If you've read the story about finding our forever house you'll know what had me at hello. 

We were actually en route to another house viewing having sort of ruled out this quintessential English country house on account of being listed. 

Having always loved living in new build-ish houses after our uni days the thought of taking on the responsibility of a listed property felt so enormous we had kept scrolling through the house listings even though in every other way it was the perfect house, albeit needing more than a little modernisation. 

We drove through the village tentatively, a surreal feeling of warmth swept over us and by the time we got to the house itself we both had the “this could be the one” feeling.

The garden got me. The huge peony bushes at the rickety garden gate, the creeping roses over the stone window frames and the view.

Some days, when a cupboard almost falls off it's hinges, or another tap starts leaking, it can feel like we haven't made much progress at all, but really we have done so much to make it feel our own and I want to share these changes in a new series of posts called #housegoals charting our inspiration and before and after transformations!

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We love the garden it as it is, no wait we adore the garden as it is, but there are corners that have so much more potential. Trees begging for rope swings, a home made tree house for boys to climb in and fruit trees that drop the most amazing amount of apples, plums, pears and damsons, that I have to confess don't get collected and made into jam like they used to by the previous owners. My father in law does a good job pottering off to the bottom of the garden and coming back with the bottom of his jumper filled with apples like a carrier bag!

So now we have bigger still stripy boys running a muck, barefoot in summer and winter, I chase them down the garden path begging them to put on wellies or shoes, who love to hide under the low branches, and pretend to go camping in the long grass. 

There's two areas I would love to makeover for the summer. Last year we were away more weekends than we were at home and I could only count on one hand the number of times we ate at the garden table on the patio. Not for lack of good weather and balmy evenings but because we were racing around so much.

This year we've promised ourselves we are going to have an open house policy for the holidays and invite lots of friends and family to us! I want to make the most of the pergola and plant up some big containers on the patio to act as road cones and slow down the scooting that makes me gasp with fear when I see two boys head towards a flight of stone steps.

I am always searching the internet for inspiring garden ideas. Patio designs, beautifully symmetrical vegetable planters and lusting over those huge hanging egg shaped seats.

We went on a night away to Tetbury last year and spend hours going in and out of all the vintage and antique shops. Every one we went into was bursting with ideas for our country garden. 

I have this dream of collections of galvanised pots and old dolly tubs brimming with flowers, and a long metal table that can stay out all year, with metal folding chairs that I can make comfortable with squishy padded cushions in every colour of the rainbow.

And lastly on my wish list is a quiet, tucked away greenhouse just like my neighbours.

Quite frankly I want to move into hers. Shelves for rows of old jugs, trays full of succulents, everywhere you look there is something so curious and intriguing. 

Whilst I may not be anywhere near as green fingered I really want to make the garden feel as much like us as the house does. We've planted a few extra bulbs, some more peonies at the back and the first of the new pom pom Dahlia bulbs we inherited from another generous neighbour flowered last summer. 

Oh and these beauties that grow at a local walled garden that I discovered last summer. I need them in my life!

It's a much bigger project, a garden rather than a room, but the results are everlasting. You don't want to change the colour of the turf as trends change!

What would you have on your garden wish list?

A collaboration with Homify

When we moved to our house, our "forever home" as we nicknamed it, we knew there was work to do. Every bathroom needs ripping out and replacing, we have plans to move stud walls and create a slightly larger master bedroom and use the natural fabric of the building to create proper wardrobe storage behind the solid wooden beams that have supported the house for over 300 years. We have bigger dreams to one day bulldoze the leaking conservatory and sensitively extend the kitchen to make a real country kitchen with as much glass as possible to bring light into our low ceiling stone fortress.

The walls are so thick that it feels like we are cocooned in a bunker of stone and mortar but then the drafty, fragile single paned glass windows give it away that the house needs looking after. 

Over the last couple of weeks we have been busy giving our guest room a complete makeover, which I can't wait to show you soon, and whilst we had some extra pairs of hands in the house to help, we decided to update the downstairs cloakroom which sits between the family living and dining room and our more grown up sitting room. It's tucked into the corner of the hallway and now we have given that a bright shiny fresh coat of white paint, it feels as though this little downstairs toilet lets it down. 

It started as a "it just needs a quick paint job" but quickly we realised what a compromise it would be to have smooth lovely walls and the old, cracked, whistling old sanitary ware. You know when it feels like it's got to a point where you clean it and clean it, and there's still a strange green ring around the bottom of the sink. Urgh!

