The House at No. 1

Short: It will be. We got the keys on the 20th Feb xxx

Me: One year! We should celebrate x

Short: ...

Short: Yeah I suppose we should.

Short: What should we do?

Short: Have an Indian that weekend? Invite people round?

Short: Do some painting?

Me: Fix the light switch?

I don't know that we've lived up to our expectations over the last year. We were going to do all this DIY, and the house was going to look completely different now. A year ago I was worried that I would run out of things to write about because we would get all the work done so quickly. Short was convinced he would come home from work and get on with the DIY whilst still spending a generous amount of time at the allotment. We both thought that by this time we would be eating Jams and frozen veg that we had grown ourselves.

Maybe we were slightly optemistic?

We've done some DIY. The Living Room is pretty much finished, we need to repair some damage done by a leaky gutter, and new curtains might be nice - but its in a livable condition and we love it.

The Dining Room is nearly finished too, there's a little bit of gloss work needs doing, bits of the ceiling need repainting after the pipe explosion and we need some curtains or something in the window. Oh and a little bit of trim on the skirting boards.

The Kitchen remains pretty much as it was. With the addition of white walls, blue painted tiles and the removal of one door lock. Oh, we also put a new lampshade up, but the fitting needs replacing, we're just psyching ourselves up for that.

The Laundry Room is the same, minus the flooring. Its cold in there, very cold.

The Hallway is looking, ok... The chalk board wall hasn't materialised yet, but it is mostly painted. The gallery wall is there, in essence. Still need handles on both the doors, the stairs need painting and the floor could do with another coat of varnish. I also want to put up some coving, some sort of window dressing and get a door mat for the gap in the floor.

The Landing is...well, its just bad. The big holes have been filled in, and I got so fed up with the floor I painted it. Which looks ok, sort of. If you ignore the bit where the paint ran out and I used a different type and its not the same shade of white at all. Who knew there was more than one shade of white?! We have been talking about replacing the floorboards so we can sand and stain them to match downstairs. It should be a weekend job to do, I think.  We also need to finish stripping the wall, then fill and paint the whole thing, the bannister rail needs doing too.  But if you get half way up the stairs, close your eyes and then feel your way until you get into whichever room is your destination it looks fine.

Bathroom. Painted white - unfinished. Not really changed, just new bathroom bits like shower curtains, bin, etc. Really want to fit the new radiator, light fitting, tiling, shower, etc. Big job, will be content for now to just get Short to fit the new light switch, and finish painting the bits I can't reach.

Master Bedroom. I switched the furniture round? We added curtains too, and replaced the light fitting. So pretty much as was really. Hoping to get the end of the room set up as a walk-in wardrobe type space, ideas for getting extra storage out of an awkward space. Really would like to check out the condition of the floorboards, but we're butting heads on carpet vs wooden floor in the bedroom.

In the Spare Bedroom all we've done is added furniture - we don't go in there often and there's still no mattress. This is way down on my to do list, I don't even know what I want to do with it.

We spent a weekend painting the Office. Only to find that the walls are in worse condition than we suspected. We were going to strip the wallpaper, but its stayed through fear it would bring all the plaster crashing on our heads. So, quick paint job, new lampshade and our old bedroom curtains have done the trick. I have half finished painting the furniture, but gave up when the weather turned cold.

We won't have finished any of the rooms before we hit the year mark, I don't think. But that's ok. It's not about rushing to get it completed, it was about buying a house and creating a home for us and then living in it. We've done that, everything else will happen in time.

I'm thinking by 2030 we should probably have finished stripping the hallway... 

You know I was congratulating us not long back, just on the fact that the house was in pretty solid condition all in all. That really on a scale of 1 to 10 we'd done alright, not too much damage needed to be repaired. Really everything was ok.

I was wrong. Very wrong.

When it came to the landing upstairs anyway.

It was one of those days where we'd already spent the best part of two weeks stripping wallpaper in the hallway. We were tired, and we'd already spent a couple of hours at the house that day. We had an extra helper in the form of little sister, and as usual I was flitting around taking paper from what bit of the walls and then another.

I got out the step ladder and began to spray the paper above the doors, resting my hand on it I leaned down to get my scraper and the wall moved. Ok, slight exaggeration, but the plaster definitely did move under my hand. So I got back up and, well, poked it a bit. Definitely spongy. So I pulled at it a bit.

Then it began to fall off. A lot.

I might have screamed for Liam. Maybe.

After clearing it with his Dad we made the decision to pull the rest off, it it was spongy it had to go. Then his dad would come and re-plaster it for us. Which was lovely of him again!

So we got to work pulling the plaster off. Poor sibling had the job of standing underneath the door with the bucket, catching the dust as it fell. Whilst wearing the attractive combo of her brother-in-laws t-shirt, a breathing mask and protective goggles. Safety first friends, safety first.

Here's a handy tip, according to a plasterer. Apparently, if you have a hole that you want to re-plaster, first prepare the surface, and surrounding jagged areas of plaster, with watered down PVA glue. It stops the open plaster edges from crumbling. I can say it does work.

So then we waited for that to dry, and father-in-law came and filled in the big hole with cement, and we waited again. Then when that was dry he came and skimmed it for us.

And now?

Its all ready for papering.

