Another mad busy week of ups and quite a few downs, the only way to cope has been to light the fire, watch Great British Bake Off and do some sewing...

What a roller-coaster life we lead! 

We havent been up to much on the house recently, pressure of work, visitors and an art exhibition have meant we haven't had much free time. I have as always managed to squeeze a little bargain hunted, included the purchasing of my first every tea pot...

...or possibly a coffee pot...we're still undecided. Anyway in 32 years its my first Tea Pot, gosh I feel grown up!

I just loved the 70s kitchness of it, Im not normally a huge fan of this sort of 70s design but for some reason this just called to me and for the price of £1 I couldn't pass it by.

Then a day later I picked this 50s plate up from a charity shop for £2.

We getting a bit of a glut on plates now, what I really could do with is bowls but they seem harder to find.

Maybe I'll get something more productive done next week...or possibly not!

I treated myself to a make your own cushion kit last week from the amazing Sarah Young, anyone who hasnt seen her lovely design work pop over the Etsy and check it out!

I brought her Hester the Hare kit and have been stitching it together whenever I've had 5 mins free, am so pleased with how it came out...

It looks great on the Ercol sofa with my patch-worked blanket and the St Jude's sample fabric cushion!

Definitely an excellent xmas prezzy idea or just something nice for yourself!

I meantioned a few posts ago that Rich and I where lucky enough to purchase a G Plan sideboard when we where in North Shropshire last, we got if from a second hand place and only paid £40 for it (actually Rich's lovely Mummy & Daddy where very kind and brought it for us as a present, we are very lucky sticks!). We already had a set of Victorian draws that Rich had adapted to fit all the DVD and game consoles in (as I have a massive aversion to having to look at loads of equipment and wires ), however as lovely as this unit was we brought if for our last house which it fit perfectly but as the new house is slight bigger it was very lost in the alcove we wanted it in, meaning loads of wasted space which is pointless when you live in a small house...

See you would never know from the outside thats is does tricks!...

Tada! Rich is a very clever boy! Luckily some of our close friends are going to give this excellent unit a new home in their lovely flat so it wont go to waste!

To be replaces with this bad boy...

Anyone who's into mid century furniture will know that a good condition sideboard goes for anything for £100 -£300 on eBay these days (anyone remember when these where just chucked in skips, I do!) so we where well please at the £40 price, however it did mean it needed a bit of work. Whoever had owned this in the first place had obviously had a small dog who used to jump up at this sidebord as it had a lot of quite deep scratch makes all over the front.
So we gave the whole thing a sand to take the patching varnish and as many of the scratches out as possible. Unfortunately as this is a wood veneer it is very thin and as the scratched on the front of the draw where so deep we when though the top layer trying to get them flat. As this looked terrible we simple painted this draw  and waxed the rest to get this warm matt finished. 

As you can see it fits the alcove exactly meaning we now have more cupboard space which is always good! We also took out the bookcase as it would have looked to crowded with both and have had the other Ercol chair back from my sister who was giving it a temporary home. I think they look brilliant together!

Rich is going to cut some holes in the back of the end cupboard at the weekend so we can fit the DVD and the consoles in it which will be excellent.

We're thinking we might build a floating white shelf above the TV to accommodate some of the books as I don't like having a room with no books in!

We also had to find a new perch for Captain Pinky, but he seem happy enough. 

Sometimes when we're doing jobs on this house things seem to take forever and it feels like nothing is moving or improving, then some days you seem to take a huge step forward. I love this sideboard and am so glad we went to the hassle of getting it!