The older I get the faster time seems to fly by, but nothing could have prepared me for the whirlwind that has been the past 6-7 weeks.

I started 2018 with good intentions. With the gift of a year’s gym fees from Gaz for my birthday, and a vague plan to get up at 6am each morning to run a few miles, I was going to be fit and active. I’d set goals for work, my bank balance was starting to settle after some client chaos towards the end of the previous year, everything was swell.

Then, on the spur of the moment, we decided to go and view a house.

With my mortgage deal ending in March and the kids getting to the point where sharing a bedroom is impractical, a house move has been in our near future for a while. I’ve had my eye on the local property market for 18 months or so; I had my list of requirements and I was ready to house hunt. Not ready enough though, it would seem, because having decided to view a house — and realising it ticked a variety of boxes, including ones we didn’t know needed ticking — the chaos that ensued knocked me completely for six.

We jumped head first and made an offer on the New House and after a small amount of haggling, we were accepted with the New House being removed from the market on the condition that we put our house on the market and sold it within six weeks. A generous move by the seller, but still… six weeks to tidy, market and sell a house that was definitely not ready to be sold.

And so my 6am starts to go for a quick run suddenly became 6am starts to clean the house for a viewing. My gym time became “waiting around for the photographer” time. My already busy calendar quickly filled up with appointments, packing, prepping and tidying.

We finally had an offer on ours last Thursday: the eve of the 6 week deadline. We countered and received a follow up offer which we accepted on the Friday, bob on 6 weeks. Nothing like cutting it close to the bone. Now we just have to hope that the legal bits ‘n’ bobs progress smoothly and we can exchange and complete without a hiccup. I have every limb & digit crossed…

Lead photo by jens johnsson on Unsplash