Wall Envy and Confusion

Yes I know, I think I would get D - for my blogging at the moment.  What can I say?  Still clearing the attic, it is embarrassing the amount of stuff up there!  Anyway by Bank Holiday Monday I was so grumpy about the whole thing that the bearded one decided to get me out of the house for an hour (to save his own sanity I think as I had been snapping at him all weekend).   I had wanted to go to Potager Garden for a while after hearing about it from friends and this was the perfect opportunity.  It is over on the south coast where our new home (hopefully) will be, so we thought we would explore the area.

It's a lovely little garden with a cafe, there is a lovely 'feel' to the place, all very 'hippyish' which suits me down to the ground.  I especially loved the wall built out of logs, my sons partner has said he will  make me one when we move, probably not to this scale though!

Coffee, cake and a stroll around the garden getting ideas for our new home set me on the path back to a happy Chickpea.  People thought I was a bit strange photographing the compost heaps and chicken run but it is all research.  The cafe is lovely with a glasshouse next to it where you can play table tennis and extra seating so that even if the weather is miserable you can sit surrounded by exotic cacti.  It lives up to it's name by growing veg for the cafe, potager meaning kitchen garden.

If you are in the area go and pay a visit and give them your support in developing this little oasis of calm and community.  I'm sure I will be visiting often.

House news - I'm about to get quotes from removal firms, it's been 15 years since the last move so I think I will have to sit down with a stiff drink afterwards!  I'm still prodding the bank and conveyancers to get things moving, why do things take so long?

I'm confused this morning, blogger is telling me something about changes in HTTPS settings.  My poor brain can't take in anymore information at the moment.  Can anyone translate this into English for me?

Chickpea xx



Chickpea xx

Prancing around in my Pinny

Lucienne Day design fabric

I took some time out from the frantic de-cluttering/packing this week to go to a pinny making workshop.  A friend was saying how she would like to have an old fashioned crossover pinny when we walked into the fabric shop a saw a pinny making workshop advertised.  Well it was fate so we immediately signed up.  I found this fabulous retro fabric which cost more than any sensible person would pay for a pinny, it just means that it will never be allowed anywhere near any type of cooking of course.  I will just prance around in my pinny, glass of wine in hand pretending to be a 50's housewife.  It is not quite finished of course........yet another unfinished project........but it will look nice hanging up in the kitchen even if I never finish it.  I hope to get around to it before it is packed for the (fingers, toes, legs and eyes crossed) house move.  I just need to finish the shoulders and top sew around the neck and armholes.

Crossover back

I am chuffed to bits that I actually made something I would wear, unlike my other dressmaking disasters.  I'm even tempted to make one in linen to wear over a top and leggings.  What do you think, would anyone notice it's a pinny?

In other news, things are moving slowly on the house front, it doesn't help that the buyers solicitor sent the paperwork to our old solicitors despite being informed that we had changed to another.  Two weeks wasted!  Oh well gives me more time to plough through 15 years of clutter in the attic.

Chickpea xx

Send out a search party

I am lost in the hell that is my attic.  I cannot believe how much stuff is crammed into every corner, it is a nightmare!  I think attics should be banned, if I had to look at all our old stuff everyday, move it to clean, constantly trip over it etc, I'm sure I would decide that I really don't need to keep every bit of paper that my children draw on, all of their old school books, toys and clothes.  The drum kit and surf boards would have been ditched years ago, but while they are hiding in the attic they avoid the grim reaper.  I am drowning under a sea of boxes, if you don't hear from me for a while send out a search party, seriously I need help, I have fooled myself that I'm not that bad at hoarding but I confess......I am a hoarder.  Is there a cure?  I hate the thought of things going to landfill so have been trying to come up with creative ideas to divert a lot of the stuff elsewhere.  Old c.d.'s will make bird scarers, old clothes for quilts and rugs, a huge amount is going to a friends mother who raises funds for a wheelchair football group at car boots.  There is still an awful lot of stuff that unfortunately has to be taken to the dump, it is a timely reminder not to buy anything that cannot be disposed of in a 'green' way.

I am also in a flurry of chasing up solicitors, estate agents etc. to try to keep things moving.  What a palaver!  The house buying/selling business being as it is in England, there is nothing stopping someone coming along and offering more money on the house we hope to be buying, or our buyers pulling out.  It is a nerve wracking business and the further I can push the process along hopefully the less likelihood of this happening, though I get told horror stories of people pulling out within days of exchanging contracts.  Aaarrrgghhh!!!

I am so stressed that I am grinding my teeth even more than usual in my sleep (when I do manage to sleep) and have broken bits off two teeth.  I have been told that wearing a shield when I sleep would help but I'm worried that this would affect my already terrible sleep patterns.  Has anyone ever tried one?  Any advice would be most welcome, I don't want to shell out a load of money only to find I can't use it.  It hasn't helped that I have had redundancy looming over me....yes good timing hey....but was relieved to be told today that my job is safe.  I feel desperately sad for all the people who have lost their jobs.  Working in the Public Sector used to be a relatively safe profession, not any more!

