Jack fails again to get his Wednesday post up in time –

Wendy and I have moved house six times so far and it’s always taken us a while to get each one organized to our liking.

We started out in a small ground floor apartment in Rosyth in Fife and there wasn’t much choice there, with just a sitting room, bedroom, kitchen, bathroom and guest room. Then we moved to the wee village of New Gilston at the other end of the county and into what had been the schoolhouse. We were there for five years and it took almost all of that time before we finally decided which rooms suited which purpose!

After that to Padiham in Lancashire, England and a gatehouse built in 1790. It had been extended over the years and with lots of nooks and crannies. Once again we had two small spare rooms and once again it took almost until we left before we finalized which room was a home office and which was the guest room.

From there to White Springs in Florida and although the house had an obvious sitting room/dining room/kitchen, there were two bedrooms and again it took us a long time to decide which was which and which could also be a home office.

Continuing to Big Stone Gap Virginia and our bookstore, where we lived for fourteen years. The house was enormous and we started out living in the top story but over time that became part of the bookstore and our sitting room there became the ‘2^nd Story Café’. I eventually converted our very dark and dingy basement into our bright and cozy apartment.

Finally here we are in Wytheville Virginia and in a lovely, well cared for, old house again. The lady we bought it from left a great bed and dresser in the main bedroom upstairs (mainly because probably she couldn’t get them out). So for the first couple of years we left things pretty much ‘as is’, including the well cared for back yard. In other words we continued to live in someone else’s house!

But now we’re beginning to make it our home and doing all kinds of changes that the poor previous owner would probably not approve of, although she might like the extended vegetable garden.

I suppose the message for today is that a house can become a home, but it can sometimes take quite a while!