Three Little Things

Three Little Things

by JaneNo Comments
Second on our List Us humans look for patterns in many things. We all have our superstitions (even if we say we don't)... personally I have some really weird ones and most of them are based around even numbers (don't ask). However, for some reason last year we decided that both good and bad things come in threes so we should hedge our bets and pick just three things to complete in 2019. That might sound simple, but us being us - those three things were enormous tasks. You have already seen what we did to the kitchen, but in between days working on this we tackled another two large projects. The second on our list was the garage floor. The frame of this garage had been up for a year and we couldn't use it because we had no floor. It was a big space and would need around 12 cm3 of concrete, plus a covering (6 tonnes) of gravel, rebar reinforcement...
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The Kitchen Story

The Kitchen Story

by Jane4 Comments
The Whole Nine Yards. As promised I have accumulated all of the images related to our kitchen transformation and I will try to take you through our process, but first I think you have to understand what other stages it went through during our time here. When we bought the house in 2013 this room was down a dark corridor and contained two beds and a little old sink behind a curtain. It was cold, dark and damp and we thought... this would make a great guest room! We dug out the floor, and put down a new concrete surface. Some of the wooden beams found in the floor have been used elsewhere in the house, in fact one of them is above the new door to the kitchen. We then replaced render on the walls, tiled the floor, painted, put in furniture and bobs your uncle... Four years later .... fed up of living in a cramped 'make-do' kitchen which attracted flies in...
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When Sorry Just doesn’t cut it…

When Sorry Just doesn’t cut it…

by JaneNo Comments
There are many situations in life when it is necessary to apologize, but there are times when sorry just doesn't cut it! Like when you're trying to rescue a spider out of the bath and are armed with glass and paper and the little bugger moves at the last second. You panic and plunge with the glass, unceremoniously amputating a couple of its legs... for the spider this is one of those occasions. For me the situation I find myself in, may not be like losing a limb, but still I think the fact that I haven't written a blog in 18 months, might also be filed firmly under the heading 'Where the fuck have you been' and 'no you're right, sorry just doesn't cut it'! But I am sorry! Not only because you of course have been desperate to hear what's going on in my life, but also because now I am faced with the problem of how to update one and...
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To Blog or Not To Blog

by JaneNo Comments
I love writing about our adventures, but why do it if there's nothing to tell, or if I seem to be just duplicating everything I've already put on Instagram or the Facebook page...I don't want to start boring you guys senseless.... Yeah I know not all of you follow my social media journeys...why, I don't know, because I am a photographic genius!! This may be a slight exaggeration, or even a downright lie, but you are missing some cracking adventures...usually me hurting myself or just making a fool out of myself and putting  my injured pride out there on show for all to see. In fact since I last wrote I have done a ton of things, from painting silly pictures - this one here is going up for auction in the UK to raise money for rescue dogs out here! I've kept running (mostly just to have some quiet time) and have made it to 5kms which is pretty amazing for me....
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Early Retirement Plans

by Jane2 Comments
Well now the snow has gone, it is full steam ahead with my plans for a new kitchen. As you may have guessed I have spent quite a lot of time planning layout and requirements in terms of pipes, electrical points, appliance, wall and door positions, but now it is time to get cracking! First the room needed emptying so we can see what we're dealing with, so I mentioned to Dan that we'd have to live with the mess for a little while, his response?! "What another 4 years?" Ha ha, how we laughed... So the chest freezer is now in the lounge (how this is more strange than it being in the bedroom I'm not sure), the large sofa is in the dining room, the bed and mattress are in the next door's barn (thank you Neil) and I have yet to find a home for the large wooden chest full of goodies...if all else fails it might have to...
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The Mother of Invention

by JaneNo Comments
They say that, 'Necessity is...' and that is where I found myself...and so I had to become a little inventive! It is not original, in fact it is done all over the country and many depend on similar set-ups for hot water supply, however what I am quite pleased with is that in the, now aptly named, Box Room from Hell, we already had most of this set up. All except for the little brass tap in fact, I am not sure why I am surprised by this as there is not a lot that is not in that room somewhere...but finding what you want at any given moment can be somewhat demotivating!   The black tank we have used is part of a Finnish wood-burning sauna system that we brought here...for obvious reasons but haven't yet had time to put it to use in the way that it was intended...but it is perfect for this temporary hot water solution. So now you would...
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Topic of Choice

by Jane2 Comments
The very British tradition of talking about the weather at every opportunity doesn't stop when you leave the country, in fact it just amplifies the situation. In the UK we have very little weather to talk about really, unless you count the summer of 1976 when we had sun once, but the moment you move abroad you have a whole host of things to fill those awkward conversational voids. I love to wax lyrical to my friends stuck back in old blighty about how we have four proper seasons and brag about our 70 degree temperature shift throughout the year, but in fact the weather here actually does dictate everything you do. Even the festivals are governed by mother nature. Where else in the world do we substitute the commercially recognised Valentines Day with cutting back vines and trying out home-made plonk, or wear red and white bracelets until we see our first blossom or stork and I, for one, have not...
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Country Surprised by Seasonal Weather

by JaneNo Comments
I was intending on being in the UK last week, to visit my Dad, who has amazingly made it home from hospital, but the weather made me think twice and eventually postpone my visit. Not because we had vast quantities of snow here, not because I live three hours from the airport and trains, buses and transport routes could be in chaos… No I postponed my trip because the thought of getting to Birmingham and not being able to get out again, filled me with dread. Planes, trains and automobiles ran like clockwork here, whilst trains were being cancelled left, right and centre in the UK….before it had even snowed a flake. While the UK struggled to cope with the 'Beast from the East', we here in Bulgaria were going about our lives as normal and have now decided on an alternative name for the 50cms of snow and -21C temps that we experienced over the last few weeks…we have called it...
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Chinese New Year, A Fire Horse and a Cabbage

by Jane2 Comments
As many of you know I teach English online to professional adults around the globe and thus get inside knowledge on many of their varied customs. A better known one is obviously Chinese New Year or Lunar New Year so… In my attempt to build rapport with my students I talk about what they do to celebrate etc. expecting parades of people wearing enormous dragon costumes, eating large bowls of noodles and setting off lots of fire-crackers late into the night. What did I get? Well I got tales of women cleaning their houses, not just wiping over surfaces with a damp cloth and spraying Febreze at the curtains…oh no…when they say 'cleaning' they mean 'decluttering'! So as you know I am not one to rush to get out the duster and the furniture polish and I continue to claim not to understand how the hoover works (that's a blue job - ask Dan), but…organizing, decluttering and generally taking back control, well...
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Word of the Week…

by JaneNo Comments
Ever thought of getting out of the rat-race and taking the plunge into a simpler life like we have? Can't say I blame you and it's easy, honestly you just have to make the choice and then plan! However if you are coming to Bulgaria there are another few adjectives that you may want to consider, like 'patient', 'inventive', 'willing' and 'adaptable'. It is the last word that comes into play frequently if you are thinking of taking early retirement, I mean Bulgaria is cheap but it is not free, so you have to be able to support yourself and your animals. You don't have animals? You will have when you live here, even if you don't want them, they just move in…(Picture - Exhibit A).   You will be living a self sufficient lifestyle so you don't need to buy food…really?! Let me say we all have this intention, if not self sufficiency then at least a little more self reliance, but it...
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