Oh, I do like to be beside the seaside...

We've moved. Again. And, this time, we're quite literally beside the sea - The North Sea - to be precise and not so much as 'beside' exactly as more 'above'. Perched on the edge of a cliff (I feel a bit weird typing that) the new house has spectacular views and I'm finding myself captivated by the expanse of blue, and thoroughly entertained by the constant parade of marine traffic, whether it's a heavily laden container ship or a jaunty little fishing boat. Not long after we had moved in we were amazed to see dolphins and learned from our neighbours that this is a regular sight; such a thrill to see them leaping clear out of the water.

I think my Australian sister would not think much of the rock and shingle beach below but I love it. I like to be able to amble down the path and walk along the shoreline, trying to distinguish between the many types of gull as they soar overhead while admiring the stillness of a pair of grey herons as they wait patiently on the rocks. The beach is not one to attract tourists as it is not a traditionally pretty beach but a wild and rugged spot. This is a place for birdwatchers, photographers, and serious walkers; the John Muir way passes through here. Neither is it a beach that's easy to discover. It is hidden away and you must walk down the pathway, through the dean and past the old mill house, following the sound of the water.  On one side you look out to the north and on the other the industrial coastline of East Lothian, the power station dominating the headland.

At the end of the path...

The little path down to the beach

We're not just enjoying having the beach on our doorstep, we're also enjoying the new house. I always attribute human qualities to houses and imagine them as distinct personalities. I think of this house as a stoic matronly type of house. She stands for no nonsense from the weather and seems completely unpeturbed by the gales and horizontal rain...so typical of a Scottish summer! One hundred years old, she must have witnessed a great deal and several generations have lived out the dramas of family life within her walls. Her rooms are firmly square and spacious - no whimsical arches, narrow recesses or pokey corners. It's comforting how solid she feels though the bones of her stairs and floorboards creak a little with old age. Despite her maturity, she's a well- kept woman and everything was immaculate and sparkling when we moved in. It made the whole moving process so much easier, only having to clean the one house we were moving out of and knowing that things could be put straight away; now I'm determined to keep the house that way!

So as well as photos of the beach, here is a sneak preview of one or two of the rooms in the house. We're still in the process of making the house into our home: deciding where furniture should go, sorting out pictures and raking through the remaining boxes - you know, the ones with no contents listed, packed at the last minute and containing all manner of random and unrelated items!

The back of the house has an open plan feel with the sitting room leading through to a dining room with a large picture window overlooking the sea. There is a sliding door to the kitchen from here and a sun room to the other side. I can't quite work out which way the garden faces but it seems to get the best of the sun for most of the day.  

When mowing the lawn or hanging out the washing you're liable to get distracted by the beautiful views and it takes discipline to finish the job.

 I end up just standing there admiring the scenery, lulled into inactivity by the sound of the waves.

Our eldest daughter definitely has the best bedroom in the house. She has two large windows that afford all round views of the sea and the coastline. Fabbydoo seems to like this bedroom the most too and can generally be found on the end of her bed or perched on the windowsill, looking out while the house martins and swallows put on a first-rate aerial display every afternoon.

I'm hoping that now we're settled here, and with a change to working 4 days instead of full-time, that this will be the start of more regular blogging. This setting is certainly inspirational!

Moving On

The new little house

Well, it's been more than a month without a single blog post. And the reason for such tardiness? We've moved house...again. In fact, we've moved four times in the last five years so you'd think that by now we would have the art of packing and unpacking down to a smooth and seamless operation where everything is organised and reorganised with professional ease. You'd be wrong. Each time we move it seems to be more chaotic and stressful than the last.  Consequently, I have no useful tips to pass on to other potential house movers. Moving house for me is a bit like my tennis: the more I do it the worse I seem to get! So where I was planning a post full of useful advice I will instead regale you with a few 'home truths' about moving and a few glimpses of the new place (as long as you understand that it is still in a state of moving flux and this is not the finished Pinterest-worthy interior).

Home Truth 1: There's nothing like moving furniture to reveal the truth about your housekeeping
Yes, the neglect of every corner, the failure to hoover or dust adequately, the stains on the carpet - all will be revealed in horrible slovenly detail when the furniture is moved out and you're left looking at the empty carcass of a rather dirty house.  Fortunately, we have good friends who were happy to go along with my excuses about, 'That being a very difficult place to get to' or how, 'There's been no point in hoovering these last few weeks what with all the boxes everywhere.'

