Category: The archive (Bradford house)

Change of plans

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I’m kind of sulking, because I’m not going to be able to chop up our units to make a dressing table.  The neverending saga of me not having a dressing table continues.  I suppose if I ever actually got one, it wouldn’t be neverending.

Instead, we’ve decided to leave the units as they are, and replace the red stuff with white stuff.  Otherwise, it’d be white on white on white, and that’s clearly too much white.

As I said before, we will still be having white drawers/cupboards/wicker baskets in the units, but it won’t be quite as clinical as we first thought.

Barry’s asked me to clarify why he’s wearing sunglasses inside on yesterday’s post.  It’s not that he’s too cool for school, is a pimp, or has some strange eye disease.  No!  It was just incredibly sunny this Sunday – so sunny, he had to wear sunglasses inside.

I also wanted to show off that we got tickets to the Sunday of Radio 1’s Hackney weekend, and am super excited about it!  If my friend Rach picks up her phone, we might even have somewhere to stay for the night…

I’ve just remembered that I promised our living room carpet to Jaime many moons ago.  I’m afraid it’s not going to be much use to anybody (it’s covered in splashes of paint), and Charlie and Jaime did get their carpets redone about a year ago, so I’m hoping he’ll forgive us when we throw it away!

Slowly but surely

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We had a busy weekend planned, so didn’t get much house stuff done. On the plus side, we got to play with Finley (Charlie and Jaime’s super-cute and ridiculously clever baby), saw The Hunger Games (the book’s better; knocked half a point off for shaky cam; 3/5), and had a delicious Sunday dinner at Charlie and Jaime’s. We even ate outside in the sunshine! Fly count: 1. It has been decreed, Barry can no longer use the fly excuse not to eat outside.

Anyway, between all that, Barry did a bit of painting. Not art. He painted the alcove (again, please watch In Bruges to find this funny!) and the windowsill is all glossy as well. A photo didn’t really do it justice, so I’ve scrapped the one just of the windowsill. Still got sanding and painting to do, but we are steadily getting there.



Very excited about the flooring coming on Saturday. We got it from a sale at www.infloor.co.uk, which was by far the cheapest we’ve seen it. No idea how long it’ll take to put in though.

As an aside, we also saw The Cabin In The Woods last night. Also 3/5. Would have given it more apart from the gaping plot holes, although it was funny and shocking at the same time.

Lottery

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Do you ever think of the things you would change (house-wise) if you won the lottery? I do!

Win over a certain amount, and obviously you could move (which we would – why would you live in a semi-detached house?), but if you won a less life-changing amount, you could still make some dramatic changes. I like the thought of not having to wait to decorate rooms. We could have our bedroom painted at the same time as decking is being put into the garden. Built in wardrobes? Not a problem. Dressing table? I’ll take two.

Having said all that, as long as we’re in this house, the kitchen will always be the kitchen Barry put in with his own bare hands. We’ve agonised over flooring, and waited until payday to buy the next lot of paint. I’m not trying to say I would’t appreciate the money (I definitely would), but there’s pride to be had in working for it too.

Photo wall

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While all the kitchen malarky’s been going on, I’ve also been thinking about our photo wall for the living room.  I’ve mocked up the photos on Illustrator, and it’s been really helpful to visualise how it will look.

This has made me realise that we need to whittle down the photos more, and scale down some of the ones we were going to have printed A4, so it has been a useful exercise.  Definitely need to look at it again before buying anything!

It’s hard to know where to start with this, because I’ve never done this before, but this has been a cheaper way of discovering I’ve gone a bit overboard than buying all the photos and frames, and then realising it!

Tables and chairs

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I’m looking at tables and chairs for the kitchen.  We’ve talked about having stools and having the extra bit of wood as a breakfast bar, but I’m anti-stools in principle.  I don’t enjoy balancing as I eat.  The extra bit of wood has to wait until we get the flooring in anyway, as we need to fix the pipe (that’s just arrived) to the floor to hold it up.

I’ve got my beady eye on these white chairs and matching table from Argos, but Barry prefers the purple, which I don’t think matches.  I also like these ones, which are on offer at the moment, but we’ve just bought the flooring, so I think they’ll have to wait a while.  You can have a look at them with the other stuff on my Pinterest kitchen pinboard.

I am looking forward to having breakfast in our shiny kitchen!

As a side note, you may notice that I’ve added a bunch of buttons on the right to make it easier for people to find and follow me.  Most of them were copied from Karen’s blog (thank you!).

As yet another side note,  I’ve committed us to the raspberry paint I mentioned before on our bedroom wall, although at the moment, it does like someone was shot and killed against it, and then the killer tried to clean it.  It’ll be better when the whole thing’s pink.

Something for the weekend

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Along with going to see The Hunger Games on Saturday and Sunday dinner on Sunday (both with our best buds Charlie and Jaime, hi guys!), we’ve got a few kitchen tasks for this weekend…

  • Paint the alcove. If you aren’t thinking quotes from In Bruges right now, I pity you.  This is the alcove (right).  Or do you say nooks and crannies?
  • Sand and paint the ceiling.
  • Cut the peninsula to the right size. Barry’s just bought a shiny new circular saw and is itching to try it out, despite the fact we can’t put it up until the flooring’s in.
  • List the radiator and butcher’s block trolley on eBay.  Because we all know how much I love my customers.
  • Order flooring. We’ve made the following mathematical calculation:

a + b = c

Where a = concrete flooring, b = £100 off online sale and c = credit card.

