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Beautiful views of Owey island, clean white lines, 12-foot windows creating an oasis of calm where the nature of Donegal is welcomed inside the home of its most famous singer.
It was the Room to Improve that fans were waiting for. Daniel and Dermot, a match made in heaven, and Majella’s charismatic personality.
There was even a sing-song to end it all, an hour of quality television.
When you strip it back though, it came back to the basic concept of making a house a home.
Yes their budget ended up being €350,000 and, without a doubt, it is a huge house with a wow factor, but essentially it was a couple looking for their forever home, a home to reflect their personalities.
And for Majella, it struck a chord even further as she created her cocoon in Kincasslagh, a place to feel safe when her mental health isn’t great.
Pictured is Majella O'Donnell, businesswoman, singer, reality television star and the wife of entertainer Daniel O'Donnell. Photo: El Keegan
“We absolutely love it,” she proclaims when she met Irish Country Living just before the show aired.
“You know, I used come down every morning and have to turn on the lights in the kitchen because it was so dark.
"The darkness brings me down but now my kitchen is a beautiful white bright space with lots of cosy sections that are relaxing and calm.”
“Dermot’s vision is greater than ours and the house speaks for itself,” adds Daniel.
Dermot and Daniel’s visions weren’t always in sync throughout the project tough.
Dermot and Daniel
Amongst the heated discussions concerning en suites and hidden doors which led to even more bathrooms, there were some exasperated, albeit entertaining, expressions of ‘gee whizz’ from Daniel while Majella was at one point flaking tiles across the yard.
And the source of much of the angst? The budget.
“When we first starting planning the project, Daniel and I were discussing what to spend,” says Majella.
“I suggested €300,000, he suggested €100,000 so we met in the middle at €200,000. So Dermot goes away and designs this beautiful concept that we love but then when it goes out to tender, prices are coming back in the €300ks.
"It was like giving a child 10 sweets and getting them all excited and then saying, ‘actually I need to take back three of them.’”
But the big plans went ahead. Daniel says, “We decided a few years ago when Majella was sick that we were going to do things we wanted do, we weren’t going to hold back.
"We owe nothing and nobody anything and we said this would be something we both enjoy.
"People will come to it. It is a house for us to enjoy with our friends, our family.”
Grandchildren
Two people that Daniel and Majella are especially looking forward to having are their two grandchildren, Olivia and Archie. While Archie is just a few weeks old, Olivia is two and is also known as Daniel’s “wee doll”.
“Daniel is a complete and utter softie as a granddad,” says Majella. “He rings nearly every day asking: 'How’s my wee doll, the best girl in the whole world?’”
Daniel beams, saying: “She calls me Gaga, she came up with that one all on her own. It’s the best thing ever, I have to say, it’s unconditional.
"She doesn’t care who you are and what you are, what you have and what you haven’t, which is lovely.
To her, I’m not Daniel O’Donnell, I’m just Gaga.
He teases that Majella is a little stricter.
“She has to learn”, exclaims Majella laughing, “but yeah, it’s great, you have all the love you have for your own children but without the responsibility so you really enjoy the time with them.”
Fit and healthy
Despite all this talk of being grandparents, both look great, fit and healthy. In fact, you wouldn’t think they were grandparents at all.
You especially wouldn’t notice that Majella is wearing a hearing aid, one of the projects they are promoting at the moment with Hidden Hearing.
“I knew I had problems hearing quite a while back,” she explains. “I had a lot of tonsillitis when I was young.
"With that, I nearly always got ear infections, almost once a month, but, you know, I just had a hot lemon or whatever and got on with it.
"In the end though, I ended up getting perforated eardrums and because of that, the ear drum is completely damaged, no part of it is normal.”
Even when I was in my 30s, I would go to meetings and if there were 12 people around a boardroom, I was lost.
"Someone would say something and then someone else would interject and I just thought, why can’t I keep up?
"It never occurred to me that I couldn’t see their lips so it was harder to hear.
"In that situation, your brain fills in the gaps about what it thinks is appropriate but it isn’t always right.”
“When I got a hearing aid, it really was like a wow moment. It was like having a blocked nose and someone giving you an inhaler, like taking cotton buds out of your ears.
"Quite honestly, the first one I got didn’t work so well for me in the sense that is sat into my ear and I found it itchy and a little irritating but now I have one that sits just behind my ear, it’s very discrete and comfortable."
Daniel also adds that his mother had hearing problems which made her feel isolated.
“We would be sitting around talking and she would be looking at us as if she wasn’t interested when the truth was she didn’t know what we were saying.
"Then she got a hearing aid and she was back to her old self. Then we started to wonder if we had done a good thing or a bad thing!” he says teasing.
Daniel and Majella are hitting the road in a few weeks again for yet another of their B&B series.
It’s another active schedule but as we finish up, Majella adds that she is determined about one thing; more time this year to sit down and enjoy their beautiful new home.
Majella on mental health
Majella has always been vocal about her mental health and says that it really is something you have to manage over a lifetime.
“I am feeling good at the moment but it is always something you have to manage, it never goes away.
Recently now, to be honest, I had to have my medication re-jigged because I was getting into a low period again. I also went to see a psychiatrist.
I am grand again now but it is a constant thing you have to be aware of all the time. It’s likes physical health, if you can catch yourself going down a bad way and pull yourself out of it, it is a lot easier."
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