Anyway, two such blogs have been rattling around in the semi-occupied space up top and chronologically this one has to come first - for reasons that will become apparent later.
A little more than thirty years ago, my beloved took his very large wife (great with child - yes, still me!) down a lane, along a bumpy track and over a rattly cattle grid to a small gamekeeper's cottage surrounded by fields, with a garden the size of a postage stamp and numerous very run-down outbuildings including a straw barn occupied by a major rodent population. More honest estate agent's blurb might have read: no heating and a kitchen circa 1960 which should be demolished with immediate effect. I expect it actually read something like: A unique opportunity to buy a period home in need of some restoration with stunning views across open countryside, blah, blah blah. One day I'll find the particulars but in the meantime, I can tell you that my version is a whole lot more accurate.
Also it isn't true to say that we were 'viewing' the property because my beloved had already shaken hands on the deal and if I had imagined that our forever home (for this is what it was always to be) would be in a pretty village with a proper kitchen, heating and somewhere for the children to play in a safe environment, that ship had already sailed. But I knew that this was indeed my beloved's forever home as it was part of the estate where he had lived as a boy (in the posh house, of course) and he had poached extensively here throughout his youth. And this has been our forever home, a life sentence of the best possible kind - probably a lot longer than any custodial sentence dished out in court.
So already purchased by the time I even saw it for the first time, thirty years ago this month we moved in - that is to say, I moved in with the help of a friend at bang on nine months pregnant with number 2, my beloved arriving at about 4.00pm having been held up at work. Hmmmm.... Anyway all that 'Mr Shifta' stuff failed to dislodge number 2 who wisely chose to stay where she was until the central heating was working properly a couple of weeks later.
Various outbuildings were demolished, straw bales removed and the rodent population took over the garden until one day when I had laid number 2 baby on a rug by the front door in the sunshine only to see a very large rat (my imagination says terrier-sized but I may be exaggerating) approaching. The rodent population was well and truly obliterated with immediate effect thereafter!
We had such grand plans back then but never the capital to do more than a relatively small amount of work at a time and friends (who thought we were mad to move here in the first place) always referred to the house as a work in progress which even now thirty years on would be a correct description. We've built and converted, dug every square inch of garden, fenced and cattle-gridded, planted all the trees apart from the two cypresses which is all that remains of what was there when we arrived. It took eight years to get rid of the dreaded green formica kitchen and I still think of my twenty year old kitchen as 'the new kitchen' even though it is now overdue for replacement.
But this is home in every sense of the word. Three of our children never lived anywhere else until they left school and number 1 won't even remember our previous house (with a proper garden and very nice kitchen!). It's a special place to all of us and even though we haven't done half of what we'd hoped, it is, without doubt, on a sunny day like today the best place on the planet. Though I may of course be a bit biased but this is my blog and I'm allowed!
