When the plan, doesn’t go to plan….

Perhaps I always envisaged I would have a blog one day?  I’m creative; I love home interiors and styling; I am an avid reader and follower of other peoples blogs.

I’m what my mother would call someone with “sparkle”, but my teachers at school would probably have labelled as a tad opinionated.  Either way you look at it, in my life I have always had a bit of a “plan”.  Meet Mr Right (or in my case Mr Wright) by “x”,  marry by “y” and buy our house by “z”. Then have our beautiful children.  What I had pictured in my head was a wonderful lifestyle blog of home, children and fashion; like so many of the beautifully inspirational blogs that I read.  A blog where I captured my life as a Mummy and home-maker in Surrey; one where our Boden-clad children splashed in puddles and we spent days outside crunching through Autumn leaves, before returning home to play with homemade play-doh and craft, bake and laugh until everyone went to bed.  A perfect world with arts, crafts and lots of organic vegetables (yes, one of THOSE mums).

Shit. What happens when “the plan”doesn’t go to plan? What do you do when the universe makes you think it’s all going your way, and then takes all of your cards from your hands and throws them up in the air?  What do you do when you have your beautiful, long awaited baby boy; and then he dies?  I never imagined we would have to answer any of those questions. The universe, however, had some ideas of it’s own.

As a result of losing Teddy, I have spent the last eight months of my life navigating a new way through; a new plan for when the old one seems laughable.  Working out what to do next, where to go from here, and what my purpose is if I’m not the Mummy that I had planned to be?  I have always loved our home; since the moment we walked through the door to view it almost two and a half years ago, not long after we married, I knew this was the house I would make a home.  I never thought that this home would, quite frankly, save me.

My passion for interiors and for feathering our nest began long before Teddy arrived.  He was always there in my planning though; “When we have a baby we’ll need this room” or “We should probably move this to here for when we have children.” What was different was that I never needed that passion then; it was just an interest, a hobby; something I fitted in around the day-to-day goings on in our lives.

When we returned home from hospital on 19th May 2016 empty-armed and broken hearted;  I simply did not fathom that it would be our home that helped to heal me.  What I have discovered over the last eight months is that throwing yourself into a “hobby” that is as creative as it is rewarding, really can help you in more ways that you knew possible.  Admittedly I have had the time to pursue things that I never would have made time for if I had been at work; or if indeed,Teddy had lived.  I have made lampshades, footstools, painted (and re-painted) pretty much every piece of new and existing furniture in our house.  I even mastered concealed zips on my cushions (praise the Lord!); I’m not saying that is fun, but I do think it makes me a pretty seasoned pro at cushion making.

What I am saying is that I have sat at that sewing machine in some of my darkest moments.  I just kept on sewing.

Truthfully, I have found the process of planning, making, creating and then being able to enjoy our home something that focuses my mind again.  It gives me the “purpose” my life was missing after Teddy died, the purpose I so desperately needed when I felt as though purpose was entirely lacking from my life.  This blog is a place for me to share that journey; what has been so far, and what is yet to come.  I hope and dream that this isn’t forever, that one day this home will be filled with tiny footsteps, lots of “firsts” and plenty of laughter.  In the meantime I hope you will all enjoy the ride, whatever brought you here, as I continue to feather this empty nest.

Elle x