Home Truth 2: The curse of the random box
I think our main problem has always been to seriously underestimate how long it takes to pack. We start off with the most beautifully packed boxes, items carefully wrapped in packing paper, boxes clearly labelled. As moving day looms ever nearer, the boxes become more and more random until items from entirely different parts of the house are thrown in together, possibly wrapped in an old towel or just wedged in with the odd cushion. Worse still, the description on the outside of the box rarely corresponds with the contents and so could end up anywhere which is how the tv remote ended up in the garage.

Home Truth 3: Sibling rivalry reaches new heights
Room sizes are just the start, we've had arguments and bickering about the most trivial of issues in the new house, even lampshades, and the view out of the window, have been the source of disagreement. A sharp reminder that the girls now have their own rooms and that we could insist they share again have swiftly restored the peace and they are now enjoying making their rooms very much their own.

Home Truth 4: No sleep for the exhausted
It doesn't matter how tired you are after moving, or even if you've managed to somehow reassemble your bed and you're not sleeping on the floor, the first night in a new house brings no rest. I spent the first night with seemingly super hearing, listening in to every strange new noise and feeling disorientated by now sleeping east to west rather than north to south as we had in the old house. Getting up in the middle of the night to try and find the loo proved interesting as I tripped over packing boxes, the hoover and the cat basket in my attempts to find the bathroom in the dark. I would have turned a light on if I'd had any idea where the light switch was!

Home Truth 5: New is better
Moving tends to bring out the optimist in me and I view each new place in a positive light. This home has lots of lovely features. It's terrifically light to start with. The house faces east and sunshine floods in through generous windows. An oak-framed extension has been added to the side of the kitchen, originally as an artist's studio, but for our artistically-challenged family it makes a super dining room instead and I'm looking forward to decorating the beams come Christmas time.

View from the kitchen window

Despite being towards the centre of the village, we are tucked away in a quiet corner and surrounded by hedges making it feel private and the sheltered garden provides the perfect environment for a huge variety of feathered friends. Best of all, from the kitchen window I can just see the sea!

Warm &Cosy

With stiff and aching joints, I'm thankful to be on one level - no more stairs to drag the hoover up - hooray! This little house is on higher ground and well insulated and so we no longer have to endure the damp and mould that permeated the last house.

Luna has found her chair

Home Truth 6: Moving makes you thankful
Thankfully we are blessed to have the most wonderful friends who came to our rescue onec again and helped us to move. They hauled 'the impossible wardrobe' onto the van and friends who were not able to help move furniture, helped instead by providing a much appreciated delicious lunch for the workers.

The Wonderful Man was entirely wonderful and managed to sort out all the technology in the new house in record time (the Ryder Cup which was on at the time and various other sporting events proved a useful incentive). He also took more than his fair share of physical punishment as chief removal man - this eventually resulting in a very sore knee (he is still hobbling - bless him!)

When the Rain Stopped

Luna's new favourite spot

Well, it's been nearly a month since I've written a post and now, finally, I feel that I've got my blogging mojo back. It's also a month since we moved and the new little house is starting to get a little clearer, a little more sorted, though it stills feels a bit like a holiday cottage and I wonder whether it will ever truly feel like my home. Since moving, work has been full on and I've never been so pleased to get to half term. But, rather than get immersed indoors with the last of the unpacked boxes, I decided to venture outdoors and discover the area around the new house. What prompted this excursion?...The rain stopped!

We've not had the terrible weather that much of England has been dealing with but the rain and drizzle have been pretty constant. The new little house is shaded by trees and the bare branches all around us look black and foreboding against the winter sky. Once outside, the sodden grass is sprung with moss and streams of muddy rainwater race along the sides of the lane and down to the burn. It hasn't been very tempting to go out and about and when I did battle the elements, it was with head down against the wind and tightly wound scarf obscuring any view. What a difference a little sunshine makes!

Suddenly,  the colours of the garden have come into focus and I can see the daffodils and crocuses starting to peek through determinedly. I have no idea what other treasures are lurking beneath the soil - possibly lupins - I do hope so as they're a favourite of mine. I had never even noticed the roses around the front door and they too are starting to bud.  

