From now on I will only answer to the name of Uriah Cratchit

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Firstly, check out my creative book storage solution! This corner in my bedroom used to just contain a stack of books, but then I was in Home Bargains the other day (if that means nothing to you, think Wilkinsons on speed, and if that means nothing to you, then you are missing out on one of the funnest shops in the UK, because Tupperware from only 39p is wonderful thing) and I saw these decorative crates in the garden section. At £3.99 each I stretched to 3, and have made this little display I’m quite pleased with. There’s something of second-hand book stalls and fruit and veg about it, or as my teenager unhelpfully put it in a smarty-pants rising tone ‘Are we, having a jumble sale?’

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Secondly, my parents are in their sixties and have sold their impractical ancient house with it’s death-trap steep and windy stairs to move to a bungalow. This is a time known to grown-up children everywhere are the when parents will try and give half their junk on them. My mother has tried to give me more china and crockery (I could cook a casserole every night of the week in a different dish if she had her way) and pictures than my tiny house has walls for. However, for many years I have had my eye on this clerks’ desk tucked away in a lumber room. It is missing its legs, and weighs a ton so I’ll need to get some sturdy ones constructed. Also, someone has re-glazed the side panels so it’s not completely original, which is a shame as it could have been leaded stained glass originally. I spent last night looking at glass ink wells on eBay, obviously.

 

Inside the desk are some Charles Dickens prints my mum bought when we went to his birthplace museum ‘a few years ago’, she said. I was there, I was eight years old, so in thirty-two years she’s framed only one, but I couldn’t say no. As soon as I have space, I’ll do something with the rest of them, or, my daughter will when she’s packing me off to live somewhere smaller, and I’m too old to climb atop my clerks’ stool. That’s a point, where the hell am I going to get one of those really high stools?!

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Category : Reading Rhubarb, Uncategorized
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