I’d only gone out for a couple of hours dog walking, whilst my husband stayed behind to do “boat jobs”.

How a boat can transform itself from a home, to a serious blue water sailing transport device to a scrapyard within a few hours is quite remarkable!

Both dogs Poppet and Gimble jumped on-board, eager to see my husband (and to be fed!)
"oh hang on a minute you can’t come inside" came a shout down from below. I looked through the companionway, the steps had disappeared and my husbands head was in the engine room. I say engine room, just large enough to fit our Yanmar 3GM! ,
"almost finished adjusting the belts a voice said, whilst you’re there can you pass me the 13mm or the half inch Spanner please...

The Dogs urgently wagging their tails as starvation mode was seriously now setting in and they’d die if they didn't get fed within 5 minutes.

I threw the dogs onto the quarter berth, from there they hopped onto the floor narrowly missing the adjustable spanners and just missed the tin of Boeshield!

Tools were spread out on our full sized chart table, galley and the floor leaving no space to place your feet. But that's boats, we have a large cupboard in our galley where we store all our tools, power, spanner kits, and they’re all hidden away until you need them.
One of our most used tools, other than my purple Leatherman is a cheap adjustable screw driver with Phillips one end and flat head the other, it gets used for everything. Other tools and spares are kept in areas which don’t need to get accessed or disrupted much.

You might be lucky enough to have a workshop or workbench on-board. Does your husband start a job and then ask for a certain tool or spare, “oh can you just hold this, pass me that?”

That's what I love about boats, they are like chameleons, a house with a water view one minute, then it turns into a mode of transport which can cross oceans, the house stuff gets stowed and it changes into life on a different angle bashing her way to windward on her next adventure.