Spice Up Your Home

Spice Up Your Home

Living in a home is more than just having a place to stay. We’re moving shortly (10 days and we still haven’t packed) but the new place already feels like home. Your home is somewhere you feel at home, somewhere you love and somewhere you are proud of. We’re there already with the new spot!

We have grand plans for the new place and you’ll no doubt hear all about these soon enough! I’ll be posting about adding a new look to each room and so have put together these ideas for you to get started with thinking about what you can do with your home.

The Driveway

We are so grateful to have a driveway where we are moving. On street parking is an absolute pain. We’re determined to make the most of the driveway though as it’s one of the first things you see when you approach the home. First impressions are important so you’ll want to make sure that everything is tidy if your focus will be on making the most of your driveway too. It’s easy for the drive to become a little messed up with various bits of dirt and stone making its way onto it.

It’s wise to give the tarmac a little sweep every now and again to avoid the neglected look. You can also give the drive a spray with a pressure washer if you want to go one step further. After years of the floor taking a beating from the elements, it can slowly become very dirty over time – so slow that you don’t even realise it is happening. A blast with a pressure washer will show you the difference that was made.  

Your Garden, Your Home

When you think about making your living space better looking, what you do to your garden will be near the top of your list of priorities, surely? You’re going to want it to be either as close to flawlessness as possible – you’ll be looking at it a lot, or wonderfully wild (in a deliberate kind of way). The first thing you’ll want to do is to clean it and clear it. If it’s a bit of a mess, make sure everything vanishes – a tidy garden is very comforting. In terms of additions, things like potted plants, ornaments, and fish ponds are very lovely looking and add to the comfort of being sat out there.  We’re going with simply but with seasonal surprises. More on this later!

Get A Conversion

A popular thing to do nowadays is to take a certain part of the house and convert it into something more practical. The most popular choice is to take the loft and turn it into an extra bedroom or office. Obviously, your loft is going to be full of stuff, but if they’re no longer hold any value or you can find another area to store it all, then you could turn that attic into something beautiful. Another good idea would be to take your garage and make it into something other than a place to store old stuff – if you don’t use it for your car, that is. But who parks their car in a garage anymore?  

Our grand plans for the garage are very much steeped in geekery, which won’t surprise you if you know us or have read many of my other blog posts.

Get An Extension

If you need more room or just want to add an extra part to change the style up a bit, you could apply for permission to get an extension built onto the house. You might need an extra bedroom or an office space. You could even put a lovely conservatory out the back. This isn’t something we’ve planned but is a great idea if you are looking to add value and space to your home.

Move To A New Home

If you fancy a big change, you could just up sticks and move to somewhere new, like we have. Sometimes you need to pick a whole new place and carry on from there. A good idea to freshen things up would be to have a little look at some new homes that are being built. There are tonnes of companies that are creating new places every day, so if you wanted to check out some Redrow new builds, you could just head online and see what’s available from the likes of them and others. When you buy an entirely new place, you get to decide almost everything, so a personalised design would come as part of the purchase. If, like ours, your home is a little older, places like Rightmove can be great for having a nosy inside people’s homes for inspiration!

There is no wrong way to breathe new life int your home but if you are looking to make changes, this is a good place to start! 

 

Setting Up A Farm Business

Setting Up A Farm Business

There are many good reasons why you might want to get into the farm industry. For one, you will actively be supporting something which is one of the most important bedrocks of the culture and society we live in. After all, without farms and farmers we would not really be functioning as a society at all. It can also one of the most profitable kinds of business there are however don’t think that farming is easy or that this profit appears very quickly. Farming takes a lot of hard work, planning and grit but it’s also a great way to make an honest living, and that is what draws a lot of people to it.

In this article, I am going to look in particular at some of the early stages of running a farm and setting it up. This is not a comprehensive guide but a few points to get you thinking if you are considering farming for yourself.

Sourcing

First of all, you might be struck by just how much there is to get hold of in order to be able to run a  farm business. There are a whole host of machines and equipment which you are going to need, and the more aware you are of what exactly you need, the easier it will be to get started on finding it as soon as possible, and with as much chance of spending little as possible.

When it comes to sourcing equipment, bear in mind there are some essentials to focus on. You will need to find quad bikes for sale if you have a larger farm, so you can get around more easily. You will also need to look into tractors, combine harvesters, and – if you are excavating before starting your farm – a digger. Get all this, and you can start actually building your farm. Without it, you will find that much harder indeed. Do your research and get the equipment you need and only that as remember, profit can take a while to come through.

Marketing Your Farm

You need to start telling people about your farm, ideally as early as you possibly can. If you leave this too late at all, then it will only result in you not quite being able to make the right kind of money early on, and that will mean your business is more likely to tank before you have even really begun. To market properly, you need to spread the word in person, and to make the most use of local advertising that you can.

People like to support their local farms, so keeping it mostly local is going to really be an advantage in most cases. However, you should also make a point of using digital marketing wherever possible too, to really get the word out there. Look at what your unique selling point is and focus on that, be it that you are local, organic, have a certain type of crop, a certain way of working, if you have something interesting about your farm to share, share it!

Hiring

You might find that you need some help for the farm. If you do, then you should look into hiring as soon as possible in order to stay on top of all the work that needs to be done to maintain a farm. Remember that when hiring someone you need to look at tax, national insurance, workplace pensions etc so get some proper advice about this. Also, consider what kind of employer you are going to be.

 

Running a farm is hard work, very hard work. It can be rewarding though, if done properly. Make sure you do your research before taking the plunge.