So it was time to get some inspiration! 

We want to tie the downstairs together with a palette of blues and greys, whites and mint without it feeling like we've just bought everything to decorate each room from one store! I like that there's an overall theme that ties each room together as a whole and gives a sense of calm as you walk around. We live hectic lives with two boisterous and excitable boys, so making the interior decor soft and more serene than using pops of bright colour helps give us a more gentle influence.

It's hard to find inspiration for a downstairs toilet, because they are very tricky to photograph! I am wracking my brains of how I am going to show you the final finished room - it might need to be my first home vlog tour! But I love this simple styling from Grey and Scout paired back, classic and a hint of contemporary with a country feel. 

I found this beautiful tiling mixed with a traditional design sink from UK Bathrooms and pinned it to my For Our Forever Home Pinterest board!  It seems almost silly putting so much love and thought into a cloakroom but it's one of the rooms in the house that gets used the most, and by everyone! The boys blast in and out, guests use it who visit for the day and we often leave the door to the hallway open, so we wanted to take the chance to do something a little nicer than originally planned. Take advantage of the opportunity of it being a little space to choose fancier tiles (on the basis we wouldn't need as many as the main bathroom) and keep costs down by tiling just a splash back as opposed to half or full tiling the entire room. 

It's a very old house and as much as I love modern elements, we knew the suite needed to be in keeping. We went for the this WC from bathstore which was on offer and the Savoy corner sink with a handrail underneath. So we bit the bullet and found a like for like toilet and sink and with next day delivery the full makeover commenced! I realised having the hand towel fixed to the wall meant mucky pups were washing their hands (which was a win in itself) and dripping all the excess water down the wall before the reached the towel! Whilst I love all the fancy pants modern taps and the statement sinks like this heavenly beauty I found photographed by Paul Massey, this is a little room, in a 16th century home and the traditional look is just right.

The taps we bought have the porcelain hot and cold detailing and it all feels so bright I almost don't want to spoil it with using it! The sink is in but as the toilet was being fitted we hit a problem! It resulted in the original (but looking very tired and worn) parquet flooring being ripped up, the soil pipe being moved.

I saw this as a marvellous opportunity to persuade my husband to choose the Fired Earth tiles I have been dreaming of! I've actually taken their brochure to bed a few night this week (yes very romantic!) and we've oohed and aahed over the bold prints and patterns which you just can't find anywhere else. 

We needed to order the tiles asap on a next day delivery not to halt the progress and luckily our favourites from the Patisserie range were available from our local Sherborne store. 

I looked though some of my very favourite interiors books and magazines and by collating all my ideas together it helps to visual the finished room, agree colours and styles with my husband (and less arguments!) and hopefully helps anyone else looking for the same interior styling as us!

I love Inspire by Willow Crossley, Living Life Beautifully is my dream country interior style and I always find things to wish for in Pure Style Home. I tear out product pages from home store catalogues and adore the lighting department in Cox and Cox. 

So the challenge is on! The tiles will be delivered on Monday, fitted and I can start sourcing the lovely bits, a blind, accessories for the freshly painted deep window ledge and possibly a lovely new towel. I want to think about some artwork too, rather than replace the wallpaper that lined the entire room beforehand. Something more soothing to balance against the busy print floor!

I'm thinking a set of pencil drawing botanical prints, what do you reckon? Any ideas where I could source them from?!

I can't wait to show you the finished result.

psst. This is not a sponsored post, I have linked to companies we love and products we have bought. Have a good Friday!

We live in an old house, a very old house, with crumbling walls, peeling lining paper everywhere you look (bar the teeny tiny corners I snap and share on Instagram of course) and a funny layout upstairs designed by the previous owners, that gives me a wonderful shoe cupboard if I had super small feet like a pixie. 

We have big plans for the house that we have nicknamed the "forever home". It started as a house for forever and it is slowly becoming a house that will take forever to finish! Owning a listed house makes you fall in love with the fabric and history of the building. You know before you turn that key in the door that it's going to be a labour of love and you have to really love it. 

