A personal note from Dr T & Dr B.  We hope you are staying safe and well.  During the Covid-19 global pandemic we are all searching for that ‘new normal’ in our lives: we can’t go back, we are limited moving forward, but we can live fully in the present.  For many of us that has meant rethinking values and rethinking where and how we live.  For many home is even more important as a refuge and comfort and, my darlings, that’s what this issue is all about.

Home is where the heart is.

Home for The Burnout Queens means comfort, security, style, ambience and expression.  Our HSP hearts and minds were in need of idyllic rolling fields, stone villages, hip towns, sheep, cows, horses and lots of peace and quiet.  So we found ourselves a little farm cottage that fits the bill and began a new chapter in our lives.

We had been thinking about this move for quite awhile, in fact before we even left Canada it was part of the ‘big’ plan.  Now it was time to put our plan into motion so we could live in harmony with our values and desire to live more simply and leisurely.

It’s official, we are countrified.

During the Covid-19 lockdown we moved to a small country village.  It was a relief to make it happen before total lockdown hit.  However, trying to rebuild a lifestyle when nothing was open has proved to be a huge and difficult challenge.

We had prepared and planned.  Last year we began Nordic walking and now find it a great way to walk, climb and see the countryside in a very personal way.  We never imagined that we would be trekking through fields past big historic houses or climbing footpath ladders, but here we are!

We challenged ourselves to plant a vegetable and flower garden to enjoy. (our friend and VA sang ‘Green Acres’ to us and she wasn’t far off).  After frustrating weeks of waiting for deliveries everything arrived at once!  Not shy of hard work Dr T and Dr B used muscle-might (and the wheelbarrow a sympathetic neighbour loaned to us) to move 1 tonne of soil into new raised beds.  The plants are now standing tall and producing a great crop for dinners with extras to share with new neighbours.

The walks around us are peaceful although not always quiet.  We have discovered just how loud sheep can be.  There is history everywhere we look; a church here, a Manor House there, and farms and fields that have existed for centuries.

The architecture is different in this new area; gone are castles, shops and brick structures replaced by thatched stone cottages, village churches, Manor Houses and many quirky little buildings.  It is definitely quintessential English countryside.

Our nature neighbours seem to have their own diverse architectural homes. Believe us when we say, that beyond the expected robins and sparrows, we had not exactly banked on getting up close and personal with this new curious neighbour!

Lockdown is easing in the UK so that means we can hop in the car and explore the backroads.  We look forward to sharing our new journey with you…even when we frequently get lost!

Stay well, stay safe.  We hope that home is truly where your heart is.

Until next time, love from Farm Cottages.

Little Town Living

From the time we were teenagers we dreamed of living in the big, bustling and cultured city of London and we finally made that dream come true.  The thing is dreams aren’t static, they need to evolve.  Our environments change, life changes, and we grow and change.  So our decades long dream needed to grow-up and sync with who we had now become and how we now wanted to live.

Much to our own surprise we ended up moving out of the ‘Big Smoke’ (i.e. London) and into the English countryside.  We are truly little town residents with city ties (known here as  ‘down from Londoners’).  We left the galleries and glamour for history, pastures full of sheep and cows, and muddy boots!

Our little county town has community, a vibe, lots and lots of history and many traditions that stand the tests of time.

People are different here, they aren’t always walking with a mobile to their ear.  They will stop to chat, neighbours wave, the ‘veg boys’ call us ‘darling’ and you are known when you stop for tea and cake or a veggie burger!

Our views are now of fields, sheep, swans, and cattle rather than skyscrapers and smog.  (And yes of course our Castle!)  Canada geese (they found us!) honk flying over, the garden is alive with birdsong, and the night skies are so dark (the street lights go out at midnight, we couldn’t believe it either at first!) they sparkle with stars and planets.  Our little town literally straddles the Greenwich Meridian dividing eastern and western hemispheres!  (Personally I find that powerfully interesting but then I am an HSP nerd).

Little town living has given us the courage (and dare we say desire) to ‘go’ even smaller at some point but that’s the future and who ever knows what the future holds.  All we know is we will be ready to embrace the next adventure that comes our way.

For now, we’ll enjoy the sights, sounds and pace of where we are.  There is always something to celebrate like Bonfire Night which is mad, loud, and what this town does best!

But please, don’t just take our word for it, watch this 5 minutes of Lewes madness!!!!!

(P.S. it is hours long to watch in person and, oh yes, it gets freaking hot!)

Lewes Bonfire 2019

Until the next issue, cheers from these ‘little town Brits’!