We are on the move

So, it's official. We'll be moving out of our first home together from the first week of June. I don't feel much at the moment but I know when we get nearer the time it will be hard on my emotions. 

We saw this place on the market before we got married. We looked at a lot of places but knew we couldn't hold anywhere since we were traveling for three months for our honeymoon so we waited until we got home to look at a place seriously. 

We lived with my parents for two months after being married (once we'd got home from travels) before we settled on this place. By the way, living with my parents was fun. I guess because both of us lived with parents until we got married it didn't feel much different other than that Sam was allowed in my bedroom! Haha!
I had huge expectations for my first home so when I saw this place on the internet I immediately discarded it thinking it was too small. I wanted somewhere where we had a spare room & a big kitchen because I was eager to have a place I could host people comfortably and visitors could stay the night but God knew before I did that we could still do that in this place - we would just have to be more creative!

Two months at my parents, nowhere feeling perfect for us and feeling eager to settle down & start our married life just the two of us I gave in and we made an appointment to see this apartment. 
It was a 'walk-in-and-know-immediately' moment for both of us. It was completely empty but I could see exactly what I wanted to do with the rooms. We asked the estate agent if we could have a moment to talk and went into what now is our bedroom to do a little 'this is the one dance!'                                                       
We gave our offer to the estate agent & a few weeks later it was ours!
NB: We rented this place but you can always ask for the rent to be cheaper - it works!
 
We moved in the first week of December 2011 and enjoyed our very first Christmas together, just the two of us.

Even now it's still feels like a novelty to come home to the same place every night and wake up next to him every morning. I hope I'll always feel that.

Because it's a rental property we couldn't do much to the place other than add our own furniture and put up a few photos. I resisted the urge to paint walls and put up shelves - my time will come! It still felt very much our place though.
 
We've made some great memories here in our first home. We've led church small group with up to 18  people curving around the sofa into the kitchen but  still having some great God moments and intimate prayer time. A good few celebrations with people filling the dining room, lounge & kitchen. A Lord of the Rings marathon, visitors sleeping on a blow up double mattress on the floor, two very special Christmases, many dinners with guests squished in between the wall & dining table & much much more!




God knew exactly what we needed, much more than we trusted and we had the first home of our dreams!
 
This house had a window in the lounge that provided us with glorious sunrises & sunsets, snowy trees, dancing leaves & crazy thunder storms & the tree outside our window looked beautiful in all weather.
A gated-fenced off area where multicoloured flowers & ivy grew to create curtains of real beauty.
The gravel on the drive told me exactly when my sweetheart was arriving home from work & the clang of the side gate told us to get the kettle on for visitors!




 
It didn't matter where you were in our apartment we could speak to each other from every room. 

We have laughed, we have cried, we've napped, danced & sung. Been hot, been cold, had cuddles, had fights, said prayers, read books, watched films, been creative & been lazy in this home.

We're going to enjoy our last three months here then go off onto another adventure down the road.





Thank you for the special memories Hole Lane. You were super cute & beyond good to us.

Our new adventure to where we are moving will be documented in the near future. All I'm saying is that I now get to pick out paint colours! Let the creativity loose!