Stresses

 I'm having sleepless nights at the moment (just for a change!) worrying about everything that needs to be done for our move into the caravan.  Which is daft really, I know - there's no pressure, it's not set in stone, we don't HAVE to move in on any particular date.....just that we have other appointments coming up here at home, so working out when we can stay over in the caravan (and get on with the rest of the work whilst there) means some juggling of dates is necessary.  So it's not critical - but try telling my brain that!!

There's just so much to do and think about and gathering of stuff together to take over there - it's just like a house move, but on a smaller scale - and all this whilst doing a complete renovation too.  It's wearing me out, frankly.  I think I need a few days off.  

There's other things going on too - we have an electrician coming here (to our home) today, to do a full electrical service and check, landlord's orders, it's going to take several hours, apparently.  We're going to the caravan once he's arrived and just leaving him to it....I'm not really keen on leaving workmen (complete strangers) alone in the house, but needs must - if we were here, we'd just be in the way (or he'd be in our way) and presumably he'd have to have the electricity turned off (or keep switching it on and off) so that would interfere with anything we could do here anyway.  We'll be leaving him a key, I just hope he remembers to lock up when he leaves.

I was supposed to be going to the chiropodist yesterday, but she wasn't well and had to reschedule it for next week, which meant I had to juggle a few other things around.  I also have a dentist appointment next week for some major work, which I'm dreading and is already preying on my mind.  The physiotherapy for my sore back and hip was supposed to restart in June - they'd temporarily suspended all physio as the staff had all been commandeered to help out with Covid vaccinations instead.  However, yesterday I had a letter from them saying they're currently snowed under and have no idea when my appointments can start up again.  So I've just got to put up with the pain, which is much worse lately, for x number of weeks to come.  I'm also awaiting a first physio appointment for another, unrelated problem - who knows when I'll get that?

I just feel really stressed by everything at the moment.....wish I could be more like husband who breezes through life with hardly a care in the world.  I know all the caravan stuff will be SO worth it in the end, I do love it already.  It's just such a lot of work right now, although husband does the bulk of the physical alteration works, it's me who has to organise everything.  Case in point.....when we were leaving here yesterday to go to the caravan, husband sauntered out to the car carrying.....a drill, and sat there in the car with the engine running waiting for me.  Whereas I was loaded up like a packhorse with about 6 bags, including our packed lunch which I'd just made, and had to juggle all the bags to get a hand free so I could lock the front door.  The bags were all sat in the hallway by the door, so husband could have taken some of them to the car.....but was oblivious!!! (Men, huh!).  At least now the new fridge has been installed at the caravan, I can leave cheeses, cold meats, milk etc in it, so no need for me to prepare packed lunches to take anymore.  But of course the fridge has to be stocked first.....by me.  I even have to remind husband to take whatever tools he needs, plus his glasses, wallet, phone, dog lead etc - he nearly always forgets.

And the personal stuff we have going on at the moment is not getting any better, so that's an added stress.

Nuisance - but alright in the end

 Got to the caravan this morning with the intention of steam cleaning the headboard and mattress.  The mattress is covered with a valanced sheet - clearly original, as it matches the headboard - and we hadn't actually lifted it and looked at the mattress, nor sat on the bed.  Husband had prodded it and said it felt lumpy.  We'd decided we would take a chance and not buy a new bed, just steam clean it and have bought a thick deep mattress topper to go on it.  Well, on lifting the valance and examining the mattress and bed (it's a divan) this morning, we found it's knackered - the mattress is horribly lumpy and the divan base underneath is broken, it's collapsed in two places.  How the previous owners had been sleeping on it I really don't know.  On mentioning it to our caravan neighbours this morning, they said 'oh yes, Phil always said they needed a new bed, he was too tight to buy one though!'.  Huh, wish they'd mentioned it to us (or we'd actually checked the bed) before, it's a bit last minute.  So we've now had to buy a new bed, it's coming Friday.  Well, we're collecting it on Friday, husband is insistent we can transport it to the caravan on top of the roof racks on our (little) car....I hope he's right!!  Bit of a nuisance, and another expense, but I'm not sorry really, I wasn't too happy about sleeping on a very old second hand bed.  And it does mean I don't have to deep clean the old mattress, and we can just chuck it and the base out in the garden, leaving a completely empty room to decorate, which will make things easier.

