Champagne Lifestyle on a Lemonade Budget - 2021

MrsPorridge

Enjoy your facial Helen, what a lovely treat.

phoebe1989seb

Wednesday, is there any update on your house sale/purchase? It seems an absolute age since you first mentioned you were putting yours on the market. Hopefully it will all fall into place soon and you can begin life in your new location 😊

My recent champagne moments include - 

On Saturday morning we drove a couple of miles into our nearest market town to pick up picture hooks and command strips (the latter for attaching a set of aesthetic movement inlaid oriental panels - another of DH's amazing carboot finds from a few years back 😁) and did a detour into the local antique centre. I knew it was a bad idea as soon as I saw the huge framed Indian embroidery panel 🙄 Suffice to say I bought it, although at £120 it represented quite a bargain imho!

Yesterday we began putting the guest room back together, although even that isn't a five minute job as there are so many components involved 😉 Loving how it looks so far!

After today's latest dentist appointment I popped into Homesense to return a couple of items and was delighted that a pair of cushions I'd seen there recently were still available...and marked down from £50 to £30 each 😄

Wednesday2000

phoebe1989seb said:

Wednesday, is there any update on your house sale/purchase? It seems an absolute age since you first mentioned you were putting yours on the market. Hopefully it will all fall into place soon and you can begin life in your new location 😊

I can't remember what I said on here, but we have a BTL investor buying our house now. He has done the initial mortgage valuation and got approved by the mortgage company. We just paid for the survey on the house we want as well but it was only last week (I think) so we haven't had the results yet.

It is idiotic how long it has taken and it is still not definite obviously as other things could go wrong.

It was the start of July that we got our offer accepted and sold our house! Nearly March now. I can't believe I actually thought at one point we could be in by the time the stamp duty holiday ended last year.

phoebe1989seb

That's crazy, Wednesday!!! I consider DH and I extremely lucky that we've never had a house sale/purchase take anywhere near as long and sincerely hope you don't have to wait much longer 🤞

It definitely puts me off ever wanting to move again and makes me all the more determined to continue the process of making our current home somewhere we'll never want to leave..... that's the theory, anyway, lol!

Today's champagne moment - I'm going through the boxes of vintage taxidermy butterflies and preparing to hang them on one of the guest room walls 😎 Although we reduced our collection drastically a few years back, we still have a reasonably decent number and it will be good to have these on display again!

Happy St. David's Day 😄

helensbiggestfan

Oh Wednesday, that is so frustrating for you.  Let's hope it all gets put to bed soon and you can get into your new home and start your new life.  

The EA rang me this morning to see if I was ready to put mine on the market yet.  Unfortunately not quite, still a few outstanding bits and pieces.  All cosmetic but they will make a real difference, making the house easier to sell and hopefully help me get a really good price. 

 I am a bit behind, I have been struggling a bit, trying to do it all myself.  Tbh im getting a bit long in the tooth now for diy. 😂🤣.  So, taking a cue from my husband who used to say "why have a dog and bark yourself",  I have decided to delegate some of the heavier or trickier jobs.  I think I now need to stick to the designing, sourcing materials and doing all the "fluffing". My handyman will be coming in a couple of weeks and hopefully we can really crack on and get it all finished and market ready.  I'm aiming for around Easter.  

Ive ordered a new bed, which arrives tomorrow.  Grey suede divan with 4 drawers for extra storage. Very smart.😉  I Will need to buy some new bed linen because it's a double whilst my current bed is king size.  The double will go in my room.  The king size will go in the upstairs bedroom, which although it has sloping ceilings, it is a much larger room so the bigger bed will look better up there.  The upstairs room Just needs a lick of paint first and then I can go to town and dress both rooms and hopefully make them look beautiful. 

I have seen a gorgeous apartment, great location, wrap around balcony, overlooking the river and with panoramic views. It will probably be snapped up before I have chance to sell. I'm not too bothered.  I keep seeing nice properties on right move but the best ones are literally selling like hot cakes.  Im not going to worry I am happy to rent for a while if needs be.    Like you Phoebe, This will probably be my last move so I want to get it right. I don't mind renting whilst I search for that perfect gem. I really would have loved the Georgian Town house I missed out on.  A big project but I could have taken my time. Alas it was snapped up within less than 24 hours.  It would have definitely  been my forever house.  Hey Ho.  I'm sure there will be something with my name on it.  

Speaking of gems.....I had a lovely browse round the chazzers this morning.  So nice to see summer clothes coming in at last. I picked up some real bargains this morning.  A beautiful embroidered cotton maxi skirt, a luxurious cream silk John Rocha top, a heavy linen shirt which can also be worn as a lightweight jacket and a cotton fine knit sweater in a lovely coral colour.  £13 the lot.  

Just goes to show you don't need to spend a fortune to have beautiful clothes.  

MrsPorridge

Champagne moment today meeting up with our friends for coffee.  We met at a garden centre and was nice to walk around and chat without our masks on.  The garden centre is very large and airy and very quiet so we felt good to be without the masks.

sugarbaby125

My Champagne moment on Monday afternoon was going to my local Odeon cinema to watch the film The Duke. I laughed out loud so many times at this tale based on real life events. It was just the pick me up I needed. I would give this film 9.5/10 

My Champagne moment today was having my photograph taken by a professional photographer for the photographic exhibition which will be at Blackfriars Settlement to celebrate International Women's Day on 8th March.   

phoebe1989seb

Helen, I hope you find a fabulous forever home when the time comes 😊 I feel your pain over the one that got away, though!

Sadly, there's a few *forever* homes that we've let slip through our hands over the years and whilst many people would be truly delighted to call our old mill home, with its lack of period charm (considering it's 400 years old!), I can't help but miss those places we've lost...

Most of all the stunning Arts and Crafts house we sold to move here - it wasn't the largest house we've owned (although it was half as big again as the mill 🙄) - but it was bursting with amazing character features, including a hand carved stone plaque set into the wall, detailing the builder's name, the date it was built/extended and who he'd built it for (his grandson)....it was so special!!! All our furniture and decorative pieces looked like they were meant to be there and - despite the fact we never finished it - to me it epitomised home 🙁

Never mind - it's too late for regret now...and we will - somehow - make the mill a home we are proud of!

Anyway, having succumbed to Homesense cushion lust the other day 🙄, I'm following the *one in, one out* mantra, so today's champagne moment was selecting several from my existing stash to get shot of!

One huge feather floor cushion (pad only, brand new, bought for a project that didn't happen) has wended its way to the charity shop whilst two massive silky art nouveau cushions have been listed for sale 😃

I received some more curtain fabric samples through the post, but have decided to save money by using the gorgeous green GP & J Baker damask velvet ones (already vintage when we got them on eBay about twelve years ago) we already have 😄

I'm about to embark on boxing up the snug contents in readiness for phase 3 of the building work, which we'll be starting imminently....so it'll be *horns pulled firmly in* time henceforth as we've lots of very spendy building elements to purchase 😉😂

MrsPorridge

Went to the cinema this afternoon to see The Duke - you are right Sugarbaby - lots of laugh out loud moments - a great film I loved it.

phoebe1989seb

Today's champagne moment - the guest room is just a smidgen away from being finished 😁

Just need to hang the door and somehow haul the bulky chest of drawers up the stairs (hopefully over the weekend!), but I can't resist adding a sneaky peek of some of my favourite features 😍

(edited to add - if you look too closely you'll spot that the window hadn't finished being painted in the last pic... and I'd not yet removed the protective plastic from the lamp shade 🙄)