Progressing

Today has been a tiring but productive day.  Good to see progress!

I was up fairly early to take delivery of our online shop.  We spent yesterday evening planning our meals etc so hopefully we now have everything we need for the next week.

After that I got some  washing done and then I tackled the garden.

This is the view looking out of the kitchen or dining room window.  You can see I've got the bird feeder set up now and our bench is now where it will enjoy some sunshine .

This is looking back at the house.

And this is looking down the side of the house to the other section of garden.

I spent time tidying the paved area at the end today and cutting back the lavender that is in the raised beds in the corner.

Looking much better!  And one thing I like about this London borough - we have a brown waste bin for garden and food waste.  They only collect fortnightly but so much easier than having to book it as we did in the old house.

These pictures show the chaos that still remains in the studio.  I've now got the exercise bike from my daughter but there are also ordinary bikes in there and gardening equipment.

It's a mess but it will be good when it's sorted and it does look out onto the garden.  We've ordered a shed but it will probably be a few weeks before it's delivered and installed.

Once the shed is up we can move stuff out from here and the garage, then the ordinary bikes will be able to go into the garage and we'll be a little bit more organised.

Another couple of things I've achieved have been sorting out the alarm system and one of our TV sets.  

We had the alarm system checked and it's all working fine.  We can even alarm parts of the house during the night which is reassuring.  I don't feel unsafe in the house but the layout is more vulnerable than our old house so the alarm is definitely a plus.  I even managed to program one of the keyfobs into the system today.  We discovered one of the fobs wasn't working and assumed it was the battery.  I changed the battery but it still didn't work.  It looked fairly new compared to the other fobs so I checked and found the system only had 3 fobs set up but I was able to set the 4th fob up without setting off the alarm!  Progress.

As for the TV, well that was a bit embarrassing.  It was working fine in the old house but seemed dead here.  We changed the fuse in the plug.  We located the remote.  We found the alternative buttons on the side of the TV but nothing seemed to work.  After speaking to a repair shop and planning to get it looked at I decided to do one last check for any other buttons!  Just as well I did.  There was a small on/off switch hidden away that had obviously got into the off position during the move.  I'd have felt really stupid if we'd dragged it all the way to a repair shop for that lol.

Social media and the internet can be a pain at times but it can also be useful.  Thanks to a recommendation from a local group I've also got a repair guy coming to look at our dishwasher which has gone wrong.  I did try and check for any obvious problems with it but according to the instruction manual the light that's flashing indicates a problem that needs to be fixed by an expert.  That I am not!
 

Getting to know the area

Well I thought moving house was exhausting but it seems settling in isn't exactly restful either.

I can't believe we've been here 3 weeks already but of course the arrival of two new grandsons rather threw any ideas of routine out of the window.

We still have boxes to unpack and jobs to do but we're making progress all the time.  Just slowly!  We're learning how to work things, where to put things, where to find things etc etc.

And then we realise that actually some things work better when stored elsewhere and we have to learn all over again where they are.  

It's been very wet since we arrived but we did take advantage of a couple of dry spells to get out and explore.  We're on the edge of Epping Forest and a five minute walk or so from woodland and Highams Park and Lake.

The last pic was taken on Sunday, the others were taken last Tuesday.

We're looking forward to exploring more of the forest.

We've also managed to get our wifi working throughout the house - Nick's den as we refer to it is in the top part of the extension to the house and had poor reception due to the 9 inch thick wall but we've sorted that now.  We've also got reception out here:

This studio will be my hideaway when I want some peace and quiet lol.  The former owners used it as a home office.  I've got my bureau out there plus my sewing machine and I will have an exercise bike out there when we pick it up from my daughter.  She has bought herself an all singing and dancing exercise machine so no longer needs her more basic bike.  We also need to get an ordinary shed for our garden stuff - things like the lawnmower, tools, etc which for now are sitting in the studio. 

But of course all these things take time.  Just notifying everyone that we've moved is taking up a lot of my time.  Especially at the moment with many call centre/admin staff working from home.

Yes of course some of these things can be done on line and are easier than others.  It doesn't help when the main Government department (HMRC) have your date of birth incorrect on their records.  I spent ages online trying to set up a "Gateway" account to update our address only to be told repeatedly they did not recognise me.  When I eventually got through to a human being on the phone he spotted the problem but wouldn't actually tell me.  But my telling me I need to send in a certified copy of my birth certificate it became obvious what the problem was.

Just another little chore to add to the to do list.  Fortunately my best friend's daughter is a solicitor so she will be able to do the certifying for me.

We've also managed a trip to Nottingham at the end of last week to meet Grandson Miles and just in time.  Nottingham are now under tighter lock down restrictions due to Covid and we would be breaking the rules now by visiting them.  So glad we went!

 

Getting to know the house!

Yep moving into a new house comes with various challenges.  Like the fact that there are 6 external doors and one internal door that lock with keys.  7 different keys!  We're gradually getting familiar with which key works for which door.  Some are easier to spot than others.

Then of course there is the key to the outside post box.  We only have one key for that.  No spares.  We've found a sensible place to keep it.  We just need to remember to check the box regularly.  Or maybe not.  In our old house we were in the middle of a terrace - houses either side and no side entrance.  Here we are semi-detached.

So in this picture you can see our front door, the garage to the left and then the gate into the garden.

This pic is taken from inside the garden and you can see the wet patch left by this parcel.

I have no idea when it was "delivered" (as in thrown over the gate) - no delivery card was left, or that this might even be a thing.  Of course I have heard of various delivery services being creative about what they consider to be a "safe" place to leave a parcel if you're out but in our old house they would usually leave it with a neighbour or in the porch. 

Now I know that I not only need to check the mailbox, I need to stick my head out the side door and check behind the gate! Yes getting to know a new house is a steep learning curve.

Fortunately the package inside the soggy box (a wall bracket for our TV) was fine.