Barry put one of those pop up plugs into the worktop yesterday. Scary drilling a huge hole into our shiny new worktop, but it looks fine! A post for the peninsula is on its way. eBay is good for so many things!

We also bought one of those paint pads with the tiny wheel a few weeks ago. They’re supposed to create a straight line at the edges when you’re

painting, but Barry’s had another crack at the black paint and it doesn’t seem to have made a blind bit of difference.

Barry put the shiny new curtains up yesterday too.  They’re a lot thinner than our last ones, but they’re pretty!  I could always line them if it’s a problem.

Almost there

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Barry’s been a busy boy (say that five times quickly after a few drinks). He’s made the box to cover the fuse box. Twice. I didn’t like the purple on white action, so he had to make another door in white.

He’s also been sawing away at the cornices and pelmets, so they’re done, and we’ve made the interesting discovery that Tipp-Ex ® is nigh on exactly the same white as our wall units. Good to know.

This means that the units are done!  The peninsula can’t be made until we’ve got the flooring in, so that’s it for now.

We’ve been comparing the flooring samples to the units; it’s definitely got to be white. For the quantity we’re wanting for the kitchen and living room, it’s of no benefit to us to get two rooms’ worth together, so we may split it into separate lots so we can at least have one room sorted. It will definitely be the kitchen first due to the concrete flooring!

We’ve also put the dining room table back up because it doesn’t look like flooring in there will be changed very soon and we’re both tired of eating off our knees in front of the TV.

You know the drill, photos below!

Neighbourhood watch

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Despite living in this house for three-and-a-half years, we don’t really know our neighbours.

On one side, we have Family A; the ones who let their dog poo freely.  I’ve mentioned this before.  We know the couple’s names, but they had a baby a couple of years ago and I’ve forgotten his name.  I know the name of the dog, who is the fluffiest Alsation you ever will see.

On the other side, we have Family B: a lovely couple who I think we’d get on with well if we saw a bit more of each other.  I once sat next to the lady on the bus home and we had a lovely conversation.  Barry’s spoken to the man’s dad quite a few times, so we know more about him than anyone that actually lives in the house.  Her mum has been round a few times to borrow a corkscrew!  They also have a dog, but it’s a bit crazy and won’t stop barking when it sees anyone other than the owners.  Although I see myself as a dog person, this makes me jump and scares me.  On our way home from a night out, a very drunk Barry stopped to pet the dog and (in his best doggy voice), said, “Hello, doggy!  Why are you out on your own?  Where’s your owner?”.  The owner was at the other end of the lead Barry had failed to spot, so I just dragged him away, apologising.  The neighbour seemed bemused, but it may be why we haven’t seen much of them.

Both sides have been round and looked at the kitchen.  The dad of the man from Family A actually knocked on our door to have a nosey (which is fine because we’re show-offs), and then happened to be outside the day after the worktop was put in, so we asked if they wanted to see it.  Family A guy said they were thinking of doing something similar, so there may be a spate of home improvements down our street shortly.

Family B nipped round when B&Q delivered some of our stuff to their house, and made polite noises about it looking nice, but haven’t been round since.

I’m thinking a housewarming may bring us all together.  I’m calling it a housewarming, because we never had one, and now we’ve definitely got something to be proud of (or will, when the floor’s done!).  After all, we all know that’s when good neighbours become good friends…

Bits and bobs

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Did a few bits and bobs yesterday.  Barry put the new lights up while I cleaned the kitchen windows and then he sealed the boxed off boiler pipes with silicone and the cooker hood with liquid metal.  We also remeasured the kitchen and the living room and looked at flooring again – if we get the one we want, with cheap underlay, it looks like it will be about £750, so Barry’s investigating cheaper options!

In the meantime, I’m sewing material into some boot top covers – we’ve got fancy dress next month for Barry’s birthday, and I’m going to be (wait for it) Supergirl.  Can’t wait!

A retraction

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Following yesterday’s post, in which I explained how I was sorry for not picking up the phone to the eBay woman, I would now like to take that back.

Exhibit A is the texted conversation from yesterday morning:

The kitchen is incompatible with the plumbing, so I need to sell it.  could you offer it to the next highest bidder for me please.  many thanks

I’m sorry, but you will have to relist it.  I can’t see the next highest bidder now it’s been sold, and it was possibly different bidders for all 3 items.  Sorry unable to help.

OK.  I might just change tops and sink, so not a total disaster.

I really didn’t want to get involved in either the fact that plumbing matches the kitchen, not the other way around, or selling the kitchen to another person who could turn out to be just the same, and still be embroiled in this madness.  I’m emailing her the photos of the kitchen so she can relist it (when her computer’s back up and running), but that is it!  My part is done!

We were at a 105th birthday party yesterday (happy birthday Jaye and Carole!), so didn’t get much done, but we did nip to B&Q in the morning to buy some lights and get the right cooker hood filters (thanks once again to Jason K, who was brilliant.  Bet he loved seeing us again!).  We decided on some lights from B&Q, like the other ones I wanted, but in a circle instead of on a rod, and £10 cheaper.  They have disappeared from B&Q’s website though, we’ve got a habit of choosing lights that are about to be discontinued!

Barry’s also bought a coffee machine that lights up, very exciting!  And he oiled the main bit of the worktop so it’s really glossy and smells nice!  We also took the protective plastic off the stainless steel splashback, which is always very satisfying.