Instagram Friday

1. Tonight it’s “dessert for dinner” at the Meyer house
2. It’s a doglet’s life…
3. Coffee chocolate cake
4. Pink toes for Spring & my teal #SexyShoes

All hail the king

…the king sized bed that is!

Last Friday Gary and I went in search of a tailor-made corner couch unit for our new home (we’ve been searching for a couch since we put in the offer to purchase our house). Unfortunately we had no luck at the place we had gone to but on the way back to the office we were lucky in another way… NO! Not that way, you naughty-minded people!

We happened to pass a factory outlet for couches and beds and decided to go in and have a look around at what they had available. We looked at their couches but nothing seemed to grab us. And then we headed to their bed section because we were told that there was a special on at the moment.

A Restonic, no-turn, memory foam, king sized bed was on special. For only R5,000.00! Depending on the quality they can cost as much as R10,000.00 so this was a bargain!

As we had been discussing buying a new bed for a little while, we bought it. And after work that Friday we went past Sandton to buy a new duvet and bed linen so we would be ready once it was delivered.

It arrived on Saturday and we ripped off the protective plastic only to find that they had delivered the correct standard length base, but that the mattress was extra length (obviously not what we ordered). It took a few phone calls to the store manager and about an hour or two before our mattress arrived. Again we tore off the protective plastic and got to work setting up our bed. Boy were we excited to sleep that night!!

I must be honest in that the first night’s sleep wasn’t great. And I think it was mainly because the mattress was new and not what I was used to. It was also a bit odd to sleep in whatever position I chose to and not elbow Gary in the back.

The last few nights have been amazing though. And I think that Gary and I will be happily married for years as we now no longer need to fight for mattress space or for the duvet, and I can now sleep however I want to without leaving Gary with bruises!

So…All hail the king!

Hugs & Kisses
Jessica Giggles

House Sweet Home

Making a house a home is hard work! It’s something I’ve only discovered recently after buying and moving into our new home.

I think we were a little idealistic or naive when we moved in. We didn’t think there would be that much to do around the house considering the previous owners had renovated most of the house. We did know that we would need to sort out the main bedroom cupboards and redo the kitchen cupboards, but other than that there wasn’t much.

But now that we’re all moved and have lived there for 2 weeks, our To Do List has grown and it seems every weekend for the rest of our lives will be busy with stuff on our house! I’m not complaining at all because the house is ours! You see, I’m just not the type of person that can wait to see results. I need to see everything the way it should be now! (The same goes for me and exercise…)

The weekend after our move saw us heading to Makro to buy a hosepipe (we hadn’t even thought about this one), and to Builders Warehouse to buy a new kreepy head. Gary spent an age getting the new kreepy to work considering the amount of leaves in the pool, while I fished as many leaves as I could with the leaf scooper. We’ve also had to buy pegs for the washing line, fish food for the gold fish we inherited that live in the pond, light bulbs in bulk considering many of the bulbs were dead, a HUGE roll of black bags to clear the pile of rubbish left by the previous owners (we still haven’t got to the bottom of this pile), etc. And that is just the last 2 weekends!!

We will need to buy “pollyfilla” to fix all the holes in the walls and chunks missing in the walls from when the previous owners moved. We will probably have to repaint many of the rooms considering a good clean didn’t do much – can you say Painting Party! We will need to buy a lawnmower at some point too. Unless we buy a goat first!

I suppose all I need to do is make a proper To Do List. And then I’ll feel better by being able to tick things off as they get done. I do think that on the top of the list should be “spend all our wedding gift vouchers”. What do you think?!

Hugs & Kisses
Jessica Giggles

My #SexyShoes Addiction

If you haven’t quite figured it out yet, I have a major #SexyShoes addiction. Not only do I go “off-track” while shopping to OOOH and AAAH at the #SexyShoes in the windows, my addiction is also fuelled by The Daily Shoe. Every morning I receive a pic of a pair of #SexyShoes. Which I drool over. And which I always wish I could make appear in front of me with one shake of my magic wand.

If only I could make a living reviewing #SexyShoes! Perhaps the #SexyShoes goddesses will help me out…

Hugs & Kisses
Jessica Giggles

Girl Guides: In-depth review of the Toshiba Portégé R830

QUICK LOOK
- Core i7 vPro
- Windows 7
- Non reflective HD display with LED backlighting
- Size of 316mm x 227mm
- 1.5kg in weight
- VGA Webcam
- Up to 8.5 hours battery life

The Portégé R830 from Toshiba is much the same as any other Windows-based laptop. It has a slim tile keyboard, large multi-touch touchpad, ports of various kinds and sizes and a simple user interface. The one very simple difference between my super-large and super-heavy Dell laptop and this little wonder is the size and weight which makes the Portégé R830 VERY portable and not a pain in the shoulder so to speak.

Go here to read the full in-depth review…

Have I told you…

…that we’ve bought a house?! And have I told you how quickly it all happened?!

