Dreams and Wishes for a New Lunar Year.

What are your hopes and wishes for the new lunar year?

One of my dreams has always been to live on a smallholding. But where do our deepest dreams come from?

My wish stems from happy memories visiting my Grandparent's smallholding near Castle Ashby in Northamptonshire. The end of a lane of traditional estate cottages.  Door in the middle of four windows, two on each floor, an image from a child's drawing.  I remember the joy of the adventure of our visit, a bus ride, arriving after a long walk from the bus stop along the lane beside hedgerows, in the warm summer sunshine.

One garden was a traditional cottage garden, billowing with tall frothy blooms. The rooms of the cottage were decorated simply, embroided slip covers on armchairs, a scrubbed pine kitchen table, a range and the smell of homemade bread baking and a large shiny brown teapot on the table. The door from the kitchen lead to the working garden which was divided into vegetable beds and enclosures for goats and chickens. To the side was a field, the butcher's white horse resided and my grandparents cared.

The excitement tinged with fear of entering the chicken house to hunt out their ovate treasures, sticks with me still. My Nan's leading me in by the hand and showing me how to gently pick up the warm eggs.

We returned to the cosiness of that kitchen and Nan cooked us egg on toast for lunch.

And we have found it... our very own smallholding, a serendipitous find, within our budget and still in our local area! Our house wasn't on the market but with encouragement and support from our nearest and dearest we put in an offer. Our house went on the market and sold within the first 24 hours!

It has a name and is pretty wild and is the end cottage of a row of Victorian cottages. It has a chicken coop, pigsties, raised beds, trees, a kennel (future shed), a pond, and a woodland. It has a beautiful space which will be my studio. It is small, and is just right for us, a tiny smallholding, which is not too isolated. We will still have neighbours.

We have kept this quiet so far, housemoving can be a slow process sometimes.

I am trusting that if this is meant to be in our future, the Universe will deliver at the right time. There is no need to hurry, everything is occurring in perfect timing. I am learning patience.