Karl's Random Rambling.

We get the keys to the house tomorrow….OH.MY.GOD.

As much as I’ll miss the cottage (and I will)…so help me, we’ve already started mapping out plans for the new place. New/more sockets, plumbing alterations, garden changes, you name it.

Then after we move (Saturday, all being well) and things start to settle down, I have plans to improve the energy efficiency of the house.

I’m intending to replace the kitchen halogen lights (4) with LED ones..if I can find a decent set.

ALL remaining lights will go CFL unless there’s a reason they can’t.  I can see a dimmer switch that may stand in my way, and we have a PIR floodlight that we’re probably unable to convert.

Once I’ve got my head round the central heating controls, I’m going to modify them to be intelligent and manage the heating in a far more flexible way. What it has now is..basic. I don’t like that.

There will be more. As a comedy aside, we’ve also purchased an older Roomba..a 400 model. Lets see if it can assist in keeping on top of cathair and crumbs, shall we? ;)

Home first. We’ve lived in some places during our time living “autonomously”. First flat was a 3 room flat in an old tileworks, compact but easy to live with, but cold.
Then we moved to Clarendon, a 3 bed semi in a posh area of Broseley. Nice, very nice. I still regret moving from there, but heyho. Then we moved to a top floor flat in a converted house.
BIG mistake. We thought it’d save money, and it did..but the damp, the poor condition of the conversion, the flat itself, the neighbours and the landlord led to health issues and much stress, and us leaving and breaking contract before Izz was born in order to not bring her into that place.
From there, we moved to our current cottage. Lovely old place, exposed beams, huge thick walls, lots of character, big rooms. Bugger to heat, no garden, but lovely.

My cynical side always said we’d never be able to afford a mortgage, so renting was good. However, Jem persuaded me to chat to an IFA..and we did. We found that we COULD get a mortgage.

And now, here we are..the last 2 weeks or so of living at the cottage, before we hopefully get the keys to our first “owned” house! It’s a c1950s “Wimpy No-Fines” concrete job.
Ex council, ex rental, rewired less than 20 years ago, kitchen and bathroom refitted fairly recently, fully insulated, double glazing, driveway, gardens, whirlpool bath…

It’s a big, exciting step. I have a list of things to do both in preparing our stuff to go, and readying the new house to accept Izzy..heh.

We’ll have a nice little garden for her to play in though, which will be by far my favourite bit..:) She does love being outside.

We seem to have reached an understanding this last week or so – until now, if she woke after going down and I went to her, we had war. Wailing, crying, screaming tantrum war.

This last week or so, if I go up we have a bit of a cry, but as soon as I start singing nursery rhymes to her it all stops, she crashes out in my arms across me/next to me, and with a bit of cuddling/head/face stroking, she rapidly drops back off to sleep quite happily.

This is really a nice feeling..heh. I feel like I’ve been let into a small exclusive club! The difficulty is not falling asleep as well…