Apologies that my blog is so boring at the moment, life seems to shrunk to work, housework and packing at the moment.  Hopefully in a few months I will have lots to share as I turn my hand to the country life.......I will be needing a lot of advice as I stumble my way through growing my own, looking after chickens and learning about the country that I will be surrounded by.  I will be getting used to strange sounds, smells and the dark again.  It is been a long time since we lived so close to nature, no streetlights, no local shops or walking into the city for a meal.  How our urban cat will cope with it I'm not sure.  I will also be exploring a whole new coastline, I have always headed to the north coast, in our new home (fingers, toes, legs and eyes crossed) the south coast will be nearer so lots of new beaches to walk.

I will leave you with some photos of a natural phenomenon that looks like something out of Dr Who.  Every now and then, conditions come together to form sea foam, it looks very weird, but is harmless.

                 

Love the wobble, it's a bit like jelly :)

Chickpea xx

Keep your fingers crossed

We have had our offer on a property accepted!!!!  Let the stress begin!!!!!  ........ yes lots of exclamation marks, that's the way I'm feeling, pent up energy bursting out all over the place.  It is very early days and a lot could go wrong, it is not straightforward and I have already spent two days on the phone trying to sort things out with solicitors and estate agents.  I'm sure my blood pressure has gone even higher than usual.  Being firm when I was negotiating the price was hard, trying not to show any emotion, doing the whole 'this is what we are offering, we will not offer more, we will walk away', but eventually we came to an agreement.  It doesn't help that half the people involved are off on annual leave when I really need to push things forward to meet the deadline of impending birth of our buyers baby.   ARRRGGGGHHHH!  I keep reminding myself that this is nothing compared to what Sue over at  Our Quiet Life in Suffolk  has had to deal with.  She is flipping amazing.  Luckily I was on annual leave this week so could spend the time on the phone, don't know how I'm going to manage when I'm back at work next week and can't take or make phone calls during clinics.  

Anyway, I won't say too much as I don't want to jinx anything.  I will leave you with photos of our lovely walk yesterday.  We decided to head inland to avoid the madding crowd and took a picnic with us, the first for the year.  Well o.k. to describe it as a picnic is exaggerating, there were no wicker baskets, quiches and glasses of elderflower presse, just a flask of tea and a sandwich, squashed in my backpack and eaten perched on a rock.  The weather was glorious, unlike today which is grey and raining.  It was a lovely distraction from all the things whizzing around my head.   When we returned we tidied up the garden and I covered my little veg patch, I don't think I will have time to grow anything and don't want it covered in weeds and cat poo from the neighbourhood cats for the new owners.  I have also started to clear out the greenhouse, sad to think I will not be growing anything in there, it was my dads and brings memories of his tomatoes and cucumbers which used to fill it and groan under the weight of it all.  I obviously haven't inherited his green fingers.  

These were taking at Stithians Dam, as you can see the water is very high at the moment.  It is a weird feeling looking at the water and imagining the buildings left at the bottom when the valley was flooded.  I have been to the lake before but never the end where the dam is situated, strange how we often overlook beautiful places on our doorstep.  In Cornwall we often head to the coast but this little gem of a place has lovely walks, watersports and is good for birdwatching.  

I love the beautiful yellow gorse 

Not sure what you can catch, my dad was a sea angler so I don't know much about freshwater fish

A very brazen bird who was very reluctant to move

A felt a bit wobbly taking this photo, I really don't like heights

Hope you have a relaxing weekend, and welcome to the new followers,

Chickpea xx

Destination Unknown!

My apologies for not blogging for a while, but I have been well and truly in the doldrums. The description of doldrums is "a state of inactivity, mild depression, listlessness, or stagnation'  Yep, that pretty much sums it up, I have felt like I'm neither moving forward or back, just adrift far out to sea.

However all that will change soon.  We will be moving one way or another!  Destination unknown!

When we accepted an offer on our house our buyers were not in a hurry as they wanted to move down to Cornwall to start a family (and who can blame them, it is such a wonderful place to raise children).  Well they let us know yesterday that a little one is on the way and would like to complete by the beginning of July.  Of course we said that would be fine but we still haven't found anywhere......eeeekk.  I had written a whole rant about how useless estate agents are but deleted it as even I am getting bored with complaining about them.  We used Tepilo who have been brilliant, but as for the rest of them........!!!!!

We put an offer in on a house on Monday so have been on tenterhooks all week only to find out today that the estate agents haven't even put the offer to the owners yet.  FFS!!.......no I'm not going to rant.....I must resist ........try to think happy thoughts......

On that note, I will leave you with some photos of a recent trip to the beach to walk off my frustrations.  The dogs in jumpers certainly cheered me up :)

Enjoy,

Chickpea xx

With the beautiful blues seas it looks like the Med.

The low tides have recently revealed an ancient forest but I couldn't find it

We used to be able to walk along this pier but after several people were swept off over the years it is now closed off.  The original white hut was washed off in the storms a couple of years ago but has now been replaced.