The Pros and Cons

Now with only one week to go until settlement, and three weeks until we move houses, I'm thinking about all the things that I'm going to miss about the house we're currently in, and the things we definitely won't miss!

It's the middle of winter in my little part of the world at the moment, and the rental home we're currently living in is in the bottom of a valley. In summer, this means that our house stays relatively cool and we save money on airconditioning, but in winter, it's freezing and our heating bills are astronomical.

Whilst it certainly doesn't get as cold down here as it does in other parts of the world, I can't help but feel a little jipped. If we have to be so cold, and I have to spend 10 minutes in the morning defrosting my car before driving to work, I think we should at least get a little snow for our trouble!

My car windscreen one morning this week

My front yard at 7:45am

The new house is only a couple of kilometres away, but further up the hill, so I'm hoping it will be much much warmer!

It's not all bad though.

What I'll be missing most about this house tmost, is the reserve across the road. With a creek running through it, a little pond, and walking trails, we walk Penny down there almost every day. She's loved having her own little swimming spots and space to roam and sniff free.

Penny enjoying the water in the reserve across the road from the home we rent.

I take some solace in the fact that the new house has half an acre, and our own little bit of creek for her to explore to her hearts content, but the area we're moving to is not going be anywhere near as Penny friendly for walking.

I suspect we'll be chucking her in the back of the car and bringing her back down here for walks in the reserve quite regularly :)



One week to go until the renovations start now and I'm Oh So Excited!!

Abby xx

Dining Room Wall "Art"

From the first time we walked into the house that is soon to be ours, I've been planning out what will need to be changed before we move in, where all of our furniture will be going and how I'm going to decorate.

For whatever reason, I became obsessed with the dining room. Perhaps firstly because we have such a huge dining table, that I wondered whether it would fit in there, but then because it is such a thoroughfare. With two bedroom's, the laundry/bath/toilet, kitchen, backyard, and the lounge room all having doorways that lead into it I wondered how I was going to decorate this area without cluttering it.

Obsessed with bright colours, I first started out on Ebay, looking for a bright Indigenous Australian artwork to hand on the back wall above the sideboard. Though I found many pieces like this one below  that I loved, I just couldn't justify the price.

Aboriginal Style by Jeanny N. Yarn
(http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Aboriginal-style-Jeanny-N-Yarn-110cm-85cm-COA-B322-/200793484021?pt=AU_Aboriginal_Art&hash=item2ec0396af5#ht_4030wt_1141)

So, I had to think outside the square, and decided to try my hand at making something bright by myself.

A self proclaimed pinterest addict, I'd collected a number of ideas that I hoped would work well together to create a unique and interesting piece for my dining room wall.

I started out with these mixed second hand frames that I bought from thrift stores for between 50c - $3 each. I then sanded them back and spray painted them grey.

The sanded back wooden frames

After a couple of coats of grey spray paint

I then collected a selection of mis-matched knives, forks and spoons with interesting handles, from thrift shops to paint and put in the biggest of my grey frames.

The hardest part was settling on the colours for my cutlery.

Before I could brighten up my cutlery, I roughened them up a bit with some fine sand paper and water until they lost their shine.

Next, I gave them a few coats of primer before I spray painted them the colours of my choice

Waiting for the primer to dry so I could get started on making them pretty!

Painted up and drying, before I put them in their new frames

I backed my frames with grey chevron paper that I spray adhesived to mdf. Once the adhesive had dried, I put the backs into the frames and used a hot glue gun to secure the cutlery to the backs.

Now all I have left to do is print out the photos I've selected (here they are just printed on plain paper from my home printer), put them in the frames, and then when we're in the new house, hang them on the wall.

I can't wait to see what it looks like on my Dining Room wall!

I'll be sure to share a photo of it when it's up :)

Abby xx

Two weeks to go

After years of work, play and travel, we've bitten the bullet and bought our first house. A little earlier than we planned to, causing a bit of a mad scramble for cash, but we're so certain that we've found the perfect house for us, that we're sure it will be worth it.

With settlement only two weeks away, the drama of getting our finances sorted is behind us, and now the panic of packing up the old house, renovating the new house, and moving houses all whilst still trying to work four days a week, is beginning to set in. This week the removalist dropped off some boxes so we can get started packing, and today they will be coming to work out how many trucks they'll need to move all of our stuff (and there's a lot of stuff!).

Matt's away with work up until 5 days before settlement, so I'm slogging it out on my own to get a lot of stuff sorted, but as he's usually away six months of the year this is something that I'm fairly used to.

So, a little about the house:

Three bedrooms
All with very dirty, ugly, smelly, perhaps original carpet in desperate need of being ripped out.
With ugly old built in robes that we'll be ripping out (even in the main bedroom where there is a walk in robe that someones converted to a mini office. Strange)
And all in desperate need of a good clean and coat of paint.

One two-way bathroom
80's.
Blue, blue, blue.
Scary.
Will be ripping it out and putting in a new one as soon as we can afford it.

Kitchen
Updated two years ago.
Not to my taste, but serviceable.

Two living areas
Both reasonable size.
In need of a coat of paint, new curtains and new floors (Lounge floor is lino that looks like wood. Ick)

Backyard
The major drawcard for us buying this property.
Huge (half an acre).
Creek running through the property.
Needs new fences to keep the dog in.
As with the rest of the house - needs a bit of work.


Armed with my folder of ideas that I've been collecting over the last two years, I can't wait to get in and start getting my hands dirty!

I'll keep you updated as we go :)


Abby xx