The final moving day was just too traumatic for words - I'd been cleaning for days and still hadn't finished packing when a very hot and bothered Andy rolled up with a van which was too big to get up the lane. So we had to hump the last annoying odds and sods down to the main street, with an audience of various neighbours. It was humid, frenetic and exhausting. There were a few swear words uttered. We ended up leaving one or two things behind out of sheer frustration with it all. I said a last goodbye to the garden - the new tenants will find some healthy potato plants and Swiss chard.
Final packing - the cats.
Last one out, lock the door!
Goodbye to you at last, tiny little cottage - we had ten cramped but happy years in you, though Lord alone knows how we all managed.
The hot weather finally broke as we left the village and the first rain for weeks started to fall - thank goodness the cab had excellent air conditioning. The cats howled all the way to Shropshire.
But they settled down later that evening, in their new quarters - the kitchen, which is actually bigger than our old cottage drawing room
After all that, I only needed one thing, and could only find one thing to drink it out of.
Andy had already been here for some days on his own, and had unpacked what he thought were my most important studio things. My work desk, of course.
And some of my best treasures.
But there was still all this to deal with -
- which is now sorted. Most of my stuff is staying in boxes, as we hope to move into our own place before Christmas. (Famous last words?)
That's better. Hello new, temporary studio.
And hello to having no proper garden - although I do have tomato plants, thanks to Andy's kind mum - whether they will come to anything in the wet, grey summer we are having, remains to be seen.
And - hello Shropshire! From here we can see Wales - there's nice.
