I can still remember it so vividly. Frog was about 6 months old. I’d been at home with her all day, stewing. Something in our house had broken and it wasn’t the first time. We couldn’t fix it, because the cottage was rented. It was another reminder that we didn’t own our own home. We couldn’t paint the walls or fix a leaking tap without asking permission first.

Fast forward a few months and we had the conversation. “We need to accept we’ll never be able to buy our own place,” said the (self-proclaimed) Northern Love Machine. I reluctantly agreed. With a small baby, a teacher’s salary, a fledgling freelance career, living in one of the most expensive parts of the UK, I had to accept he was right.

We didn’t have super rich parents. We didn’t have any inheritance. We only had what we earned, which covered our rent, petrol, living and childcare costs. We were lucky if we could scrape a spare fifty quid at the end of the month to chuck into savings. A 25% deposit on a house in our village stood before us like a mountain, impossible to scale. 

But yet, we wanted it so badly. The thought of paying rent as a pensioner was scary. More than that though, we wanted to put down firm roots. We wanted to know the place we were raising our little girl was going to be where she would grow up. We wanted to plant vegetables in the garden and watch them grow. Make plans to paint the walls. Maybe buy a pet. Overall, I wanted to feel settled.

Then, a couple of years ago, I got a new job. My contract meant I was earning more, alongside my other freelance work. We could finally save properly, substantially. But still not substantially enough to afford a 25% deposit on a house in the region of £350,000.

So we saved. And saved. And saved some more. I worked. And worked. And worked some more. Some weeks I was pulling 80 hours alongside looking after a toddler who needed regular hospital and physio appointments. We went without posh holidays. I turned my face away from handbags and shoes that winked at me from shop windows. Gradually, the money in the bank started to grow. We wondered if, perhaps, the idea of owning our own home may be a possibility one day.

And now, here we are. The NLM got a job in Devon, relocating us from Berkshire to the South West this summer. Prices here are far, far cheaper. The cost of living is far, far cheaper. It’s pretty, relaxed and affordable. It wasn’t until August that we had a mortgage in agreement granted. We threw ourselves into house hunting with enthusiasm, putting up with the tiny rental we had secured safe in the knowledge it was only temporary.

Eventually, we found her. The dream house. A terraced cottage in a little village on the edge of Dartmoor. It has a meadow and a river at the front and a garden with a vegetable patch at the back. There is a park, a village primary school, two pubs and a shop. There are high ceilings, a log burner, an open fireplace and three sizeable bedrooms. The bathroom is bigger than our current bedroom. And, downstairs, we have a living room, opening onto a dining room, a kitchen and a sun room we will use as an office.

After months of false starts, other buyers trying to gazzump us, promises of exchange and huge disappointments, we finally have her. We exchanged today. Completion is in a week.

In one week we will be sitting in our own home. Our very own home that we have worked so bloody hard for. With space and walls that are all ours to paint.

Our very own home. I can’t quite believe it.

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After nearly two weeks of living amongst wet paint, newspaper and clothes strewn across every spare inch of floor space, my bedroom makeover is now complete.

This is a big milestone. I’ve written before about the fact we’re saving towards a deposit for a mortgage. And with many banks currently requesting 25% – with the fees on top of that – in the area we currently live in we’d be lucky to buy somewhere with less than £50,000 in the bank. Unsurprisingly, we don’t have that kind of change lying around.

So we are saving. Saving, saving, saving. I work around 70 hours a week and we aim to put aside much of what I earn. We try not to make too many frivolous purchases, although white wine and chocolate buttons are budgeted for. But stuff like brand spanking new furniture is a rarity.

This is why I did a little jump for joy when Feather and Black contacted me about taking part in a challenge to makeover my bedroom. With my early starts for work (my alarm clock goes off at 3.30am), I tend to be in bed by 10pm many evenings. But this is no fun if the room I’m sleeping in is a tip, full of 90s furniture and dusty photographs.

We’ve been meaning to revamp our room for a while. Not owning the bricks and mortar meant painting the walls wasn’t an option, but doing up the furniture and spruicing up the place with some pretty accessories was a possibility.

Here’s the before version. Don’t judge me.

I would love to invest in one of those beautiful wooden beds, but alas that is an expense I can’t justify at the moment. So we’re making do with the chrome one I’ve had since I was 16. Classy.

The old room also featured some rather tasty 90s furniture….

But after doing up said 90s furniture and purchasing some rather lovely accessories for the room I was left with something altogether different.

Here’s the “after” version…

Decluttered and free of that hideous dated pine. My bedroom furniture no longer leaves me cold.

I love it.

Here are the Linda Barker-esque facts:

The rug is from John Lewis, costing £55. It was bought to go with the beautiful silk throw I already owned, a relic from my time working in India a few years ago. It also matches the wall hanging I have kept ever since a trip to Sri Lanka, but which has been hidden behind my wedding dress since last August.

As you can tell from the bed, I’m rather partial to a cushion too.

The red spotty one cost £39, from Melin Tregwynt, a tip picked up from my friend Heather, the interiors goddess who blogs at Growing Spaces. The other cushions were bought on a trolley dash to Dunelm Mill and cost £19.99 (for the felt one with the yellow flower), £7.99, £5.99 and £4.99. Bargains.

The 90s pine was rubbed down, painted and decoupaged and is accessorised with a Dunelm Mill jug (£5.99) with a selection of fabric flowers. The (self-proclaimed) Northern Love Machine banned real flowers on account of his hayfever.

And to finish the whole look off, this stunning upholstered Richmond Blanket Box, from Feather and Black sits pride of place at the end of our (old) bed.

It now houses our sheets and my wedding dress, meaning I no longer have to battle with a ziplock bag every time the bedding needs changing.

For the first time in my adult life, I now have a room that I love. A room that I feel at home in. It feels like ours, rather than a temporary, in-between space until we have our “proper” house, whenever that may be.

You can check out the rooms of the other four bloggers who also took part in the bedroom revamp challenge on the Feather and Black Facebook page. (It’s a competition, so if you see my picture and you prefer it to the others, give it a “like” and I may be able to invest in a new bed afterall.)

Linda Barker, eat your heart out.

***

Disclosure: I was given a £150 budget to make over the room, along with the beautiful Richmond Blanket Box, to help me with this challenge.

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It’s Christmas soon. My favourite time of year. And with a toddler (who is yet to toddle) it should be even more exciting. Except it’s not. Because all I can think about is what happens afterwards; what January will hold for my family and I, as we try to negotiate those shifting sands.

We have a lot of stuff going on at the moment. Work stuff. House stuff. More work stuff. We don’t know where we’ll be living this time next year or where we’ll be working. We don’t know where Frog will be spending most of her days – with a childminder or with me. We don’t know where the year is going to take us or which path is the “correct” one to follow. Everything’s a bit up in the air.

While this would have excited me in my former, pre-baby life, what I crave now is a bit of stability. I want to be able to make plans, to look ahead with a calm feeling instead of a queasy one. I want to be able to fold my daughter’s clothes and put them away in her room, without wondering how much longer I’ll be doing this daily task in this actual room. What will the next room look like? Where will it be?

It doesn’t help that my parents are in a similar situation. Our family home of the past 24 years went on the market yesterday. Bristol will no longer be “home”, as my mum and dad make the move further into the depths of the West Country. The last place of constant familiarity and stability in my life is not going to remain for much longer.

So as I struggle to keep my balance on the shifting sands beneath my feet, I need to look at the important things in my life and not get bogged down by the inconsequential ones. We are healthy. We have each other. We have food on the table and a roof over our heads.

And I need to remember; home is where we are, where ever that may be.

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