Ding! Ding! All change, please... (now replaced with new diary on MFW)

RosaBernicia · 5 September 2023 at 12:31PM

Happy new home EH, peace and joy to you both there and everywhere.

rtandon27 · 5 September 2023 at 1:36PM

EH - hope you are taking lots of breaks and not drowning in boxes & packing materials

Suffolk_lass · 5 September 2023 at 1:50PM

Guessing still no broadband, as predicted (along with better things to do with your time).

Now you are in, please can I suggest you get a qualified sparks to do a full electricity safety check and give you a ten year certificate. We have to do it for (thatched property) insurance but having lived in a Heath Robinson wired house once, this is a good thing to put on your to-do (or ta-da and KC calls them) list!

EssexHebridean · 6 September 2023 at 11:32AM

Morning all - and thank you SO much for all the lovely good wishes, comments and questions!

To try to answer a few things, (although with no specific recollection of who asked what for the most part I'm afraid - sorry about that!) I'm still undecided about the new diary idea - not least as this one is still quite "young" - but then again I do feel that this is a clear time when I should be heading across to MFW, so perhaps...

Electrics - (this was you SL I know) - one half of our selling couple was a trained and qualified electrician so we are pretty comfortable about this bit! As and when we have our "tame" sparky in for anything we will get him to have a look over the house and spot anything he thinks we should address. We are intending to get the heating and boiler checked over in the next few weeks though so we know where we stand with that, and we will also be getting the chimney swept quite soon so we know that it all done ahead of winter.

Broadband is due to be done on Friday which will be handy - we will need to establish what coverage we get from that although I'll be expecting the vodafone chap to ensure that we have coverage ALL over the house before he leaves!

First saturday night tea in the new house was very fittingly cheese and crackers - a proper weekend favourite of ours, and also with the advantage of being quick and easy! I've also had my first go at using the oven (as has MrEH now) which went reasonable well even if the cost of cooking on electric did make MSE-me go slightly pale...! The hob too is fine - it IS an induction one - so I have assorted cookware that isn't any use to me now - including all three of my lovely Anolon frying pans. that's going to be an expensive game to replace, but needs must! We have already replaced the wok too - sadly my lovely old Ken Hom steel one (lovingly seasoned with nudging 30 years of use) while will start off heating just fine, as soon as it gets properly hot the base "domes" just too much to make it continue to work. Needless to say I found this out at precisely the point where I dropped the first veggies in to start cooking on sunday evening! Cooking stir-fry in a saucepan is "interesting" and so when we saw a well priced updated version of much the same wok but with a fully flat base on Monday, it got purchased! It's a non stick one but is allegedly safe for metal utensils - well we'll see won't we!

And finally, as requested - to try to paint a picture of the house for those of you interested. You walk in through the front door to a wide-airy hallway. The front room is immediately on your left - big low bay window, lovely little open fire in a black surround. All in a bit of disarray at the moment as we keep thinking "Hmmm...not sure where that's going" and sending things to the front room! Back in the hallway ahead of you you have the stairs on the right, and the corridor leading down to the kitchen/diner on the left, but just before we head in there I'll just point you to the door at the end of that corridor on the right - a neatly fitted downstairs loo, very handy!
In to the kitchen then - an L-shaped worktop in a gorgeous "sparkly" black granite, cupboards fitted above and below are all just a classic white, and a large island with has the sink fitted in it, and also houses the washing machine and dishwasher below. I can see that keep the island clear of "stuff and clutter" is probably going to be a full time job all of its own and may involve a fair bit of swearing-under-the-breath!. Beyond the kitchen is the "diner" bit - or the living room as we are calling it already. three velux windows in the roof mean that the light just floods in, it also has french doors in the centre of the back wall with a window each side. Garden beyond as you might expect is not huge but plenty big enough for two people who've never owned a garden before! Massive shed at the end which is currently quite full but will actually have masses of spare space in it once we are all unpacked and sorted!
Upstairs - three bedrooms and a small bathroom, oh and the stairs have a "return" with a window on the part-way landing which is great - makes the stairwell really light and means that in warm weather getting good airflow through is easy. The first bedroom you come to is what will be our spare room - requires a wee bit of decoration but we'll get that sorted in time. Next door to that is our bedroom - we've already got that pretty much sorted all bar a lampshade. It's got an absolute MASS of fitted wardrobes which is brilliant - SO much storage in those - and a lovely restful duck egg blue/teal/white colourscheme which we've added to with teal curtains. Went full MSE when looking for small rugs for each side of the bed too (it's got grey laminate flooring which will be a bit foot-chilly in winter) and ended up with a pair of what are technically bathmats, but work perfectly! Also the little storage unit which had been in the bathroom at the flat turned out to fit as though it had been made for it in the gap between the end of the run of wardrobes and the wall so a nice bit of shopping from home there.

Finally the smallest bedroom which also contains some very useful storage, and now has my dressing table (no room for that in our bedroom) and several bookcases too, plus the laundry hamper. The bathroom has a white suite as you might hope (might have been entirely put off the house had it not had!) with one of those shower-baths with the wider bit at one end. A bit of storage, lovely geometric tiles on the floor which have also been used for the shelf to the side of the sink. Window (Which will want a blind fitting ahead of winter) above the sink. Needs a heated towel rail fitted but it looks like the fittings are there for that ready - we'll get the boiler/heating chap to look and quote when he comes in.

And there you go - that's our house!

I'll probably be back later with a bit of a fully MSE type round-up....perhaps in a new diary though, I'll see. Will of course put the link here if so!

lucielle · 6 September 2023 at 11:51AM

It sounds wonderful!!
L

EssexHebridean · 6 September 2023 at 12:56PM

....OK - the plunge has been taken....

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6471208/and-now-we-go-again/p1?new=1

It would be delightful to see you over there - and as always the virtual kettle will of course be on!

Makingabobor2 · 6 September 2023 at 2:26PM

Sounds amazing. Will be joining you on the new diary of adventure.

Seasidegal58 · 6 September 2023 at 3:51PM

Off to join you on your new adventures!😀👍

rtandon27 · 6 September 2023 at 5:13PM

oooooo - EH - thank-you for painting such a lovely picture of your new home!!! Looking forward to your further adventures on whichever part of the forum you decide to "live" on!