March – What a Month!

I simply cannot believe we are already in April. Say what? Seriously – where is the year going? How can we be already 1/4 of the way through? I am however eternally thankful for the miserable British winter to go away and sunnier spring days arrive. We’ve had some absolute fab ones so far and I’m really hoping for even more to come and perhaps even a BBQ too!

A couple of things happened in March that I felt needed mentioning. The first is that the blog was featured as Property Renovate’s Blog of the Month – There’s a lovely feature about our renovation, which you can read here including our plans, our regrets and all challenges we’ve faced so far. I was super excited to be featured in this and had much fun responding to a load of renovation-y questions.

And the second thing that’s happened in March is that we got a freaking kitchen!! If you’re following me on Instagram (find me here) you’ll be up-to-date on all the home renovations and already know this. But if you’re not – after a whole freaking year without a kitchen, we now have one. Well, half of one. We still have worktops to fit and the sink to plumb in, but we’re getting there. We’re REALLY getting there. A day I thought would never come!

I’m not going to lie, a year without a kitchen has not been easy. There were moments when I just wanted to hide in another room and not face the chaos and the many months with a lack of nutrition turned me into a right old grump too. I most certainly will not be missing Icelands bargain ready meals, which has been the sole part of our diets for faaaaaar too long. I’ll also be thankful to see the back of the plastic cups, which had me spending endless hours chasing dogs around the house after they’d be blown off balance by a mere breeze and then pinched by their little tiny mouths. Oh and plastic cutlery – bloody heck, those things are a health and safety nightmare! I can’t tell you how many forks I’ve been using, only to realise some of the forky-teeth bits had snapped off into my meal never to be seen again. I probably have an array of plastic stuck in the bottom of my belly which surely is just not healthy? They’re also a right bugger for melting and becoming nothing short of useless. It’s just not practical, I tell ye!

{This was one of the fancier ready meals I purchased, so obviously had to photograph such a luxury!}

I also wont be missing our makeshift kitchen tap, which went strong for a whole 11 months! It’s basically the formation of a stop-cock and random pipes put together. It dripped like a bitch for about 5 minutes after every use, which meant the need for a constant bucket under it. And the exposed waste pipes also leaked – another bucket situation, but this one was a very very stinky bucket. Anyone want to smell the water that comes out from the washing machine and left to sat for a few days? Honestly. The life we’ve lived for the last 12 months has been nothing short of ridiculous. Even the kettle made me want to puke every time I looked at it. I’m sure we’ve been drinking tea infused with dust.

But all that, is almost over! We hope to have the kitchen fully kitted out and usable before Easter and we’ll be having a ginormous banquet Easter Feast to make up for the fact we didn’t have much of anything at Christmas. I literally cannot wait!!! ALL the exclamation marks for that one! Our days without a kitchen are seriously seriously limited.

Watch this Space!

PS – Here’s my happy face. It hasn’t been seen in a while…