The House Renovation - Day One (catchup)

It's day one of our major house rennovation.

I've been quiet - some say very-quiet, verging on dead - here for some time, and I'm sorry. While excuses don't hold for much and everyone's busy - especially people with children - I've been busy.

So here's a little update on the last six months:

-sold my flat, which I'd lived in like-forever. Contract exchange was tough (I cried for about three days), but not as tough as having to keep the place tidy and brightly-coloured-plastic-toy free for the viewings so that the childless funky couples of West Hampstead could imagine themselves in a Party Flat

- moved house - to a rented house. Which means we have to do it all again, at some point, but hey. Truth is, once there were three of us we'd totally grown out of the Party Flat, stylish as it was. Not to mention the comics. The comics, frankly, need their own special room. And all those things that you swear you'll never do, you do, like move house to be near a school. Not so much that, but that the school options in Party Flat zone 2 were limited, whereas in Suburban Zone 4, there are options. So we figured we'll move, have more space, let the comics breath, work out where to live later

- househunting. That's a lie - my laptop records tell me I started househunting in 2008 (when D and I finally got our collective acts together)and I guess I have to learn something from the fact that I couldn't find the perfect house in three years. Househunting is time-consuming, especially when you're really anal like me and have to know what every comparable house in the street is like before you can even go see the one that's on offer. Not that it'll ever be a useful skill, but I can value a house anywhere in North London at thirty paces

- got married (again). We didn't make a huge song-and-dance, just a medium one, and I'm kinda an event planner as well as all the other things I don't quite do, but, it took a little time. Although it was amazing. Weddings make me cry; my tip - waterproof mascara

- Actually found a house to buy, perversely, on the day we moved in our rental house (Zaphod - small child - asked me about our house and I called it our current house and now he calls it our current house). Offer accepted in September, quite a lot of hassle till eventual completion in January

- Which brings us to today - the start of a rennovation project / extension that is scheduled for six months. Which it has to be, as the lease is up on our house at exactly the same time, so we'd have nowhere to live. ALthough, we could go to our storage container on the North Circular and hang out with our furniture

So, today the builder turned up with his crew of charming Polish blokes, and they are gradually dismantling all the things from the house I want to keep ("anything over fifty years old, we keep for you, Sasha") he eventually said to me yesterday when I turned up with an itemised spreadsheet of 28 period features I wanted to make sure we retain.

Pictures. That's what you need, right? The before and after is always so compelling.

I will tell you more about the house plans later, but rest assured, the comics have their own special resting place (including their own personal structural steels).