Its in, its done, finally...at long last I can burn things!! WOO and indeed HOO! But before I share the new pics lets have a little recap (this makes me feel all warm and fuzzy this bit!)

Aarrr if only it were this quick in real life, I have just looked back through the blog to see that we started all this at the end of June, so after 4 months we finally have our living room back! I'm soo in love with the new mantelpiece, Rich has crafted it out of what was left of the old shop sign, a scaffolding plank off cut and some gash wood, clever boy!

So a huge well over due thank you to everyone who has helped, Richards Mum & Dad who are unfailingly generous to Richard and I and put up with a LOT or ranting down the phone when things go wrong, My Mum who gave up 9 straight hours of her life last Tuesday to help me paint everything within reach and also for her phone counselling services, our poor plumber Jerry who puts up with Rich and I constantly changing our minds about stuff and lastly to Richard himself. My poor boy has knackered his knees, broken his fingers, skinned every knuckle and finally buggered his back up getting it all done....it was totally worth it! Well done my love!

Now whats next...

Oh my actual god! Completely by accident we have discovered the coolest place to buy vintage goodies...

We stumbled across it on the way to The Bristol Wood Recycling Centre, its is about 100 yards down the road from them, if you live anywhere near Bristol, GO! Its totally amazing, here are a few pics of the best stuff...

How cool is this TV! I so wanted this.

So.much.good.stuff....to much choice!!!

In the end I settled on the cutest pair of £10 bookends ever...

They don't have a website and make sure you take plenty of cash, also these guys will only be at the above address until Christmas, then they are moving to a new warehouse so go shop while you still can!!

Ok, in case anyone out there thinks I spend every minuet of my day shopping, I would just like to point out that the only time we are not either working at one of our 4 jobs or working on the house, is on a sunday morning or in my lunch hour when I get chance to nip the the odd charity shop...not that I'm overly defensive...or trying to justify the amount of pennies I send...no not at all...anyway heres the latest goodies.

I really don't need another typewriter but this cute little black was only £2. I brought Rich a 50's lighter for £1, not sure why as neither of us smokes but the power of fire is always useful, yet more Ladybird books and a hand made vase.

Slightly blurry pic here. Who doesn't love vintage weighing scales, this little lovely turned up in a charity shop when I was work out at one of our branch libraries. They where £12 but I got the hernia from carrying them for free! My colleges now thing I'm nuts (actually I'm pretty sure they thought that before).

More swag soon!

Sorry Design Sponge I have shamelessly nicked this idea from your site! Anyway, you may remember this rather ratty looking picture frame which I rescued out of a bin on the way to work one morning, it was dirty and full or wood worm.

Before....

...After.

Now its all worm free, with loosely brushed on chalky white paint, with touches of the old gold coming through, admittedly the painting helps perk it up a bit!

Its taken a week or so for us to get the living room nearly straight, the furniture back in and the TVs no long precariously balanced in our bedroom (which it is way to big for!)

I have pretty much finished the painting in here, just need to touch up where the new mantelpiece pulled the plaster off the wall! We don't have any carpet as the old smelly one has been pulled up so we'll have to live with bare chip board and rugs until we can make a decision about what we what, floor boards or sea grass matting.

You can just see the back of the stove waiting to be fitted in its proper place, this was due to be happening tomorrow but some genius at the the fitters ordered the wrong flue liner, meaning we now have to wait a week for them to reorder a new one!! Do these people not realise that Rich and I are pyromaniacs who are dyeing to set fire to something!!!

This is a quick one for the Mum contingent who have requested photographic evidence...

The tiles are laid and grouted as off 5 mins ago, the wall and 50% of the living room are now  a clean chalky white, lovely!! Am too knackered to type more, will post some better pics in a few days, very much wishing I didn't have to go to work tomorrow, this working full time lark is rubbish!!

P.s the strategical placed news paper isn't a mistake, this is roughly the space the new stove will take up. Bring on the 20th!

A while ago one of my lovely neighbours gave me a old printers tray he had found at the tip, knowing I love these and that I already have one he brought it up to the house for me, which was a terribly sweet thing of him to do. This tray has been sitting in our studio for about a month waiting for me to have some time to tinker with it.
Last Sunday night I had a hour or so while dinner was cooking so I got out the white paint and got started...

I love printer trays but so does everyone else it seems, they are almost impossible to lay your hands now unless you are willing to part with quite a lot of cash (you used to see these at boot sales for a couple of quid each, now they go for about £25!!) I already have one which I scored from a junk shop, we have it in the hall down stairs and I have filled it with old pottery we have dug up in the garden.

My favourite peace is this creepy little buggers green head that I dug up when we where going the veg garden...

So the new tray will go on the other side of the bathroom door to mirror this one. I decided I would have some of my collection of shells, rocks and sea glass in it...

I'm really pleased with how it turned out, my weird collections look great! At the moment it still proped up in the studio but I'll post a pick of how then look together when I hang it. 

What a productive way to spend a wet sunday afternoon!

Well, we were going great guns with the whole fireplace thing last weekend, got the tiles, laid the hearth then Sunday night Rich went outside to find somewhere to use up the last few shovels full of mixed up concrete. 'Why don't you use it on that old wall round the back of the house' I said, the wall in questions is a 7 foot high stone wall that helps retain the field at the back of the house, essentially stopping it sliding in through our kitchen window.
So off Richard goes with his bucket of concrete round the back of the house...there followed a silence then a lot of swearing! Yep one touch of the wall and it had practically collapsed on top of him! It would seem that years of rubbish patching and little or no maintenance for the last 4 winters had taken its toll rather more then we had thought.
Poor Rich has spent the last week pretty much rebuilding the whole thing, its not a job we can leave as the frost will demolish whats left of it so it needs doing NOW! Luckily the weather for the last week has been tropical which has help a lot as everything it drying really fast. As I type Rich is finishing the job off and can hopefully get back to the fireplace next week.

Once again in the excitment of the moment I have forgotten to take a 'before' shot, to be honesty I really didnt want to get in the way waving a silly camerat while Rich was going his best to shore it up!

The front garden has become a builders yard, covered in wheel barrows, sand and concrete! Never mind a small price to pay to stop the back wall coming down completely, or indeed having to pay an actual builder. We did get a quote for fixing in and it make mine and Richards hair go grey so Rich has figured out how to do it himself. 

What a think to be doing when all your mates have gone to be beach because it hot! Aarrrr house ownership, isn't it wonderful!