Once again I find myself apologising for the length of time between blogs… a lot has happened.
When I was feeling so rough last Christmas 2019 we came to the monumental decision (for us) to move. We both really loved where we lived in the countryside in Norfolk and had thought that it was our ‘forever home’. The thing is having a plot that size requires work and when I couldn’t do much more than look after myself and not even much of that in October… the home and gardens were becoming a chore. Maintenance was something that had to be done rather than something we could enjoy doing. We decided that we needed to downsize. Surprisingly to us both, it felt like a weight had been lifted rather than the expected feeling of sadness that we were preparing to leave our much loved home where we had been for almost 13 years.
I recently saw a quote that said something like ‘express gratitude for what you had in place of sadness of what you lost’. I’m sure that the power of gratitude is not something new to you however the power of gratitude and self compassion have been getting a lot of press lately and rightly so (in my opinion!). This really summed up how we were feeling; our focus was totally on the new lifestyle we were planning to have rather than the old lifestyle we were leaving behind (along with all its wonderful experiences which we will never forget ❤).
Once we had decided to leave the house, the decision of where to go was relatively easy, we were going back up north. After some consideration, we finally set our hearts on Derbyshire. Close to Mum & Richie and our old haunts as well as being closer to my little sister Bryony (and her beautiful family Christopher and their two daughters in Leeds), my step siblings and wider family and we now have Dad and Chris up in Leeds too! All without being any further away from Phil’s family in Gosport, and closer to those in Northumberland.
Once we had designed our future lifestyle by imagining what we’d like to be doing with our time we were able to make a list of criteria for the kind of place we’d like to live. I started packing boxes… we had (and still do have) a lot of stuff!! We went live on the market on the day the whole country went into national lockdown, March 23rd.
On June 22nd we had our first viewing, a lovely lady who fell in love with it, her husband came the following day and we accepted an offer… long story short, we moved all our belongings into storage and ourselves and Dude into Mum’s in Chesterfield on August 12th. After a fabulous and well needed sunny rest at Mum and Richie’s on September 7th we took ownership of a bungalow on the hill in Hasland, Chesterfield.
Just about one year after I started packing boxes, I am still unpacking boxes but we’re gradually getting there!!
Things are not quite as we has planned. We haven’t yet been able to spend the time with family and friends that we had planned as part of our new lifestyle, we haven’t even been able to visit Dad and Chris in their new home but we know that we will. The wonderful things include an open sky view looking over the valley to the south from the sunny kitchen diner and have built a little kitchen garden; well we couldn’t have nothing to eat in the garden!! Mum has split loads of beautiful herbaceous perennials from her garden to fill the originally sparsely planted borders. We’ve redecorated throughout (I say we but in reality I have done very little!) and have new carpets. It really feels like home even though we haven’t got any pictures up yet. Like I said we’re getting there.
Whilst I realise that for many people 2020 felt like a year of sadness, fear, frustration and disappointment, for us along with those emotions were change, excitement, opportunity and most importantly love. By choosing to focus on the latter with gratitude, we will remember 2020 fondly.
My Mum sent me a beautiful video by a lady called Raageshwari reflecting on 2020 and my favourite part was this; ‘Gratitude tricks the brain and puts us in a place of abundance, it helps us to focus on what we have rather than what we don’t have and the truth is that we have all evolved, matured and grown at another level altogether in 2020’
I hope that you are able to find some gratitude for 2020 and can head into 2021 with a heart abundant with love.
Talk to you soon
Lots of love
Mand ❤
Wow, what a lot you packed into 2020, Mandy and Phil! And almost all of it amid one lockdown after another – well done! Yes, it wasn’t a bad year for those who escaped the wretched virus; stay safe and keep being careful, Mandy.