Living on a private country estate is quite a different experience for us. Where we are in the gatehouse, we see all the visitors and residents going in and out the entrance - deliveries, estate managers with their 4x4s, dog walkers, runners, cyclists and ramblers. It's constant torment for Luna who feels it necessary to protect her new home with lots of high pitched barking! Just outside there is also a bus stop though no sign indicates it as such. By the stop is the most fantastic of climbing trees and S has spent happy hours there already, often making me nervous by waving precariously from a top branch. She has a convincing toy bow and arrow set and has been running around the woods probably terrorising the pheasant community in her very own version of The Hunger Games. 

The climbing tree

The estate no longer has its original gothic mansion but it does have a small church dating back to 1450, more ruin than building now. Despite having neither windows nor heating, the combined parish churches have an annual summer service here followed by a picnic in the grounds. Last year, this event coincided with a visit from my mother and stepfather and was the cause of much hilarity. Regular church goers, they were keen to attend a service but weren't quite prepared to face the torrential rain and high winds that Sunday. Inside the shell of the building only a few hardened Scots were gathered. The minister did his best to preach above the noise of the wind. We sang hymns, stamping our feet and rubbing our hands, trying to keep warm and we were regularly baptised with rainwater as it blew in through the missing windows. Concerned for my mother's tendency for rhematism and my stepfather's best suit, I was forced to rush back to the car and grab whatever coats and blankets I could find. My stepfather cut a very dandy figure indeed in a bright crochet blanket worn like a poncho!   

The church in the afternoon sunshine

Little did I know that less than a year later I would be living on this estate. It's a real plus to have such history and pleasant walks on the doorstep. In the afternoon sunshine I walked up the path through the woodlands scattered with snowdrops. Roe deer can be seen at dusk and I was surpised to see a barn owl in the daylight; it took off across the fields, a furry morsel dangling from its claws.  

Snowdrops everywhere

The church itself is high enough in the parkland for me to be able to see out to the bay and coming back towards home all you can hear is the downrush of water below in the dean as it makes its way down to the sea. Often it sounds like a torrent and when we first moved here I spent the first few nights lying awake convinced that the house would be washed away down the steep banks of the ravine and into the raging rapids below but when you look down to see what's making all the noise there's surprisingly little water - more of a babbling brook than waterfall. The sound must be amplified somehow - perhaps by the many stone bridges that criss-cross above it. 

View from the Bridge!

I feel blessed in the sunshine and blessed to have found this dear little place. Even if it never fully feels like our home, and even if we are only here a while,  it's a safe and sheltered spot and I'm looking forward to exploring some more...when the rain stops again. 

(image credit: tumblr.com)

We Get By With a Lot of Help From Our Friends

I'm aware that it's been rather a long time since I posted anything and there's a simple reason for that...we've moved!

Studies list 'moving house' as one of the top five most stressful life events and after the chaos of the last few weeks, I couldn't agree more.  For that reason this is going to be my last blog post for a while. I need a little time to take stock and reassemble! Once the dust has settled, I may think about how to resurrect The Little House once again. In the meantime, I look forward to visiting all my favourite blogs more frequently rather than adding to my own.  

S helps out

This is our third move in the last four years so you'd think we'd have a smooth running no-hassle operation by now. But no, if anything, this has for me been one of the worst moving experiences and, paradoxically, one of the best.

The Worst 

Having to move when you really don't want to.  I loved everything about The Little House - the sea views, the kitchen with lots of space for entertaining, the swallows in the barn, even the quirky uneven floors (and the front door that sticks). It was so very hard having to say goodbye and more than a few tears were shed. There is nothing wrong with the new house. Though it is very little, it's very sweet and it has an equally lovely location but I feel homesick for the old one.

The Best

Discovering delightful things about the new house including being woken up by an owl at 7am (was it confused by the still dark morning or just saying hello to the new neighbours, I wonder).  In the new house we are surrounded by trees and the gables, and leaded-light windows, make me feel that I'm in a fairy tale - I'm expecting Hansel and Gretel to come calling any moment!

The Worst

Luna's looking for her food

Trying to negotiate my way around boxes of 'stuff' and not being able to find anything.  It's an experience very much like camping in your own home or being the main character in 'Hoarding: Buried Alive'. Trying to downsize to a much smaller place without having had time to really sort through and get rid of anything, is much like a giant game of Jenga. I find myself asking deranged storage questions as I stagger about through the cardboard box maze - 'Can the towels go on top of the fridge?', 'Could board games go in the shed with the lawnmower?' Will a wardrobe fit on the landing and if yes, can you still open the door?' and in despair 'Where is the nearest hotel?'

