House Move

 

It's only taken 30 years but finally I've grown up, fled the nest and am sitting on a low rung of the property ladder! Buying your own home is a hassle isn't it? It's almost as if the people who are meant to be helping you buy a house are also actively working against you and speaking in an alien language that only their kind seem to understand and doesn't translate well for the rest of us. 

As first time buyers the amount of documentation required from us was slightly overwhelming, and the whole process was just really confusing, but we got here in the end and are now proud owners of a small two bedroom flat! It's not completely ideal for us as it is a first floor flat and getting the pram up and down by myself can be a bit tricky and, watching the two, incredibly sweaty chaps, deliver our sofa was quite harrowing as they were leaning it on railings and suspending it in a slippery manner over the balcony!

An unexpected bonus of this place is the view. We knew there was a view as the estate agents had been sure to photograph it as a benefit, and we'd seen it when we came to view the property, but it really comes into its own in the evening! The sun goes down just behind that sticking out tree there and the colours are just fantastic! I have to stop myself photographing it every evening because there are only so many photos of the same view you can have on your phone but, really, it is just so lovely and I spend long periods of time looking at it. At the rear of the flat is a balcony leading to a fire escape (which we are using more as our front door as the actual internal front door is a bit dingy and depressing) overlooking the carpark but when you are sitting inside on the sofa, mostly what you can see are trees which is lovely. 

We are settling in well I think, especially now we actually have furniture! Some we got for free, some very cheaply on Gumtree and some new but on sale. There's more to do to make it ours and we haven't really started decorating yet, but I have many plans and Reece is just trying to reign me in slightly! Our parents and aunt and uncle have really helped to get the ball rolling as the flat was quite dirty when we moved in so lots of deep cleaning has happened and odd things you wouldn't have thought of are now replaced and shiny new (like plug and chain sets for the sinks, new sealant around the bath and shower, new plughole for the bath, a light pull, completely new light fitting, filter for the extractor in the kitchen and a more powerful extractor fan for the bathroom). All things I wouldn't really have thought about!

I still pop back to visit the Parents about twice a week though so the postal address for the Stitchscape Swap will remain the same for this year - I need to be sure that these precious envelopes will actually arrive and currently the letterbox on the shared front door of the flat (shared with one other person upstairs from us who we haven't met yet) is one of those tiny half-sized things so I will need to look at getting that changed for modern sized post to go through! 

I can't wait to see how this view changes over the year! Or in different weathers as it's mostly been sunny with some cloud, but a good thunderstorm should look amazing here - or snow!