Oh and when we came to put up at the kitchen window the new Venetian blind that we'd found in the wardrobe, it turns out it was actually an old and broken blind, that for some inexplicable reason the previous owners had put back inside the packet and shoved in the wardrobe, rather than throwing it away.  So we also had to go and buy a new blind.  Luckily, we found one 50% off in a sale in Dunelm this morning.

We're going to have to get Shaun, the man with a van, to come back again and get rid of yet more rubbish - the old bed for a start, and the blinds from nearly all the windows, as most of them are broken (fortunately, the nets and curtains I've bought in replacement were all a bargain price).  There's also several more bags of garden rubbish.  

I'm glad we set a budget right at the start for all this caravan work, we're getting close to the top of that budget now.  But, fingers crossed and barring any more last minute surprises, we shouldn't need to spend much more.  We have the gas man's bill to pay (he's coming back on Wednesday to fit the new part), but that's already taken into account.

We're intending to spend all day tomorrow and Wednesday at the van, husband finishing off the few remaining bits in the kitchen and me decorating the bedroom.  I'm just painting it, no wallpaper, so it should be easy enough, it's the same dove grey satin emulsion we've used in the lounge and it dries very quickly, with no smell.  Then Thursday and Friday it's just a case of taking the rest of the stuff we need over there, plus the new bed of course, putting up the curtains and making the bed, and then we should be staying there for the weekend!

Getting ready for moving in

 As I said in my previous post, we're hopeful of being able to 'move into' the caravan from this coming weekend, provided we get the bedroom decorated with no hitches, and the toilet in good clean working order.  Our plan is to stay at the van for a few days at a time - no set plan as such, just whenever we have no appointments at home and the weather looks good for a few days.  I'm not really wanting to stay there if it's going to be persistently raining - we had lots of caravan holidays when I was a child and I have many memories of rain hammering down loudly on the roof and us kids miserably looking out of the windows, bored to tears.  If we're going to have prolonged rain, frankly I'd rather stay home than endure it in the caravan.  Fortunately, the weather forecast seems to be pretty good for the coming weekend.

I'm going to need to write lots of lists for the next few days - lists of things we need to take to the caravan every day, to stock up for when we move in.  Clothes, toiletries, bedding and towels, kitchen equipment, dog stuff (a bed for Betty, some of her toys and some treats are there already).  Books and DVDs, a pack of cards and dominoes, some craft stuff (a couple of drawing pads and pencils).  And food, of course, mostly tins and packets, coffee, tea and long life juices (neither of us drinks much alcohol, hardly any in fact).  Some basic crockery, cutlery, mugs and glasses are already there.  I shall take a selection of stuff every day - we wouldn't be able to fit it all in the car in one go anyway.  We're taking the new fridge over tomorrow.

I've been getting the Gardeners World magazine and a static caravan park life mag delivered for the past 2 or 3 months (both subscriptions were bought on a very good special offer for the first year).  We haven't read any of them yet, I've deliberately kept them to take to the caravan, so that's something to look forward to.

There's a small garden centre on the way to the caravan, we've not been in there yet.  I want to have a look in there sometime this week and hopefully buy a nice perfumed rose and a lovely pot for it to go in, using some of the legacy money my friend left me.  She loved roses, as do I, so having a nice rose in her memory in the caravan garden will be a fitting reminder of her.  Toni loved purple, it was one of her favourite colours, so she would have approved of my colour choice for the van lounge!

The bedroom, both bedrooms in fact, have padded headboards affixed to the wall - the one in our double bedroom is in an awful state, heavily stained, although the material is in good condition.  Ideally, we'd like to take the headboard off the wall, take the material off and re-cover it.....however, the headboard is firmly fixed to the wall and there's no getting it off, we've tried very hard.  It appears to be stapled or even nailed all round, and may even be glued as well.  So tomorrow I'm going to firstly have a go at steam cleaning it with my electric steamer.  I've bought new curtains for the bedroom - I chose a long length, as I had the idea of cutting off the extra length and using the material to cover the headboard, we'll staple it all round using husband's super duper electric staple gun.

Quick visit

 We nipped to the caravan for an hour this morning - I wanted to see the kitchen, as I wasn't there yesterday, and a couple of things needed finishing off.  Once again when we arrived I was a bit dismayed to see all the mess the boys had left - it looked like we'd had burglars....bits of rubbish, tools, discarded empty packets, screws, unwashed cups, oddments of vinyl flooring and messy bits everywhere.  I tried to keep a lid on it, as the boys did such a good job of installing the kitchen, but it did annoy me, clutter and mess drives me to distraction.  I did say that in future, if he's there on his own, I would like him to tidy up before he comes home, even if he doesn't vacuum.

