Typical Bank Holiday

Amazingly the sun was shining on a British bank holiday and given we weren’t stuck in a traffic jam somewhere by the sea side, we decided to tackle that other bank holiday tradition – the garden.

Or more specifically, the front garden. We’d not really touched it since moving in 6 months ago and the house was beginning to verge on the abandoned looking from the street.

Shortly after moving in, we’d taken a couple of conifers down that were against next doors garage. Only after they’d come down did we discover that they were really all that was holding up the side gate. After a few strong gusts of wind, I’d resorted to rope and bits of the broken gate to secure it.

Broken Gate 2Broken Gate 1

 

I was in 2 minds whether to blog about repairing the gate since I use repair in the loosest possible terms. It’s highly likely that when we start the building work (if we ever start the building work), the gate and side fence will have to go, so I was loathe to spend any real money fixing it properly. Once I’d removed the securing rope and cross bar piece of wood, the whole thing collapsed allowing me to properly survey the scene. Both the gate post and fence post against next doors garage had rotted through completely at the bottom, although I was delighted to discover that both had deep concrete slots that they had once fitted into. I thought momentarily about just re-using the old posts and dropping them back into the holes with the result that they would be slightly shorter than before and then the gods sent me a message. A strong gust of wind caught the old fence post which I’d propped up against the garage and sent it careering towards me. With a long rusty nail sticking out the back of it, it neatly tore a gash down the length of my t-shirt at the back. Counting myself lucky I had someone escaped a trip to A&E, I decided to opt for something almost as painful and braved B&Q on a bank holiday monday. Fortunately, someone must have been smiling on me today as they had both the gate post and the fence post in stock in the right size. Armed with them and a pack of decent, but frighteningly expensive, screws I headed back home. What better excuse than a glorious sunny day to crack open the circular saw. An hour or so of heaving and faffing around later – my temporary fix was in place. Hopefully it’ll last me out until the end of the year. Something felt very wrong about nailing back the rotten old featherboard to the sturdy new posts, but at least it all blends in and my repair is seamless to the untrained eye. (Well from the front anyway).

Fixed GAte

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The rest of the afternoon was spent tidying up the beds and weeding the drive. I can’t claim much credit for that as Lu spent pretty much the entire day on her hands and knees on the gravel turning what had practically become a lawn, back into our drive. 8 Green sacks of cuttings later – we’re looking sort of presentable again at the front. Well, apart from the render of course!

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Shocking! (or hopefully not)

After moving into any house, there follows that period which I call the “Discovery era”. You start to notice things that you probably should have noticed before buying, but nonetheless they turn up now.

Fuse Box

The wiring on the house was one thing that we knew we would have to sort out at some point. The fuse cupboard contains a historical account of wiring through the ages. My view has always been though that the last people had lived here with this wiring for 30 odd years, so it’s probably not going to combust on us tomorrow.  That said, it’s definitely near the top of my list to sort out in the future.  Looking through the assortment of fuses, I’m sligtly alarmed to discover that the kitchen is on a spur rather than a ring seemingly and only protected by a single 13amp fuse. Quickly doing the math of a halogen hob, oven, microwave, kettle, fridge freezer – seems like we may be pretty close to 13amps of usage at peak! -Mental note not to use the kettle and microwave at the same time methinsks- (Wonder how long that’ll last)..

Also – following the trail of mystery wiring around – slightly perplexed to discover this:

Bell Transformer

..hmm yes – the door-bell transformer seems to have been used as a handy junction box for wiring in the hall and study lights as well as a cabinet light in the lounge. Another area to pretend I havent seen for the time-being methinks and besides, at least it’s all protected by this:

Big Switch

Yes – that does seem like a very appropriate fused switch to protect the door bell! (In someone’s mind I guess).

Just because it fits on paper..

One of the first things we needed to buy for the house was a new washing machine. The previous owners had taken theirs with them and we’d sold ours to the folk who bought our house. Buying a washing machine is a surprisingly mind-boggling task. Spin speed, drum capacity, energy rating – just what is the difference between A; A+; A++; A+++ anyway?!? We decided to go for something as big as possible on our budget and ordered online.

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What really should have been a simple plumbing and installation exercise became my first important lesson (elementary really) in measuring up. We have a utility room (cupboard) where the washing machine was to be housed. There were all the necessary connections in place and plenty of room for the machine to fit. Slightly less room, however to actually get the machine into the room.

Hours later with the shelf dismantled, door removed – finally we had the ability to have clean underwear! Hopefully that’s not going to have to be moved again any time soon!

 

 

Moving Day

Moving Day

14th September 2012 – After what felt like an eternity, moving day was finally upon us. Although there are just the 2 of us, moving out of a fairly standard 3 bed semi, we somehow managed to fill 2 removal lorries to the brim.. and a transit van.. ..and the focus.

Going In...

Nothing quite compares to the feeling of getting the keys to your new home and going in for the first time! Much to the annoyance of the removal team, we speedily rushed round with a camera to capture the calm before the storm – also known as the ‘before photos’..

 

Hello World

Ever since moving into our new home, I’ve wanted to keep some form of log to chart the trials and tribulations of a house that everyone warned us not to buy. Inspired by my friend and work colleague Dave’s blog, I thought I would venture into the hitherto unknown realms of wordpress.

..and so with the obligatory initial “Hello World” post, here beginneth the story.

Having just finished the complete renovation (de 1970’sing) of our last house we decided it was time for a new challenge and to try and find the ‘forever home’. Our wish list would send Kirsty and Phil running for the hills, but at least we were flexible on area. With a pretty tight budget for London’s suburbs, the only saving grace was that at least we were prepared to do some work..

Estate Agents Picture

Estate Agents Picture

Lu found the house and initially I wasn’t even keen on going to look at it. Eventually, as is the usual setup with these things, to keep the peace we booked an appointment to go and look round together. I’ve always been a believer that you know whether a house is right or not the minute you walk through the front door, and stepping into the oak panelled hallway – we both immediately knew this would be the house for us.

Seeing as this would be a not insubstantial purchase, I booked (in a moment of insanity) a home-buyer survey through the mortgage company. If I could only offer one piece of advise to a prospective house purchaser, it would be don’t waste your money on a mortgage company home-buyer survey. The document came back helpfully colour coded in red – for severe, needs immediate attention; yellow – would benefit from maintenance and green – ok. Except it wasn’t – it was all red. Every section, every subsection – red. Walls, Roof, Electrics, Plumbing, Damp, red, red, red, red, red. Reading through the pages of horror, it’s a miracle the house was even standing. Only, every section was caveated with – “you should consult a specialist surveyor to inspect this area”.

Electrics and Plumbing seemed an absolute no brainer and I was expecting, but the damp and walls worried me so we found a local independent surveyor and asked him for a second opinion. I met him on site to run through his report. The news wasn’t great, but at least there was no damp and although I think the term ‘Money Pit’ was used he could at least sympathise with our immediate love for the house.

..and so with the sums worked out (cheated and manipulated) with surely our heart ruling our heads, we completed our purchase.