I didn’t quite realise how long it’d been since I wrote a post, and reading back the last one, that feels like a long time ago!  So, what has happened over the last month…

We had a very quiet couple of weeks after the last post (hence the lack of a follow up) but managed some lovely weekend walks, did a swing dance class online, played escape games every Sunday, made some fantastic food and mulled wine, watched a streamed Tim Minchin concert and did plenty of craft (I knitted us each a beanie and made a few new masks). We were all extremely shocked on December 2^nd when the government chose to end the lockdown as scheduled.  Cases had only dipped back down to where they were at the start of the lockdown, which didn’t seem like enough progress to justify ending it. However, the UK government is extremely economy-focused with their approach to Covid and for those reasons needed London not to be in lockdown ahead of Christmas. For our purposes not much changed though, we continued to be quite careful and not eat out or meet up with people outside of our bubble.

The last few weeks have also been the turn-around to a very wintery start to winter. In the last week of November and first week of December, temperatures were down to 1 degree, which made for some very chilly morning runs!  The fog has been crazy as well, with dense fog rolling in overnight and hanging around until 9 or 10 in the morning some days. Unfortunately this was timed with our boiler (hot water/heating) giving out once again – it was out in October, when we had all the issues with the landlord as a result. It does come on here and there though, so we’ve been trying to avoid contacting our landlord until after Peter’s birthday.

Peter’s very Christmas-y so as soon as December arrived, we had three Advent calendars ready to go – a Nespresso coffee pod one, a fancy Fortnum & Mason tea one and a beer one. On the 5^th we headed for a big walk up through Shoreditch and picked up a little Christmas tree in the churchyard of the St Leonard’s Church where Grandpa’s ancestors were baptised and married! Upon arriving back in the apartment (after a bit of a slog of a half hour walk!) it turned out to be much bigger than the one we’d had last year.    It didn’t fit in the corner where it was supposed to go, so it’s got pride of place in front of the window. We spent the evening decorating the tree, which made the apartment feel a lot more festive!

On the housing front, the sale on the Forest Hill apartment has fallen through. It was becoming more and more ridiculous, with current and future works piling up and looking like it was going to be a bit of a money pit.  On top of that, on the 1^st we’d gone to a house viewing in Penge (near Crystal Palace) and absolutely fallen in love with the place. It’s a three-bedroom freehold (you own the land) house with a little yard – and a cute red front door and gate! Luckily in the UK before contracts are exchanged, you can just withdraw your offer. So despite being three months into the process for the Forest Hill property, Peter was able to make an offer on the new place and as soon as it was accepted, just transfer all of the bank documents and his solicitors to processing a sale on that! Completely wild u-turn, but one that is going to hopefully mean a faster sale, and a more stable financial outlook for a place that Peter actually entirely owns, rather than having to muck about with owners’ corporation works etc. The vendor and the real estate agent want to get the sale done by the end of January, so we’re really crossing our fingers for that! 

It’s Peter’s birthday this weekend, so we’ve got a few plans for that, but I’ll save that for the next post…