After an accident last year we lost our beloved caravan Lola! We were devastated when the insurers told us she had to be scrapped and even more gutted when they offered us half of its value!
So much so I couldn’t bring myself to look at new caravans for the family to do the festival season this year.
But Mr O forced me to look at one or two on ebay and before I knew it I was falling in love with lots of vintage and lovely old ladies. We had spent our savings on a super posh van with Lola and she had all the mood cons… shower, hot water, blowers and more… Mr O hadn’t wanted me to revamp her up too much either and although we did make her ours we were limited to what we did with her. After all that fuss we lost her anyway and we had had old vans that had lasted longer.. vintage was the way to go this year.. oh and she had to be cheep!
after loosing out on a few we found a bargain van, she was going for about £300 at the time and we could see why she was so cheap, she looked clean and although a bit unloved she had potential for me to let me creative juices flow.
WE had a bid and unbelievably won her for £400!!!! amazing if she wasn’t a dud of course.
Day 1 Mr O picked he up on Saturday and arrived back home with her for lunch time. I had bought some cupboard paint and some bits and bats to get working on her, we figured we could maybe sell her straight on and find something we loved a bit more.
Within a few hours, I had painted the cupboards and Mr o had fit a new water pump in her, already she had potential. We decided to take out he bathroom and fit a log burner. The loo was a bog standard ( I know) portapotty and we could always fit one in the van or in a toilet tent, the sink only had hot water so we figured we might as well use the kitchen sink and use the space to create a lovely stove area to make the van super cosy.
Day 2; Sunday: I stapled some pom pom trim around the edges of the cupboards and stapled some £3.99 battery powered fairly lights all around making sure the switches and battery packs were by the door for when we walked in. The van does have electric but only from a hook up, we don’t always have this in a feild so Mr O set to putting in an extra battery and the solar panels that we had taken off Lola.. we now have electric without a hook up!
I nipped into town and spend about £70 of bits and bats to make her cosy, blankets and quilt covers, little ornaments, plates and cups etc .. she was starting to feel more like ours.
Day 3: I had ordered some bits from Amazon which arrived today, some tile transfers to cover the old tiles, some stick backed plastic to cover the grotty melamine tables. With a few hours fitting this in the van she suddenly started feeling like home.
Day 4 is still to come, we are cleaning up an old log burner and I have ordered a new flue pipe for it for £20 , we will go up through the sky light in the bathroom and create a chimney. I have some heat resistant paint to paint the old bathroom and rill attach a pull out dryer for clothes and socks. We will remove the door of the bathroom to stand the burner in and hopefully create some cut out panels in the walls and fid some wonder trellis grids to let the warm air our into the caravan.
By day 2 we had named her.. like with animals it meant we were attached… Molly is part of the family already and cost us less that £500! bargain!
WE have ordered some decals for the outside, she is two tone green with an orange stripe. We figured just getting rid of the orange stripe and adding a blue or white one will tidy her up.
We will add her name and some info of the business on the back.. then we should be set!
Round Peg festival Mama 