Home!

By my reckoning, it's been three years, four months and twenty-seven days since I last slept in this house. I popped in last night on my own after work and it was so odd to be here: I didn't really know what to do with myself. I wandered 'round from room to room, putting on the lights, and trying to see if I felt at home. I seemed to be full of an uncomfortable nervous energy so in the end I went for a long swim and felt much better after that.

This morning, I dropped the girls' car off at Kirkby Motors for a service, and drove back in one of their vans, which I'd hired for the day. I met the lady who cleans our office at the house and we'd only just finished discussing what she was going to do when the chaps from the removal firm arrived with all the stuff that I put into storage last November.

The Minx turned up around the same time and we headed down to the cottage to start loading the boxes that we packed on Sunday. We made four trips to bring everything up to the house and that took us all day in the end not least because dismantling Dan's bed - one of these elevated affairs with a desk and chair underneath - seemed to take forever. And then we had to get all the parts downstairs, which was a whole new adventure. And then there was one final van load of stuff to go to the tip in the morning, which we've left parked outside the house.

And this evening, with a house full of boxes - although, crucially, every box in the right room - it does feel like home. This is the living room: I bought that round chair on the left when I moved in, fifteen and a half years ago. (I have some baby pictures of Dan asleep in it.) I was given the chair on the right by two lovely Twitter friends - Jon and Lou - when I moved into the first cottage and didn't have much to sit on. 

I think I'll enjoy unpacking, knowing that I won't be packing again for the foreseeable future. Also, one advantage of being a clutter magnet is that I have a lot more memories to unpack and put around my home.