Using a Champagne glass to hold stray nails - that's just how I roll.

You know those people who start a project then see it through right to the end. Yeah, I'm not one of them. I get bored easily. Consequently I start one project, decide that it's getting a bit dull, then move on to something different. Maybe that's not the best way to work, and Liam hates it, but since I like demolishing things I usually get my way.

So the week that we had off together was a bit of everything, we learnt a few new lessons as first homeowners:

1. Analglypta is the paper of the devil.

That stuff just won't come off! There are also two different types, one just slightly more devilish than the other. If you have the newer kind, lucky  you, because if you get a finger hold on it then you can just rip it off. Leaving only the backing paper. If you have the older kind I feel your pain, two weeks later and we've still not managed to get all the paper off in the hallway.

2. If you have textured all wallpapered ceilings then just leave them alone.

Unless you can afford to re-plaster of course, then by all means go ahead. When we moved in I was all like "Yeah, we're going to take the paper off the ceilings and then they will be smooth. I hate textured ceilings." My dad looked at me then and said "No you won't.", oh daddy how right you were. Looking at the mess the walls were in once we removed the paper I don't even want to contemplate the state of the ceilings.

3. In an old house filler and caulking are your friend

Seriously. The amount of that stuff we've gone through. The walls had so many dings, cracks and little holes in. They're also not straight, which leads me to...

4. Stuff will never look perfect

The walls in our house are just crazy. There are lumps from the old picture rails, curved corners, the window is narrower at the top than the bottom, the skirting isn't level, you get the picture. You can't measure one bit and then think it's all going to fit right, because nothing is standard. It's all trial and error, then some more error, then eventually you might get it to look half decent.

5. Carpet fitters stick nails EVERYWHERE

The amount of times I have been stuck by nails in the last couple of weeks is just not funny. Also, you know you have to pull the extraneous ones out if you want to sand your wooden floors? Yeah, we're doing that in most of the downstairs, the stairs and landing. It's a long job. You need one of these, you will thank me later. The one I am using is an old one belonging to my Father-in-Law, so much easier than using the hammer! Oh, and there will be staples too, so, enjoy that.

6. It is so worth it.

It just is. We're in love with the house, and bit by bit it's just getting better.

I wonder if you can guess what happened today?!

It's really not that much of a mystery is it?

So we're going to the house, and I am going to put a 'house tour' up, at some point. Probably.

Eeeeee! So excited! I can officially say its our house.

I know. That’s the whole aim here. Honestly though I can, hand on heart, say it is the scariest thing I have ever done.

We weren't planning on putting in an offer on any property this morning. Myself and the man had booked second viewings of two properties – one we adored and the other we felt lukewarm towards.

We viewed both last week and wanted our parents opinion on the two.

House No. 1 is a beautiful semi-detached, built in 1888. It has a hall, with original molding, a huge living room that also has original molding. Then a second reception room that is even bigger, followed by a kitchen and extension. The kitchen as it stands is big enough to house a dining table, but knocking through into the extension could create a fabulous space like you wouldn’t believe. As long as we took out the toilet that is currently in there.

Upstairs is equally spacious, with three double bedrooms and a largish bathroom. Oh, it is also on the market at around £30,000 less than similar houses in the area, and open to offers.

Why didn’t we snap up this beautiful bargain immediately? It has some pretty serious negatives that go some way to explaining the low price. It leans. We’re talking standing on the stairs and feeling dizzy leaning. The entire house seems to have sunk forward on its foundations. Now there’s no sign of cracks anywhere in the property, so I can only assume that the entire house has sunk forward. Now, if the subsidence is historical, less of a problem, jack the floors up and hey ho, family home. If you have a few grand to spend. If it’s not historical then that’s a whole other kettle of fish. Old fashioned decor we can deal with, but we don’t have the ready cash to start rebuilding a house.

However we do love the house, so we got in our parents to give it the once over. But over coffee and breakfast we decided, regretfully, what in our gut we already knew. It’s a none-starter. Goodbye dream home, hopefully you will find someone to love you, who has money.

House No. 2. We’d viewed this one before dream home last week, and I think in seeing our dream house we had sort of forgotten how much we liked it. It is exactly what we were looking for, three bedrooms, semi-detached, 1930′s, a bit of a fixer upper but not too much, utility room. It’s also in a decent location with a lovely garden, the bonus’ are that it has an original 1930′s bathroom suite and a garage.

The negatives are that it is over budget, and it is getting A LOT of interest.

Problem.

So we did what anybody else would have done, rung up our estate agents and put in a cheeky offer. With a view to going higher of course.

Unfortunately we were met with a firm negative, but given a little heads up on what the venders are hoping for. So Monday will bring, offer number two.

People tell me that buying your first home is exciting. Honestly, I don’t know whether it’s my anxiety, or whether it is normal to feel absolutely petrified. I didn’t want to make the decision, I wanted the man to do it for me. In fact I began questioning my entire future, worrying that buying the house was it, until death do we part.  I had to give myself a stern talking to I can tell you, and now I’m starting to feel excited. Nothing is set in stone yet, of course, but I’m finding myself day dreaming about the work we want to do. Maybe I’ve been googling how to remove Anaglypta, because this 1930′s house has a really bad case of it.