A HINT OF WHITE

If you are looking to move house, or about to move, it can be quite a big and stressful step. The negotiating a price and all the legal stuff can take quite a bit of time. But once an offer has been agreed, there will be quite a few things to do before your big move day. First off, you will need to decide if you will be moving yourself or will you be using a removal company. If you are moving out without furniture, say from your parent’s house, then you might only need a car and a few people to help you out. If you are moving from a house that you need to furnish, with all of your furniture, it gets a bit trickier.

You might be able to hire a van for a day and do the moving yourself. This could be a cheaper option for you. If you would rather someone did the heavy lifting, then make sure that you get a number of quotes for the job. Getting around three quotes is a good option, so you can see what the going rate in your area is.

There are a lot of things that you need to sort and organise with your new address. You will want to sort out your new home insurance, as well as changing over details for your car insurance. When you do that, if it is applicable to you, it is a good idea to send off your driving license, so that your new address is on it. All of these little fiddly bits are the worst part of moving house, but it all needs to be done. One thing to do is to arrange postal redirection. You might not get to chance to move everything over before you move house, so it gives you a little time to still receive your post. Then you can change your details over as and when you can.Continue Reading

If you’re anything like me, you enjoy having friends over for dinner. Playing host is fun, even though it can be a lot of hard work. Having everyone around the table for good food, good conversation and good wine always makes for an excellent evening. Anyone who likes to entertain might find it hard to get their dining room ready for a dinner party. You might have twice as many people as you would normally have at the table, or even more. Turning it from your everyday dining room to something more fabulous can take some work. Here are my tips for having a party-ready dining room, so you’re always prepared to be the hostess with the mostest.

Get an Extendable Table and Extra Chairs

On an ordinary day, you probably have somewhere between two and five people at your table. If you’ve got a large family, you might have more. But when you have a dinner party, you can get a bit ambitious and invite a few too many people. Perhaps there’s room around the table, but not enough chairs. And do you really want to ask people to sit on footstools and beanbags? If you need more space around the table, I suggest an extending table. Ours usually has five people around it but extends to seat eight. If you want a solution for chairs, folding chairs are easiest to store. But they’re often not that nice to look at or comfortable to sit on. Luckily, you can find stylish folding chairs, or stacking chair, which also store well.Continue Reading

My dining room was my favourite room until I recently completed our lounge, now I can’t decide between the two. Second to the bedroom, the sitting room is the most used room, so I wanted a cosy feel to it. I also wanted it to be inspiring, as I tend to sit in here when blogging. We have big windows out on to the main road, and I really enjoy watching the world go by.

When we first moved in, my grand plan was to decorate the whole house in grey & white, you can see my mood board here. It was just a phase, I love how versatile grey is, it makes a room bright, airy and modern. Now we have been in this house 10 months and half way through the renovations, I have found I prefer to decorate and design the rooms by inspiration from things I love, and not by following trends.

My dinning room was designed around the wallpaper designed by Barbara Hulanicki. I had always wanted it some where in the house, and the dining room seemed to be the best fit. Soon I want to remove my desk, and include a gold cocktail trolley. I will update more on that soon.

Still keeping the grey paint on 3 of the walls in the sitting room, Continue Reading