The first Christmas

I was afraid that it would feel like “The first Christmas Away from Home”.

 It was good to have to change some of the old traditions. Decorating was completely different. No room for a large Christmas tree and we now had a real fire place for hanging up the stockings. Sleeping arrangements were more difficult, but with a thought and consideration all went well.

I even managed to cope with cooking a Christmas meal in a smaller oven – for more people!

 That first Christmas taught me that change can be a very good challenge indeed.

Light and sound

Something that I really enjoyed during our first few months in the house, especially as the seasons changed from late spring to summer, was the way in which the light changed in the main room. There were two windows in the east wall and one facing south. So for most of the day there was sun light shining directly into the room.

 I also loved the sound of the wind under the bedroom door if the windows were open. When I was a child, the house I grew up in had the same noise; like a chorus of women’s voices. Some people would find it quite frightening. I loved the noise. When I was ill I would always sleep in my parents bed during the day and listen feeling safe and secure

Friday 13th

It could only happen on Friday 13th.

I got up in the night to go to the toilet. Fortunately it’s next door to our bedroom. I went back to bed and dozed for a while then suddenly woke up. The water tank was still filling up. The button on the toilet was stuck so water was just running through the system and down the toilet. There is nothing like working out how to take a toilet apart at three in the morning. Fortunately we could turn the water off easily.

It took several visits from plumbers and replaced parts before it was fixed. We flushed the toilet using buckets of water for a month. I still check that the button goes back properly today.

Finding our way around

The end of the first week was marked by the closure of the sale of our old house. It was a very strange sensation to lock the front door and hand over the keys which had been with us for the last 25 years. I didn’t feel sad at all.

As I said; “the last 25 years”, which meant that there was a lot of getting used to routines and finding things to go before we really felt settled in. Everything seemed to take longer than usual. One of the pleasures was shopping for new curtains, lamps and odds and ends. It took a few weeks to get everything just as I liked it.

Even going out in the car had its problems. There were lots of new village names to get used to (and some of them very similar). We even decided that a certain roundabout near to where we live was a second Bermuda triangle. Still it was fun exploring the beautiful countryside around us, either in the car or on foot.