One Year as Homeowners!

Today is our one-year anniversary of living in our house!  Last year on this day, I was doing the last minute things  to move out of our flat (our lease ended that day), Jon was working most of the day and then coming home to our new home, and his brother and uncle were sitting outside our new house with all of our belongings, waiting for the estate agents to call saying the keys were ready to be picked up. The estate agents forgot to call us to let us know all the paperwork had gone through--luckily Jon made it to their office about 15 minutes before they closed and was able to retrieve the keys!  But we were able to spend our first night, on an air mattress, in our very cold but very own house. 


The house needed quite a lot of work done. although nothing that made it unliveable.  So far, we have:

• stripped the wallpaper in the living room
• painted the walls and (most of the) ceilings in the living room, 2 bedrooms, hallway and landing
• put in gas central heating, including a hot water heater
• gotten new carpets throughout the house (2 weeks before Gus was born!)
• put new lights in kitchen, bathroom and living room

Things left to do (not necessarily in the near future):

• paint the nursery
• finish painting internal doors and door frames 
• put in wardrobe in our bedroom
• redo kitchen
• redo bathroom
• redo the back yard (right now there are only patio blocks, three beautiful rose bushes, and a few random plants. We would love some grass and vegetables back there--if either of us knew how to garden!)
• get the lock changed on the garage so we can actually use the big door (we don't seem to have a key to unlock it!)

Although homeowning is tough work, it is pretty satisfying as well. For months after we got the house, I would walk back from the bus stop and think I am going back to my own house!!  And it is wonderful to think that this is Gus's home, where he was born and where we will experience all sorts of his firsts. We are very blessed to have such a great place to live (and we remember that doubly on horrible cold nights like these).  Thanks, house, for being such a great little home for us!