#2291 Sunday 12th May

Since a very early age, Kaylia has worn headphones (to reduce noise) whenever she is away from home. Suddenly in this week she has stopped wearing them!  The headphones are available but she's not using them.  I think it's a sign that she's growing up.

We gained access to our new home on Friday.  It's very nice.  Now comes the massive task of moving and clearing Coo st ready for sale.

This is the river about 50metres from the house.

#2290 Thursday 9th may

Moving house is very hard ..... especially when there is 20 years of accumulated "useful" stuff.  It hurts to throw it all out. ..... ....and it hurts to sell off all my tools at bargain prices.

To keep you all in the loop with what’s happening…

 

Voluntary Administration

I have to say I really am not enjoying this process at all. However I guess that was always to be expected. Thinking about it, it comes down to two things:

·        The loss of control. I feel like I am back working for the government again and needing to have approval for decisions. I know I have a good financial team working with me but I miss being the boss with total autonomy.

·        Staff. Some of my staff are brilliant and some I would like to hit them on the head with a brick bat! When this is all done, I am going to have work very hard to let go of the appalling behaviour of some of my team – thankfully the minority. Intelligent people can be exceptionally dumb at times… but enough said about that!

 

On a side note, while all this is going on with CWBC, my other business is insanely busy for different reasons. More on that another time.

 

House hunting

Yay! We have a house to move into next week – 60 French Street, Ashfield down along the river.

 

Now – let me share what I’ve learned about this experience. I submitted four rental applications – two mentioned the word “disability” and two didn’t. Guess which two houses I received an offer for??

 

I wish there was somewhere I could send a complaint to about this but as I don’t have any proof, there isn’t. The only positive is that I have a better understanding about what some of my clients have to put up with in terms of discrimination.

 

House selling

Can I just say that I have the best husband ever! Not only is he cooking dinner for us at night. He is also slowly emptying a shed that has 20 years of stuff that has been collected. And when he has free time, he is doing repairs around the house!

 

We will be taking the things we want for the new house across on Monday. From that point on, there will be massive chucking out going on. We’ve got two weeks to try and get this house of ours ready for the market.  We’ll get there because we have to.

 

Mental health and wellbeing

Ian has been physically exhausted the last week. I’m mentally exhausted. In our own ways we are both grieving.

 

The only good news here is that Ms Kaylee is her usual ray of sunshine and is currently fixating on cheesecake for Mother’s Day this weekend J

 

Possible areas that we might need help

We are going to need help on Saturday 18^th and Sunday 19^th of May so if you’re free and would like to help, here are the two areas that we’ll need some help with:

·        Painting and

·        General throwing out of stuff

 

Don’t feel you have to offer, this is mainly for those of you who have asked. Let me know if you can come across and when you might be free.

 

Thank you for all of your check-ins and support. I’m not the most communicative at the moment. This is just how I process what is happening…and to be honest in the evenings I am working very hard to turn my head off.

 

Nxx

#2289 Tuesday 7th may

Hear! Hear!  What a wonderful sentiment.

The past few days have been taken up with clearing out my shed and with clearing the back yard of all the accumulation of steel that I've gathered over the years.  I've done three trips to the scrap metal buyers..... each trip was over a ton.

The shed clearing is huge .... I'm giving away most things and selling the large tools.  So far $1,200 has been produced and I'm nowhere near the end. There are still many freebies to go.

We plan to move house over the next two weeks.  Kaylia seems quite relaxed about the move but we expect some upset at times.

#2288 Tuesday 30 April

Hi all,

 

I thought I would start a weekly update to share with you what’s happening in the land of Crofts and Wards. Mostly, I thought it would be useful to do this as I keep losing a track of what I am telling everyone. My menopause is completely insance at the moment. Plus…I know I am very hard to pin down at the moment on the phone!

In no particular order….

Voluntary Administration

As far as formal processes go, this one is not to be recommended. However the positive here is that I think I made the right choice about the person to facilitate it.

Tomorrow will be a testing time as it is the first formal meeting convened by the administrator and half the staff at my Centre will attend. I expect it to be a combination of confronting, embarrassing and downright painful. The only positive here is that we only have to have two of these meetings and tomorrow’s won’t be about decision making, just statement of process.

No point contacting me tomorrow to check in as I expect I will need to find a quiet place to process/ possibly hide.

House hunting

What an amazingly horrible process it is to go looking for houses to rent. Sorry – the housing market is every bit as difficult as described in the media. I see so many stressed people at home opens and landlords can pretty much ask for whatever they want.

I think I have been to 10 or more house openings now and I’m realizing that personal standards really have to be lowered.  

After 10 days on the job, I’ve decided that the rule of thumb is to apply for absolutely everything and hope that one application will be successful. Finding somewhere to live is actually the priority for us at the moment (see next section).

House selling

Some good news in my somewhat depressing email… We have a lovely real estate agent all lined up ready to go. She tells me that our house will sell really well and very quickly in the current market.

The plan though is to move us out before we list so I can get Kaylee settled.

Ian and I are doing a magnificent job throwing out everything and anything that we can’t see ourselves needing. Good Sammies is a winner here! Even Kaylee is pitching in. Every time I start bagging up things, she offers to throw out some of her DVDs. I think she is enjoying this process J

Mental health and wellbeing

Not fabulous…but not terrible either… Occasionally, one of us (Ian and Naomi) will have a stressy moment (mostly me!). Kaylia is sailing by and enjoying the prospect of change. So long as we keep up the routine she will be fine.

My surgery is on hold for now as I need to be on deck and making decisions. I might review that when we find our new home so stay tuned.

Possible areas that we might need help

Just a brain storm from me but we will need help:

· When we start throwing out the big stuff we’ll need extra hands to help

· Once I have the house clear I’m going to need some folk to help with painting – mostly in two rooms

· Would love some advice about presenting the house for sale – this may be Stana’s area of expertise

· Might need some help in the garden but I am also contemplating outsourcing this.

Best time to catch me to chat is Sunday evenings at the moment. I’m coming home exhausted on the weeknights (plus also trying to cull stuff when my body will let me).

I hope this has been helpful in catching you up. Ian and I really value your support J

Nxx

#2287 Friday 26th April

 Yesterday Kaylia and I went on a car club outing in the Landrover ....

Kaylia loved it as usual.  She takes note of all that is happening .....  she doesn't ask questions but sometimes she will voice an instruction.

Today she's at her Workpower job in Malaga 

#2286 Saturday 20th April

It has been a stressful week..... we've had to put the business into voluntary administration because of the debt required to survive the effect of COVID.  This means that the business continues to operate but an administratror controls the finances. It will mean that we have to sell our home and find some where to rent.

We will shield Kaylia from the stress as much as possible. She is accustomed to different houses because of holiday travel.....  as long as she is with us she will be able to cope.

The aim is to get the business into a successful functional position again.

#2285 Tuesday 16th April

Last night at bedtime kaylia and I were having our usual time and talking about coming special days.  We got to her 21st birthday next January..... I asked her what her favourite present was.  "Mummy" she says