December 2021 saw a(nother) lifestyle step change. We were now the proud owners of a house with 6 ensuite double bedrooms upstairs, 4 large reception rooms, a big kitchen and utility room downstairs plus various other toilets etc. There was a lot of furniture and ‘stuff’ left by the previous owner, some of which we had agreed to stay, and quite a lot that we had to get rid of. There was also a lot of cleaning to do before we could move in properly.
My project plan had two big milestones for the B&B: open up reservations in February and open for customers from May, but before we could even start thinking about the B&B, we had to make our own accommodation clean and comfortable, so we threw ourselves into that all day, every day.
It was hard and dirty work, but we made good progress. The week before Christmas, Tom had to rush back to the UK unexpectedly, so I found myself on my own, in a freezing cold house with no central heating, still surrounded by packing cases and piles of stuff to sell / giveaway / recycle / dump etc. It wasn’t the happiest week of my life. But Tom made it back before Christmas by which time we (Clark) had the heating working and the house was starting to feel warm, clean and tidy. We gave ourselves a week off to celebrate Christmas and New Year in our new house and life felt good again.
The village was quieter by this time. The pre-christmas celebrations in the bars and restaurants resulted in a lot of the staff and customers catching COVID and most places closed for a month or so. With the winter weather upon us and little else to distract us we threw ourselves into decorating the guest bedrooms.
There were some lovely warm sunny days during the winter months and some VERY cold nights. I found it so strange that it could be minus 7 during the night and plus 17 during the afternoon. We did have a couple of weeks late Jan / early Feb where the fog rolled in, and the temperature barely got above freezing during the day. Up to our eyes in paint and plaster, most of the house was freezing cold, no sunshine, no social life…we were both getting fed up and questioning our decisions. But as February turned to March, the sun came out, temperatures went up, the village opened up, we were able to get out with our running group and sit in the sun with a drink after working on the house… we were feeling good again.
It was during those cold weeks that we booked ourselves a winter sunshine holiday for the following winter. This coming weekend we’ll have been in France for a year. I’m sure the highs and lows will continue but one year in and I’m convinced it was one of the best decisions we have made.