk away from Ambleside and besides there were no other houses on the market that I could afford but I had to be sensible. I didn't know what to do next, what the next step was so I asked my solicitor, hoping he wouldn't charge too much for the advice. The advice was to ring a Structural Engineer and talk to him about what exactly was causing the dreaded movement. I was so nervous to make the call, it felt like one of those do or die calls and I really was out of my depth but the man I spoke to was so reassuring. It wasn't a case of running a mile from the property he said, oh yes it was a worry he said but not necessarily a deal breaker. I was so relieved and handed over another £225, borrowed of course and was quite relieved it wasn't a lot more money as I'd worried it would be. More anxious waiting until the report came through and by the time it did a long month had gone by since I'd first put in my offer.

Christmas at Ambleside

The last post I actually wrote a few weeks ago but didn't finish it or publish it until today (New Years Day) as I'd hit a low point. Loosing my job hit me very hard and a lack of momentum and enthusiasm quickly followed, I got very very down. It was a mean flu virus too that lasted 3 weeks and that didn't help at all but then Christmas was upon me which was a distraction and provided a jolt back to action, that was much needed.

I only part decorated the living room as time ran out but I did manage to make Ambleside homely and cosy to some extent for our first Christmas together.

My Children and their partners and lovely friends that visited filled the house with Christmas cheer and I hope the house loved having laughter and a new family in it for Christmas!

 Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year

Hitting a low point

The trickiest part of developing, when your living in it, is keeping the momentum going once the initial flush of enthusiasm fades. This is made particularly harder by outside influences sometimes, like I have just lost my job and have been on the sofa for two weeks with the flu!!
Not man flu but proper flu so you can ask me any question about daytime tv and I'll know the answer, although at one point the pain in my head was so bad it was impossible to focus on anything loud....or bright, I think its the longest I've been of Facebook in years! Picture me in dark sunglasses, subtitles on watching American sitcoms on repeat in the middle of a building site!
When your feeling that low, it all comes crashing in and the brave face goes out of the window, you know those cracked and rotten windows that need sanding, painting and refilling but for now all you can do is sit in the draft and sob. I'm not going to sugar coat it these last few weeks have been tough.

Normally when life knocks you you'd scurry home, shut the door behind you, pull on your comfy slippers, put the kettle on and snuggle up in the warmth and safety of your own hugging four walls but when your walls are anything but snuggly its not much fun. The worry of suddenly having no income when your bathroom in bare plaster and a caving in ceiling is no joke and I'm hiding from the neighbours as there is now no money to replace the dilapidated fencing on the left which joy of joys is mine and will require several hundred pounds throwing at it.

When there is no shoulder to cry on and and your terribly missing the shoulder you used to cry on the test to ones character is immense. You really wish your fairy decorating-mother would show up and finish it all off and sprinkle anti-heartbreak dust in all the little cracks (or big ones)

So in the spirit of reduced financial means to do up the house, my drippy red nose and I went shopping! Look at the bargains I got! This thrills me, finding bargains, doing up a room cheaply when you could have spent a fortune and it doesn't look cheep, hopefully I can transform the Living Room for Christmas.