We have grand plans to knock down the leaky conservatory, create a real heart of the home, family kitchen, move our en-suite bathroom and create a false wall behind our bed in the master bedroom and change the configuration of the family bathroom and cloakroom that works for now, but is in desperate need of updating. The thick 3 ft deep walls that surround the rooms like armour need to be re-skimmed and repainted and we are slowly working our way around the downstairs, bringing the tired walls back to life. But the internal walls that are cracked and littered with gaping holes from pictures and photos long since taken down, need to go!

We don't really know where to start, other than a nervous walk around our washing strewn house with a listed building officer, sharing our hopes for the future, plans to move internal walls and watching him nod and snap away on his camera. 

So when I was invited to spend the afternoon learning about the Lifestyle Wall with British Gypsum's Rooms Made For You I was intrigued. Ok, I lie. I saw that George Clarke was an ambassador for the product and immediately thought an afternoon with George... he's on my laminated list! Ba ha ha!

I travelled up to London to the Good Housekeeping Institute with both my mother in law (she's been a Good Housekeeping loyal reader for as long as I've been alive) and my mother (she's been a fan of George Clarke for as long as I can remember) green with envy, and wondered what was in store.

After a quick (I'm so used to meeting a celebrity, oh wait no that's not true) handshake with George outside the venue as he chatted to a colleague I went to meet some fellow bloggers at a coffee house around the corner, so as not to walk in alone. Giddy schoolgirls was to be the order of the day.

The team from British Gypsum couldn't have been more welcoming and after a couple of glasses of Proseco and a few sweet treats we all sat down to listen to an introduction to the product - the Lifestyle Wall and then it was George's turn to take the stage.

I'd be lying if I said there wasn't an air of anticipation in the room when he took to the floor. He's the sort of celebrity that perhaps you think might not be as charismatic or charming as he is on screen, but no. What you see is what you get with George. He is passionate about his family, his practise and his work. And the products he promotes. It was so refreshing to hear that he doesn't just endorse every product that lands in his inbox, that he has to actually believe in the product he promotes. 

I was every consumer they described. We have mirrors that have fallen down, great huge gaping holes where we've tried and failed with the "right" plasterboard screw. I am not sure our marriage would survive a gallery wall.

I'm serious.

We have picture ledges in our house so I can rotate my favourite prints and photographs. It saves so many arguments. 

But this product is different. Quite frankly I think even I could hang off a wood screw if the wall was made from this Gyproc Habito structure. Now say that after 3 glasses of Prosecco.  

It was great to take part in some blogger challenges, watching some of my favourite friends Katy and Kate get to grips with a screwdriver and watch as we all flashed our cameras at George and his bulging biceps. This product is 5 times as strong as plasterboard and it took 5 times our normal strength to screw a fixing into it! Not to mention that it can withstand knocks and bumps from boisterous boys and over zealous little girls. 

This product is different. It is better. It would absolutely change my home. I love displaying photographs, we have some huge pictures and an enormous driftwood mirror that needs 3 of us lift, that are languishing in the garage in search of a new home. But the walls can't take it. We need to slowly rebuild it, and as we do I know exactly what we need, the Lifestyle Wall.

I long for beautiful smooth walls like these. A kitchen that demands contemporary open shelves and a hallway free from the interesting sand texture paint in an attractive shade of lemon that currently adorns the walls.

Towards the end of the afternoon, after trying out the product for ourselves, hanging a gallery of photographs and chatting with the team from British Gypsum and George about my days as a Land Buyer for the national house builders and their thoughts on the product, George signed copies of his new book More Amazing Spaces and I joked to him as he signed my copy, "Could you dedicate it to my mum, Vivien. In my whole blogging career this is the most impressed she has been!"

It was a pleasure to spend time with people who are passionate about the products they create, you can see the years of development that have gone into creating an innovative concept for the everyday home.

And when it was time to go home, I shook hands with the lovely people who had invited me to the event, the staff from British Gypsum and finally George. Who said, "Oh let's do kisses!" And we promptly exchanged a kiss on each cheek. Cue a gaggle of female lifestyle bloggers including Lori. Kerri-Anne and Fritha oohing and aahing in the background!

Can you spot your favourite interiors bloggers?! Thank you so much for the invitation to learn more about the Lifestyle Wall. It's on my wish list for our new bedroom next year, and perhaps I will keep my marriage and get that gallery wall after all...!

It would also be so handy to have a piece especially for photography, so any one who is looking for a more robust exhibition stand or flexible shop wall should take a peek! 

You can buy the brand new Lifestyle Wall from the following retailers. 

In collaboration with Rooms Made for You