Purple and Pearls

Feels more like home!  I’m not going to linger on the bad stuff because we really do feel more settled but the first couple of days were hard.

This is how it looked when we moved in

Complete with broken sofa, heater, blind and extractor fan.  Smelly rugs, dusty old lampshades, a TV from the 1950s and minimal furniture (we’re renting fully furnished.)

Fast forward 3 weeks,  a lot of unpacking, cleaning, moving, complaining, a few aching muscles, an air freshener or two and a fat lip and we’re finally at a point where we feel cosy.

The landlord replaced the broken sofa with a nice new leather set, fixed the heater and we have the majority of our things now out and about.  Things will probably move again because we have a side board still to come.

We still lack storage in the kitchen but it’s certainly looking a little cuter now we’ve put up our picture clock and decorated the microwave with a few picture magnets.  I also love that I can have all our cooking and baking books out on show. (Sorry I forgot to take a photo of inside our fridge cribs-styley… maybe next time!)

We’re blessed with a large hall way which has two storage cupboards to hide all of our unpacked boxes (!?) and also our bookshelf.  I love having our books out on display along with a few decorative items.  Above the shelf is the frame that people signed on our wedding day.

Our bedroom is now a more welcoming place to be, we haven’t finished with this room yet as we still have to work out a few storage issues but it’s definitely getting there.  Also – how much do you love our chandelier!?  My godparents surprised us with it just after we moved in and I think I’m in love.  For anyone who has seen Anchorman, Has said to me the other day “You actually love lamp”

The bathroom got kitted out with a few new accessories including new artwork.  We picked up a few vintage looking postcards when we were in Hawaii on our honeymoon, as well as really cool map of the islands.  So we framed them and hung them up in our bathroom.

Only problem now is, every time I go to the bathroom it makes me miss Hawaii even more!

So there you have it, our first marital home!  Huge thank you for all the cards, gifts and thoughtful tweets, you’re all so lovely!  (Sarah, Kerry brownies were a huge hit and they’ve all gone!)

So what do you think?!

x

We move into our new home just over 3 weeks ago and whilst I’ve been able to post the odd update on the blog, living without the internet has been tough!  The engineer left about 20 minutes ago and after first announcing on Twitter that I was at last connected – I’m blogging!  Oh how I’ve missed it!

First of all HUGE news, bigger than big!  Suzie is going to be a mommy!!  I know, right!  I found out before Christmas and I’ve been waiting to shout about it.  Suzie had her first scan last week and Mini is looking super relaxed and healthy.  She’s due early August and I am beyond excited!

I also had the complete honour of guest posting for two wonderful blogs.  First up was for one of my absolute fav blogs Met my Match and the second was a follow up to my previous post for the Wedding Genie.  Go take a read, both are great blogs and I’m truly thankful for being asked to post on both.

Also in other great news Cupcakes and Peonies is back!!  After a little break they are ready and raring to go!  I’m so pleased the cupcake world just wasn’t the same without them!

I have quite a bit to tell/show you including the rest of our honeymoon recaps and a few before and after snaps of our new crib, which will all come over the next few weeks.  In the mean time have a great weekend!! x

We’re in our new flat and have come out the other side a little battered, bruised, emotionally exhausted and completely worn out!

It was a lot harder than we ever thought it would be. It has taken a lot of hard work to get it anywhere near comfy.

Unfortunately we arrived to a couple of problems including a broken sofa, heater and extractor fan, we’ve also had issues with getting the oven working and the key from the car park to the apartment doesn’t work. We’ve been in touch with our letting agency and whilst the problems are easily fixed in our fragile emotional state the problems seemed to stack up and somewhat dampened our moving house excitement.

We are now, after getting a few good nights sleep, feeling a lot happier. It probably has something to do with the fact that we’ve unpacked a lot of our stuff and have really made the space feel a lot more like us.

We haven’t had chance to set up our Internet yet so posting and tweeting will be as and when I can grab a wifi spot

I’ll also get a few pictures up when I can so you can see our new digs!

Until then, I have 12 more boxes to unpack!

That’s right – today is the day we are moving in to our new flat!

We’ve taken a bit of a higgledy-piggledy route to get here, but right now we couldn’t be more excited. We are moving into a 1 bedroom flat in the city centre of Birmingham. Has will be able to walk to walk in under 15 minutes, rather than a 45 minute stop-start, leg aching journey there and back again. Quite a few of our friends live in the city, so we’ll have a nice little network of people around us. It means no more expensive taxi journeys back after a night out and we’ll also be smack bang in the middle of both sets of parents.

Packing has been overwhelming, we found out we had the flat just before Christmas and ever since we’ve spent any spare time going through everything we own. Sending things off to charity shops, storing what we might be able to sell at a later date and packing up the rest.

We’re lucky in the fact that although the flat was advertised as fully furnished, but it’s only furnished with the basics. So we have a lot of room to make it our own. The living area is large for a city centre apartment, open plan and has a kitchen one end and the lounge the other. It has quite a large double bedroom, with an extra walk in closet. Separate bathroom and two extra storage cupboards.

Hopefully by the end of the weekend we’ll be somewhere close to settled in, we have furniture arriving on Saturday and a trip to Ikea is scheduled for Friday. I’m not sure how long our internet connection will take to set up, hopefully not too long I need Twitter! But I shall be back with pictures of our new crib!

Source: Incredibly cute aluminium keyring from Etsy

Why when I should be saving hard for a wedding, honeymoon and new flat am I buying a vase?  It couldn’t even be classed as an essential bottom drawer contribution…  Unless… you take into account all the “New Home” flowers we’ll be getting, or that I got it in the sale, or even the fact that it’s g.o.r.g.e.o.u.s!

Yes, this was how I rationalised this purchase and most other things I buy.  I have a habit of seeing something, falling for it and then trying to justify why I absolutely need it in my life.

“It will go with so many of my existing outfits”  - Necklace, I’ve worn twice.  “I have so many weddings to go to this year it’ll be the perfect accessory” – a little sequinned purse, which I took to one wedding and had to carry my camera separate as it wouldn’t fit in.  ”Oh it’s been reduced to £6.50, a very reasonable price, and look it’s a good make.  Will last us for years!” – Baking tray (I do occasionally buy essential bottom drawer items!)  ”Half off!  And look at the cute storage bag it comes with I can organise all my nail varnishes now!”  A French Manicure set.  I have yet to give myself a manicure but I have used the bag to store all the other nail varnishes I don’t wear.

But I do love my new vase!

Please tell me I’m not the only one?!

Yes I know I’m early and Christmas isn’t for another 58 sleeps but I can’t help myself!  Christmas is the best time of year!!