Cinderella House

Bill’s cousin has an amazing house.  I'm told it was once a colliery house, built for a coal miner’s family.  Now, I've seen colliery houses, and so have you:  at the Beamish Museum; but if there ever was a house that has undergone a magical transformation, it is this one.  I can scarce believe it ever looked as it supposedly did, except perhaps for the long narrow garden.   It has obviously been expanded and developed and I suspect much of the success of it is down to Chris and Mike who are still making plans for new things.


The front is on a narrow lane across from the high school. The terrace of houses all have garages that have been added and these form a small courtyard that Mike and Chris have really started transforming.  I love courtyards, don't you?

You enter into a wide kitchen and utility area that span the width of the house. It makes absolute sense to have a miner returning home to enter into a washable place, doesn't it?  Except of course it now is full of modern appliances.  The next room back is the dining room which opens into the sitting room and then into – I’m so envious – a conservatory and from then into the garden.   Theirs sports a patio with barbeque (they’re optimists, you see, in spite of British weather), a deep fish pond filled with koi, and a greenhouse – I can’t even bear to think about the home grown tomatoes that will come out of there, I'm so envious.

Could you bear to have an office with this view out the glass door?

To one side of the living room is a small office that also looks out into the garden.  I could tell you all sorts of other things to make you green, but they'd start thinking I was trying to sell their house out from under them!



Home to not just Mike, Chris and koi, but also two aging dogs (a chocolate lab, and a tiny ancient thing - Mike tells me it's a Maltese; sadly they had to put down their old Dalmation recently) and a gorgeous black cat. 

We were invited, as I mentioned before, for ‘tea’ on THE Wedding Day. I told you 'tea' was a confusing term, didn’t I? Everyone gave their opinions about the Royal Wedding and the telly was still on.

We ate and ate and ate. Chris hardly ever sat down and refused any help; I can only guess that she really likes doing these things, and I do as well on occasion. Bill made a lovely carrot cake to take to the feast, with cream cheese, even.  





Instead of watching all the wedding coverage, he’d gone for a run; the streets were deserted but for the occasional street party. 

I've deleted all the rest of drivel I originally wrote about the Royal Wedding.  It's old news, now, of course.

However, Bill did pass on this item that appeared on Facebook.  He was adamant that 'someone' didn't do their job properly.  'Someone' should have been aware of this little coincidence!  Disney films, after all, aren't only marketed in the States:

Oops...  I'm sure they're both very nice young women, really.