New arrival

A most generous hand me down from my Aunty, her piano, arrived here last week.  It has found a permanent residence one side of the fireplace, right in the middle of our home. 

I used to play, but am a bit of a one trick pony at the moment playing Fur Elise and not much else.  Still to my non-piano playing family I think they are a little impressed (if not tired of hearing the same tune).

Everyone is interested though in this new arrival, from The Queen of Clean (trying to master Coldplay Clock's intro), to littlest one who likes to investigate the pedals.  Yoyo is most often found there lurking around the sharps and flats with a little tune I taught her. 

Oh and my Ercol chairs, we have still only sorted one of them out.  Did you really expect anything more?

Little Red Shelf

Another little Jumble treasure.  This one not so well received by The Queen of Clean.  I think it is cute and the sort of thing that Soulemama would have in her kids rooms (although she'd probably have a beautiful display of wooden kids toys/seasonal nature finds rather than my odd little assortment).  I like the size, the colour, the pointy ends on the top and base, I even like the little dinosaur sticker that was stuck in the middle.  The Queen of Clean on the other hand thinks it is simply awful.  He has accused me of using the word 'vintage' to describe anything fit for the skip.

I was a bit naughty and whipped littlest one into a frenzied state by showing it to him and suggesting he could keep his blackboard chalk on it.  Queen of Clean then had no option but to do the honours and get it on the wall.  Mean aren't I?  My littlest one asking you to do anything is too hard to resist.  The glimpse of blackboard you can see there spans the whole wall and it's great to have somewhere to rest the chalk nearby.  Yes that is the word 'fart' you can see scrawled on there.  What can I say, I am a  liberal parent and am willing to help sound out any word if it means a child is engaged in writing practice......

So here it is - my little red shelf for £1.  Yes another bargain scored at Saturday's sale.  I'm not even going to bother re-painting, I love the cheerful shade of red and it goes well in his room.  

What do you do when your taste clashes with your other half - do you resort to underhand strategy like me?  Or should I be more respectful that he's getting rather tired of the vintage vibe?

Jumble Treasure

I recently got into Jumble sales.  So much more fun than a car boot, as everything is much cheaper and tightly packed together.  You never know what treasure you'll find.

I was late for yesterday's jumble and had forgotten it was on, I let my jumbling partner down and rocked up an hour late not expecting anything to still be there.  It was my first time taking Yoyo and she was in awe of the currency being in pence rather than pounds.

And there I saw them.  It took me a while to spot as they were hidden beneath picture frames and boxes and not placed as a group.  We really do need new dining room chairs as we have some faux leather ones that our cats have ruined and are also very uncomfortable.  New chairs weren't on the endless 'things we need for the house' list though - we just don't have the budget for it at the moment.  So when I saw these my mind went into overdrive....I just needed to know the cost.  £8 for all of them. Decision made.   I couldn't believe it and they were packed safely into my car as swiftly as possible (before anyone changed their mind on the tiny price tag - is it just me that reacts like that?)

I kind of thought they looked familiar, and sure enough a little research when I returned home revealed they were Ercol! £179 each, so in a round about way I had saved £177 x 4 = £708.  But mine are original 60's versions with little bit of history.

The Queen of Clean approved.  He has nicknamed me Mrs Trebus in the past for my adventures in bringing home junk for him to transform, but on this occasion my efforts were praised.  For those not in the know, Mr Trebus was an infamous hoarder that the BBC made a documentary about, would never throw anything away bless him.

So with sandpaper in hand we began immediately.  Clearly he was feeling very enthusiastic - we were supposed to be getting ready for friends coming for dinner.  So it became a multi task cooking/tidying/chair sanding fest!

He used an electric sander on the seat and legs, but all those spindles need to be done by hand and that became my task.  We only had time to complete one, am sure it will be another few weeks to restore all four, but below you can see the difference between the one we have sanded and the one still clad in its stained varnish.  We'll get to you soon enough my lovely.

We need to research the best way of sealing our sanded beauties - I don't want to varnish, am thinking a wax of some kind to keep the wood pale.

So our only challenge now is that we are a family of 5 with 4 chairs.  Whoops.  We could search ebay or indulge in the new version from John Lewis, but I've also seen this bench which I'm rather taken with.  Excuse the tiny picture, but you get the gist I hope.  A hefty £399 though so I will need to save up or go for the more eclectic mix and match chair approach I think. 

So yesterday was a good jumble day.  Wish they were always like that.

What I've learnt about myself over the last month....

I much prefer making felt coasters to writing management reports.

I prefer dreaming up plans for these fabrics than conjuring up recommendations to improve employee engagement.

I tend to overuse words a lot - in the reports case it was 'impact'.  My proof reader kindly pointed out I'd used it 5 times on one page.

I want to spend my time reading crafting books rather than 'Business Research Methods' - Bryman and Bell.  Not a gripping read I assure you.

My husband knows when to step in in a crisis, one evening I was found rocking on the kitchen floor having 'lost' 2000 words when Yoyo closed my document.  He found them for me and I owe him big time.

Altogether, although I love my job and I needed to get this done studying is not my bag.

Thanks to anyone still reading......I promise to be around a lot more from now on.  With no mention of employee engagement either.