I would start with her bedroom, that's the area she wil rest. Keep it neutral and and peaceful. Make the curtains cheerful that will be the first thing she'll see when she wakes up. A four feet bed will be comfortable for her and find out how much it will cost to raise the bed ...at a certain age it is more comfortable to get in and out of. Table lamps which by a touch will light up a big alarm clock... Older people always want to know the time! Two bedside tables. Soft carpet for her feet and a big collage on the wall with photos of her family. I would get rid of the wardrobe is is so huge and if you look on your local ebay and put you postcode in you will be able to get a good bargain. Look for a comfy chair too with a floorlight for reading. If space a nice little table (local ebay) will make it complete. Your mum prefers her wall painted but again a roll of cheerful wallpaper for one wall in her bedroom will make it special for her. Try to get rid of all the clutter like those two shopping trolleys perhaps in a cupboard in the hall? I have done a lot of houses up on a shoestring and it is a challenge but can be so satisfying. One thing I have learnt ....ALWAYS finish one room completely before going on to the next room. It helps when you feel a bit down about the project and one look in the finished room gives one a big boost to continue!!! Good Luck.

Kids rooms need to be practical and fun. Lots of storage boxes and wipeable surfaces. Also the children need to feel some ownership of the space. This is key to having them value and look after it! Keeping the basics neutral and allowing for ongoing additions to decorate and organise the space would be best as things can flex and change with their age and interest. What about adding a blackboard wall that they can write and draw on? You can buy paint to put directly on the wall - Just mask off the space you want. Another great idea is a decoupage design like this. Your children will have hours of fun designing it too if you provide them with a table in there to sit at. It may be a good idea to get a nice colourful and wipeable rug under it though. Ikea will do these and be very affordable.

Whilst I recognise there's a few tradespeople on here bemoaning fussy clients I have to say my biggest regrets when renovating my house was not being specific enough with trades! We had an electrician put in an extra light switch in the hall to control both the downstairs and upstairs lighting. He put it in a good 10-15cm lower than the other switch further along the same wall which looked completely ridiculous. Made him move it in line with the other one much to his annoyance. Another similar incident was with a vertical column rad for the kitchen - whilst I was specific enough this time to ask it be centered to the wall it was on, he installed it much higher than needed with about 30cm of pipe sticking out the bottom! It would have looked much better in line with the doorframe adjacent. Had to learn to live with that one. We had engineered wood floors put in upstairs - the fitter used the shortest wall in the smallest room to take a plumbline from. When it came into the hall it was obviously on a complete wonk. By this point I'd gotten a bit better at speaking up and ensuring we actually got what was needed (and paid for!). He had to take it up and re-lay using the hall as the plumbline. Looked so much better but he was extremely annoyed! After all this I learned to use masking tape to direct exactly where pipes/light switches/trim should be fitted so there was no room for 'interpretation'. I also forced myself to speak up more and advocate for what I really wanted. That said I'm a designer by trade so I generally know what I want and how to make it look good but was definitely a bit too shy to contradict trades in the beginning!

Mary, re ordering with DIY, every single element you need is listed separately on their website you just need to go through methodically and add everything to your basket, (it sounds way worse than it is in practice :-)). Once this is done, you can send them your design and the reference number for your order and they will check you have everything you need. They spotted that I had missed an end post that I needed. I must have called them 10 times during the whole process and they could always answer my question straight away, or with a quick call down to their technical team. I did miss one end panel too that the builder realised when fitting, it did not delay the fitting and he just added it when it arrived about 8 days later. The £15k was for everything including fitting. Fitting was £1800, worktops fitted were £4k which was a great price for the amount of Silestone. We got this from Henderstone, I would recommend them. Integrated larder fridge, dishwasher, under counter freezer all from AO at a total cost of £850, Delonghi range cooker also £850. Appliances are not high end, but standard brands, the fridge is integrated and we did not require an ice dispenser or anything fancy, I can live with a bag of ice in the freezer for my G&T's :-) so as long as the fridge does its job i.e. stays cold, I'm happy. The units are Helmsley in-frame, the grey units around the walls are from their standard range of colours it's called 'soft grey'. The island is Hague Blue, they offer their units in any Farrow and Ball colour of your choice. This is then called Helmsley Bespoke. A little tip; going for the bespoke option adds about 30% to the price of the units, so if there is a colour that you like in the standard range it helps keep costs down to go for that for the bulk of the kitchen and then accent with less units in the more costly option. This is what we did with the island, luckily we genuinely loved the soft grey anyway, so this worked well for us. I also totally agree with Asifa, it is all in the fitting, a really budget kitchen fitted well and with good worktops can look amazing, a high end kitchen poorly fitted cheapens the end result. Hope this is helpful, sorry for the long post! ;-)