change is as good as a rest

Big news - life is ever changing and full of surprises!

We are moving house... back down south or at least its little way down nearer Leeds and family and to a house which we think hopefully is as nice as the one we are leaving... its a hard act to follow but somehow it feels right and while its come right out of the blue -it feels ok (ish)...

We will be very sad to leave the sea and our lovely community who made us so welcome, good neighbors, trees and rooks all the things that have made living here so special (sheep eating your plants - ducks sabotaging your sunflowers) but the new house appears to have several advantages, which hopefully will make up for these losses.

The new property is marginally bigger, it has a small 'garden room' and a large utility space freeing up the kitchen. There's a reasonably sized private sun catching outside space - may be even room for the summerhouse. There is also a garage. Its at the end of a small lane so nobody walks past or looks in and it opens onto fields and a farm... its in a small village just outside of Darlington.. its a little bit quirky, The whole set up is a bit like where we are now..10 mins of the A1... houses, farm and big house.. no amenities just post box and bus stop slightly nearer civilization but still out of the way... no sea view but open land all around and not far from the river. Just over an hour to family which is the main rationale for moving - our grand children are growing so quick... and as close to Newcastle and observatory as we are now so Dr Fred can continue all his work.. Another advantage...there a Boyes in Darlo and Barnard castle so it just gets better every time I think about it!!

our new (rather misty) view from the front of the house

It has all happened very quick and very unexpectedly last week I was rescuing paving slabs to build the summerhouse on the paddock - no intention of moving.. but there was always a niggle..... and then pretty much out of nowhere - a chance find... my head is reeling but I'm excited and ready to get organised although god only knows how its a good job i.m a minimalist.....

So this last week has been a completely new experience for me.. I have never moved house 'properly ' before - I didn't really leave home until I was over 50 and then I moved slowly a bit at a time living in two houses part time. when we finally made the move to where we are now - again we did it a bit piecemeal - one big van load and then over the next 5 years bringing stuff as and when I found it on visits back to my other house (which I rent out).

Its a bit of a shock to be honest ha ha... the realisation of how much stuff we have accumulated and starting to pack it all up is a mammoth task even from such a wee cottage as we have....... emptying the walls in my studio is quite sad but I can envisage all my bits and pieces finding a new home in a new space and all will be well.

I may be very busy for a few weeks so postings may be erratic - internet stuff has to be sorted all those pesky things that require attention when moving.. watch this space....

Scotland part 2

The second half of the week continued in much the same vein. We had one rainy afternoon which was actually quite nice to be holed up in the house with the rain lashing the windows. It probably wasn't quite so nice for the two visitors that came on their bikes but they're tough cookies - and its only water- but I did feel sorry for them having to cycle six miles back down the track in the wind and rain, but given Scotland, it wasn't as bad as it could be. The big quest for the 2nd half of the week was to find some deer antiers! The chap that owned the house dropped in to visit - he was a very friendly fella and was chatting about how this was the time of year when all the Stags lost their antlers (he collected them and sold them) so after that we were on the serious lookout. It's always been Fred's mission to find some dropped antlers.... The Monro baggers continued with the mission to bag the remaining three Monros... there is discussion as whet...

Vigo

We left the ship to explore Vigo. Its a much larger place then we expected... although tbh I hadn't given ut a lot of thought. Its a real mish mash of old and new and having got a map from tourist info we decided to follow the walking trail to the Monte Castro... the highest point of the town. Most of the town was pretty much as everywhere else... lots of traffic... lots of people... one or two interesting buildings and a lot of shopping. We headed to the art gallery - this has been a year of gallery visits so we we seen o reason to change now. The Museo de Marco is housed in the towns ex prison building and its very grand. In fact, I think that on this occaision the building might have been more interesting than the art.... Although the visiting exhibition by Susanne S D Themlitz was strangely compelling. It was a huge varied collection of eclectic items... found, salavaged, manipulated and arranged in lots of ways - weirdly inspiring - and mostly enjoyable to look at...

Funchal

So after three days at sea we finally hit Funchal in Madeira. An escape from the ship, and I have to say it was very pleasant indeed. First of all the weather is really splendid. Especially when you know that everybody else in the UK is suffering grim storms and vile winds.. Over here it is between 22 and 25 degrees is really quite warm. Funchal is a pretty city. It's built on a hill it with lots of lovely white houses with stunning red roofs. In order to get the best of it we walked along the sea front until we got to the cable car and we took it up the hill. It was a really good ride much longer than we imagined and it's quite weird because it goes right through the town - completely over everybody's house... So not only do you get a lovely vista of the bay but you can view the beautiful rooftops and get to look in everybody's gardens and to look at their picnic sets.. clean washing nice plants... scratty b...

Planet Ruby Starrs

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