The Best

Finding things you had forgotten all about and reminiscing -  the photo albums, the children's drawings and mementos and cards and letters that I've kept from family members now no longer with us. The girls have been surprisngly good about sharing a room despite the age difference (it's definitely not cool when you're almost 16 to share with your soft-toy-obsessed 11 year old sister). Nevertheless, H had a pleasant break from revision and created a fort with the boxes where she settled down with her little sister to watch a Disney film beneath the blanket roof.

And the Best Again

Keeping with the positive and the reason for this post's title - finding out who your friends really are. I've never been as thankful for good friends as I have these last two months. Old and new friends have rallied round and gone beyond the call of duty to help whether that's in storing furniture for us or physically helping with the move itself. We hired a van and the menfolk (and women and children too) heaved and lifted and manoeuvred, all in the pouring rain. I'm sure there was more than a little muscle soreness on Monday morning but I heard not one complaint just lots of laughter and good humour. I was handed a box of delicious brownies, endless cups of coffee, sympathy, tissues...and a box of wine! These are the reasons we more than 'get by'. It's what I will keep firmly in mind when I'm tempted to wallow in self-indulgent gloom - I am lucky, we are lucky and we're so grateful to have found this little community - and as one friend reminded me it's people who make a home not things and without love, family, and friends to visit, a house is just four walls. 

Arriving at the new little house 

Little Boxes

Little boxes in the living room

And big boxes in the dining room

There are boxes in the bathroom

There are boxes in the hall

There are book ones and then china ones

There are labelled ones and some blank ones

And they're all made out of cardboard

And they all look just the same

And the Little House in the Borders

Is moving at the weekend 

And we're taking all the boxes

And things won't be quite the same

We'll be packing until midnight 

Then unpacking for a fortnight

And there'll still be lots of boxes 

And we'll all go quite insane! 

A Moving Story

We have moved a lot. Twenty years ago we started our married life in a basement flat at the back of Shepherd's Bush or what the estate agent euphemistically called, 'A garden flat in West Kensington Village'. Since then, we've moved a total of eight times, twice travelling up and down the length of the country, before settling in our current corner of the Scottish Borders.  

Every house and area we've lived in has had something special  - the beams and leaded-light windows of a chocolate-box cottage in a Hertfordshire village, watching clouds of starlings in aerial display across the misty Somerset levels, looking down across the industrial landscape of Bradford from the top floor of a modern townhouse and seeing it lit and transformed with amazing firework displays every Eid and Diwali.  The Little House, however, is my favourite. It's not a pretty house, in fact it looks quite austere, sitting up on the headland facing the North Sea with its brown slurry of harling to protect against all the worst that the Scottish weather might bring. But it is a magical house.  In the summer sun it glows a warm amber and the overgrown garden is a tangle of surprising hues; all manner of plants and flowers are determined to peek through the mass of branches. In autumn the golden hay bales look like they might just roll down the hill any moment to splash into the aqua waves. And in winter, the log burner radiates heat through the whole house while the snow lies undisturbed on the surrounding fields. 

From the front door each and every way leads to a different walk. One track leads down and through the smugglers tunnel to the Cove with its tiny harbour, looking pretty much the same as it has done for the last hundred years. Another track leads along the clifftop, sea holly and hawthorn lining the path,  fishing boats criss-crossing the choppy waters below, swallows sweeping the sky. My favourite route is along the tractor-worn track and towards the small patch of woodland beyond. My favourite because this walk often affords you a close-up view of deer grazing and once, a bold and beautiful hare still as a sculpture on the path for a clear and perfect moment.

I am savouring each and every last minute we have in this house because by January we have to leave it.  As much as I like to think of it as mine, it is not. It is just leased to us and we do not own it. Although we were assured that we could live here for many years, as it turns out, things change (quickly in this case) and our landlords need it back...soon. How I wish that we could buy it. How I hope that we can find somewhere else not too far away to move to. I wish that we could stay and I hope the girls can forgive us if we have to move them away from their schools and their friends. 

In a small rural community there is little choice in housing options when you rent and we couldn't believe our luck when we were offered this place with its beautiful views and spectacular sunsets. And we are lucky. Just one look at the news is a stark reminder of just how lucky we really are.  I'm just praying that the luck continues and we find somewhere else. Somewhere near this place we love so much. Somewhere we can call home.