Getting there......

Even though it's only been 2 months since I moved in it was getting to the stage where I thought I'd never get the house finished, I'm sure everyone that's ever moved to anywhere that needed work has felt the same. Getting rid of the artex ceilings upstairs made a big difference but I needed to get another big job out of the way so that I could see light at the end of the tunnel.

The floors! They had to be next. Upstairs was covered in pretty much every shade of carpet possible - and none of them to my taste at all! The 3 bedrooms and the hall were all different colours as was the floor in the bathroom and ensuite - like a rainbow but nowhere near as pretty.  The worst by far for me was the dark green swirly shag pile style carpet on the stairs! Nasty!!! Seriously I can't believe anyone would choose to have this, still it takes all sorts of folk.....

I arranged for the floors upstairs and the stairs to be done first, that would be followed shortly afterwards by the lounge and dining room.

It's amazing how a lick of paint or a new carpet can have such an effect on a space, suddenly everything looked lighter and definitely neater and cleaner! Amazing....so here's before......

and here's the exact same room after.......ta, da!!

I'm beginning to feel this is my house now it's getting my stamp on it! 

And as for the green shag pile on the stairs.......it was adiós to that too!

How much? Seriously!?

For years plumbers have charged me an extortionate price to silicone the back of my sinks or bath, but no more!

Let me tell you - it's a big con - boy is it an easy job - you just have to have the confidence to give it a go!

My conservatory was lined round the edges with silicone, like you use in a bathroom, I assume to keep it watertight, who knows? Anyhoo, the silicone they used was (stupidly!) not mould free so the whole lot was a yeuky black and white mess making the conservatory look very worn and dirty, see below.

I was quoted some ridiculous sum by someone to redo it and they weren't even that keen on tackling it which made me (wrongly) think it must be a very hard job.......not so......

I got myself a very nice handy little plastic gadget from B&Q which helped dig out the old silicone, and infact once you get the thing started you can usually pull the stuff off in long strips so pretty quick to get rid of the old silicone. After that you just need to make sure you clean and dry the surface and off you go.

I got mould resistant silicone this time and the dispensing gun. At first I was quite nervous and didn't quite get it right on the first try. I then discovered that you had to keep the nozzle right up against the surface, move along swiftly and smoothly and Bob's your uncle!

The other trick is to have a jug of water next to you, dip your finger into it and run it over the silicone straight after dispensing it which gives a lovely smooth surface. Brilliant!

The whole job took me about 1 & 1/2 hours and the conservatory immediately looks cleaner. That's the last penny of my money anyone will see to do that particular job - infact I'm thinking of hiring myself out to do these jobs as I quite enjoyed it - I think my previous years of cake icing experience came in very handy!