Wow, I have a lot of catching up to do. And if I’m honest, I’m not really going to do it all, I’ll just give you the highlights and then *really try* to blog properly from now on.
This was a while ago, maybe mid December, probably around the time I got the really bad cold which I’m currently blaming for my absence from blogging. It can’t be that I’m lazy, that’s ridiculous. Anyway, it was a beautiful cold snap, clear skies and frosty ground. My favourite kind of winter weather, aside from heavy snow. I love snow.
And beautiful, clear, cold days mean beautiful sunrises. I can’t remember why I was up so early, but it was a glorious, beautiful morning. I’m sure I went back to bed and missed the rest of it.
Lovely Elmo joining me for a walk. I have no real reason to include this picture, there’s no narrative, but I love pictures of Elmo and I figure when I reread all this, I’ll want to see gratuitously included pictures of all the people who come here, but especially of Elmo.
I painted the walls around that time. Well, some of them, anyway. It makes a hell of a difference to the under-bed dining room, where I am currently sitting and enjoying a brighter, homier feel than when it was still, basically, dirt coloured. Not that I had a problem with the dirt colour, but it just lent a real darkness to this corner particularly.
The paint (Aglaea, if you’re shopping around) is also really good for binding the surface of the walls so they’re less inclined to dump sand all over my floor, and it smells amazing. I think they put lavender oil in it or something. I’m very happy with the paint.
I need to do another coat on the dining room and then work my way around the rest of the house. I’ve done about half and I think I’ll make it with the one can I have, which is nice because it was expensive.
As you can see, the ceiling and skylights are still not plasterboarded, but I hope to get the last two bits of plasterboard I need this week and maybe work on it this weekend. I’m not sure whether I’m going to have a go at skimming the ceiling with plaster or whether to seek alternatives. I’m afraid I’m going to be rubbish at it and just dump plaster all over everything. But I guess I might as well try.
I did a very small amount more tiling yesterday and today, enough to mean I can now panel the end of the kitchen and build some shelving. We desperately need more storage space, living here is a long exercise in moving piles of stuff from one surface to another in order to be able to do anything.
I’m determined to get some done on the floor mosaic soon. I’m quite excited about mosaic in general. Sarah-May gave me a bunch of tiles in beautiful colours that will make an amazing mosaic when I have anywhere to put it.
In other news, I’ve finally seen a physiotherapist about my foot problem (bone spur, in case you missed that news) and she gave me ultrasound, which I’ll do for another couple of sessions and then review. She said I’m basically doing everything right in stretching it and resting it where possible and wearing the right shoes. I looked online to see if I could replace my old, seriously knackered Brooks running shoes, which are by far the best for the foot pain, and found a pair of black ones at half price. If I were spiritual at all, I’d say the gods were telling me I might one day dance again. But at the moment, I’m just trying to maintain a relatively pain free state while walking regularly and pottering around here doing stuff. It’s going ok, not getting better but at least not getting worse.
Today I’ve managed to tidy the place up a bit, inside at least, and make it presentable for our ex-neighbour Judith to come and see it. It was lovely to share it with her and to see her. I love showing the place off, although the outside looks a bit of a tip. The porch seems to be full of stuff that we’ve nowhere else to put, and it just seems to pile up and up. We need an additional shed of some kind, the first money we come up with will go towards that, if I get to make the decision.
I’ve just re-ignited the fire (it’s too warm, as in above freezing, to let it burn all the time) and am about to settle in and read a stack of old Vogue magazines that Judith gave me with a glass of sloe gin.
This place feels like paradise right now. Well, a paradise where Elmo is across the room swearing quietly at his computer, but maybe I can convince him to come and hang out at my end of the room.
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