After coming back from honeymoon we started looking into properties online that met with our location and price standards. We booked to see a few properties after work and on Saturdays and also went through to a few show-days. We saw a lot of houses and all were nice BUT there was a BUT… Some didn’t have a shower. Some were renovated so poorly that the renovations were obvious and didn’t make sense. Some needed a whack of work that wouldn’t make sense considering the asking price. Some were perfect but just not quite us. We had probably only been seriously looking for about a month when…

Sunday 20 May
We had gone to look at 2 houses that were on show that day and neither of which floated our boat. We were on our way out of the area when we just happened upon another house that was on show. We did a drive-by and stopped at the top of the road before turning around and deliberating about whether to view the house or not. We decided we should. And upon walking through the front gate we knew this house was going to be way more than what our budget allowed. But now we were committed to walking through the house at least and showing some interest. So we walked through and fell in love with everything… The paint on the walls. The bedrooms. The kitchen. The bathrooms. The double garage. The flooring. And then we had to leave the house knowing that it was what we were looking for but knowing too that it was too expensive.

Gary and I then went out to lunch and got chatting about the houses we had seen. We chatted about how much work needed to go into most of the houses we’d seen. And about whether the amount it’d take to do renovations would justify the property and the resale value. And about whether we would even be able to do renovations considering the asking price of most of these homes. So we chatted and chatted and came to the conclusion that maybe we should look at a house that only needs a little bit of work rather than having to renovate everything. And now…all of a sudden…the house we happened upon became etched in our minds as the house we wanted as a home.

Tuesday 22 May
We arranged to view the house again. And again we walked through the house and fell deeper in love with everything. We had a long conversation with the estate agent on the pavement after we had walked around. We spoke about the house. We spoke about the family. We poked and tested a bit about the price with the estate agent. And then we left…

Wednesday 23 May
We arranged to view the house once again only this time we asked both sets of parents to come through too. I know we’re now adults and we should be able to do things without our parents’ approval, but it was important for us for them to see the house considering they’ve been in the property game a lot longer than us. They all thought it was great! And Gary and I left that night knowing what we wanted to do…

Thursday 24 May
We met up with the estate agent after work…to sign the OFFER TO PURCHASE! We were excited and nervous all at the same time. I mean…I couldn’t believe we were signing an offer to buy a house!

Friday 25 May
We were on our way to the “weekend from hell” event when we got a call from the estate agent saying that our offer had been accepted! Our very cheeky offer had been accepted! WOW! We were going to own a house! My wish not to move once more after moving now would be coming true! WOW!

Monday 28 May
We had been put in touch with the bond originator that the estate agent used over the weekend, and we were advised what documents we would need in order to apply for a bond. So off we went first thing in the morning to the bank to get 3 months bank statements. And while we were there we ended up chatting with a consultant about home loans… And wouldn’t you know that the bank was running a special that if a bond was applied for in-store and then approved before 31 May, we wouldn’t have to pay for registration fees. SCORE! So we stayed a little longer and applied for a bond with the consultant. And then the waiting game began…

Wednesday 30 May
We didn’t have to wait too long though because we got a call in the early afternoon saying that our bond had been approved! YAY! Now another box had been ticked and we were now on our way to owning our first home!

Friday 1 June
We met up with the first lot of attorneys to sign documents relating to transfer. We were still in a “pinch me because this can’t be real” state…

Friday 8 June
We met up with second lot of attorneys to sign the bond documents. Can’t believe we killed a few trees signing those documents. And still can’t believe we’ll be home-owners!

So within a space of 2 weeks we’d had an offer to purchase accepted, a bond approved, and the necessary documents signed. I still need to pinch myself as a reminder that this is all real and not just a dream… I suppose everything will be more real once we move in this weekend…

Hugs & Kisses
Jessica Giggles

Dark Knight Rises

Last night Gary was invited to MTN’s private screening of The Dark Knight Rises. And as I am his “blonde sidekick” (as per the invitation) I got to go with.

I was so excited to see that it would be held at the Cinema Prestige at The Zone in Rosebank as I have heard only amazing things about this cinema – lazyboy chairs that recline, private waiting area, separate concession stand… And I wasn’t disappointed!

We were greeted at the door where our complimentary tickets were requested and once through, Gary answered a few questions for the camera while I just smiled (so happy to be the +1 for once). After that we headed to the small “photo booth” that was set up to the side and donned a prop or two that was available.

Gary as Bane and me as Catwoman

We then headed to the concession stand for our complimentary popcorn and soft drink (thanks again MTN) before finding ourselves a seat in the waiting area until those lazyboys were ready for us.

After much anticipation we headed inside and found ourselves a seat. We managed to find a “love seat” lazyboy which meant that there wasn’t an arm rest between us. And then we played with the recliner and realised how difficult it was to get back to the seated position once reclined (or maybe that was just me and my legs).

So now to the movie… On a whole I didn’t enjoy the movie as I thought it was a lot longer than it needed to be. I was also a little bored. The worst part of all was realising that Bane was played by his gorgeousness Tom Hardy (also from This Means War with Reese Witherspoon).

Thanks to MTN for inviting me as a +1 and for letting me finally experience the awesomeness that is the Cinema Prestige.

Hugs & Kisses
Jessica Giggles