The kitchen cupboard doors and drawers are all in place now, and husband silicone sealed all around the edges of the worktop.  The vinyl flooring is really lovely, that and the white units have made such a difference to the light in what was a very dark gloomy space before.  We've got a new venetian blind to go up at the kitchen window - we didn't buy it, we actually found it in the bedroom wardrobe, obviously bought by the previous owners and never fitted, for whatever reason, so a few quid saved.

We're not going tomorrow, we need a day at home to do things here.  On Monday, husband needs to finish a couple of things in the van kitchen, whilst I wash down the walls and paintwork in the bedroom, ready for starting to decorate on Tuesday.  It's looking hopeful that we might be able to stay over in the caravan next weekend - fingers crossed.

This little holiday home of ours is really shaping up to be a gorgeous space and I'm so pleased with it, as is husband.  We both feel really content when we're there.  Husband's mate who was there helping him with the kitchen yesterday said it's a lovely place - the park, our plot and the caravan - and thinks we're very lucky.  We are.

Right now there's a lot of emotional stuff going on in my private life, and the caravan is the one thing that's keeping me sane and happy.

The kitchen!

 I've just been sent this photo of the kitchen progress:-

Oh it looks so good, I'm so happy with it!  The wall cupboards aren't being replaced, we're just going to paint them white and have new handles to match the bottom cupboards.  The flooring makes the kitchen look bigger, and the wallpaper is lovely.  The cooker cupboard needs the height raising a bit, it's currently a few inches too low, but that's an easy job.  The boys have done so well, I'm really pleased.

We'll take the new fridge tomorrow, to slot in that gap.  Then it's the bedroom to decorate early next week, and we might be staying there by the end of the week 😁💜

Kitchen going in, and curtain shortening the easy way

 Thank you so much for all the lovely comments.  We've just discovered the caravan is 31 or 32 years old - wow, a real old lady.....I'd guesstimated it at around 25 years.  It's in amazingly sound condition for its age, even more amazing is the fact that there's no damp - it's obviously been unoccupied for nearly 2 years and not well maintained for a couple of years prior to that, as the previous owners were old and in poor health.  It's just grubby and very old fashioned looking, so we're dragging it into the 21st century!

Husband is there with his mate, they've already put together the kitchen units (flat packed) and are currently laying the vinyl flooring in the kitchen, prior to installing the units.  They then need to cut out the holes in the new worktop for the sink unit and fit that, and then fit the worktop, finally sealing all edges with silicone.  I hope they get it all done successfully today, but there's always tomorrow to finish off if not.  It's only a small galley kitchen - one double base unit, one drawer unit and a single half height base cupboard for the table top cooker to go on - so they should do.  Husband's mate is not a kitchen fitter, but he frequently helps out his son in law, who IS a kitchen fitter, and he's also good at carpentry, so he knows what he's doing.

I made a start on shortening the curtains here at home, cut the first one to size, ironed the hem to make a crease and then put in the wonderweb stuff and ironed it in place.  Except it didn't stick - at all.  I assume it's because of the coating on the back of the curtains....they've got a thermal and dimming layer on the back, some kind of special coating, and the wonderweb just doesn't want to stick to it.  Oh bugger, I thought, that means having to hand sew 7 pairs of curtains.....But then I remembered I have a can of spray on craft glue, it says it's for all sorts of craft work, including some fabrics.  So I tried it, and it works fantastically well, and is so much quicker and easier than messing around with the webbing stuff.

There was a phone call here at 10 am, for husband - it was his physiotherapist, he was supposed to be having a phone physio session with her for his foot.  Only he'd obviously forgotten about it, hadn't mentioned it to me and hadn't put it on the calendar, so I clearly couldn't remind him seeing as it was the first I'd heard of it!  Honestly, he's a nightmare 😒

A quick photo

 Here's the dining area as it was when we first bought the caravan:-

The seating was very uncomfortable, and the fabric horrible.  The table was warped and uneven, so we wanted it all out.  Here it is in the process of being ripped out:-

Betty inspecting the progress!  And here it is now, with new table & chairs, nice new crockery cupboard, new carpet and nets in place (we left the back wooden framework in place to stabilise the walls, and because it was less work to leave it there!):-

We're so pleased with it, I think it looks lovely.  I've got new curtains to put up, they need shortening though as I mentioned before, I'll be having a day at home tomorrow to do that, whilst husband and his mate spend the day at the van fitting the kitchen.