Wednesday 18 August 2021

Starting to get straight!

Day 22 of kitchen renovation.

I picked up my Mum and took her into Northampton for a chiropodist appointment this morning, as she was having trouble with one of her toes, bless her. All of us have been going to Mrs Kirwan for years, and it was lovely to have a chat and catch up.

Afterwards, we drove to Benchmarx as I wanted to make up the paint for the doors in the kitchen and needed to know the code so I could take it to Dulux. The woman I spoke to suggested I go next door to Travis Perkins who had a scanner and would be able to scan the piece of wood I had with me.

They did a fantastic job and within half an hour I had a 2.5 litre pot of paint for the doors in the exact same colour! I had said to Sophie I would pick her up from the station at 1pm, so we just had time for a quick lunch at Dunelm. Mum chose a jacket potato but hardly ate any of it. She said she was so unhappy at the care home, and being in Dunelm, where she used to shop for her own house, probably made her worse.

At 1pm we sped off to the station, collected Sophie and took her to McDonald's for her lunch as she was starving. I had hoped to treat Mum to a McFlurry but they didn't have any! Sophie told us all about her trip to London and had had a brilliant time. We took her home as we then had an appointment at Avery Park Care Home at 2.30pm.

Avery Park is brand new (opened in March) and has a wing for independent living. They are owned by the same group as The Hawthorns in Northampton (where I wanted Mum and Dad to go in January 2020) and the decor and surroundings were very similar. We had to do another lateral flow test (even though I'd done one earlier today) and after the results were in, we went to have a look at a one-bedroom apartment for Mum. She would be on her own, responsible for her own cooking, cleaning, laundry, etc (which is what she wants) but would be able to spend her days with Dad, who would be in the care home wing. The cost every week was £600 less than she's paying now, but she could use all the facilities in the care home such as the hairdresser, therapy room, gym and cinema. She could even take her meals with Dad every day for a small charge.

If she decided against this, they had a companion room for them both at about the same price as they're paying now. We were both very impressed by the building and the staff and Mum seemed very keen.

I took her back to the care home and sped back to my own home where a large part of the floor had been tiled and the grouting was all done.





We are so pleased with the tiling and how it looks, especially the patterned tiles above the cooker!

This evening, when Jordan had gone, we dismantled the paste table and put a lot of things in the tall cupboards by the window. We did some cleaning and put the two ring hob on the worktop next to the cooker. The conservatory is now almost back to normal, which is a huge relief!

Keith cooked a delicious cottage pie while Sophie and I sipped G&Ts and played Scrabble, just as I imagined us doing!

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