I recently won a Home Depot gift card from work, which is always awesome, but it came at a fantastic time because I am close to broke! I am close to broke, but really wanting to paint the living room. I knew that we needed another 5 gallon bucket of Kilz primer, something that I use in almost every single paint job I do...and I've got a ton left on the house! So, I spent the gift card on the primer, and figured that come pay day, I could buy the actual paint color for the room.
Today, I was working on moving all the furniture and boxes (yes, we still have not finished unpacking boxes. we're terrible.) into the center of the room to lay down drop clothes while Alan was working on another project. He came through the room and noticed that trap door in the floor (where an old furnace used to be) that covers the crawl space hole was warping. He lifted it up to investigate, and low and behold... there was a lake under our house. Fantastic.
So. We investigate and find that there in no longer much pipe working as a drain for the bath tub. There's a 6 inch section of pipe just completely gone, eaten away with age. And it's been that way for awhile. Every single time we shower or bathe, our water is running under the house.
And to top that (of course!) the pipe that brings in ALL of the water into the house has sprung a pretty big leak.
Amazing Neighbor came over and told us how to fix it and gave us plenty of advice on it. Now, does Alan want to get down in the 2 foot crawl space and work in the mud on something he hasn't ever done before, or do we call a plumber to replace all the piping? The answer to that question will be worked out in time. In the mean time, we have had to shut off the water to the house. Ugh. I'll keep you advised on how we make out in this situation.
And in case you were wondering, I didn't get to prime the living room for painting. I suppose I'll get to that later.
November 10, 2010
November 1, 2010
Things I Am Loving
Things that I would like to do/make/have:
Don't want the baby, just the Zzzs....
Don't want the baby, just the Zzzs....
I love this couch. So much.
These are fairly easy to make with thread, glue and balloons.
We're planning on having a carpenter friend build some bookshelves into our spare bedroom. This would be so great.
Love the colorful pillows on the white couch.
I love gallery style hung pictures.
Our kitchen table needs a coat of paint. I may work chalkboard paint into it.
Again, I love gallery hung pictures.
Well, this one speaks for itself. Amazing.
I just really like the mix of casual jeans with dressy-ish cardigan.
Gallery, much?
What a great entry way.October 27, 2010
The Dead Dads Club
My father died six years ago. Six years and four days ago, exactly. It took me a very long time to grieve his death. He had pancreatic cancer, a type that is particularly aggressive, and almost never forgiving. He was originally given 6 - 9 months to live, and ended up living 18 months. He was blessed with that extra time, as were we. I feel as though I grieved him being gone even before he was gone. I knew that some day soon, he would not be here with me any longer. I knew that he wasn't going to make it to my senior prom, my wedding, or the day that I brought home my first child. I had to deal with those thoughts even before he was gone. And in my 17 year old way, I tried.
I still believe that I preferred knowing the cancer would eventually take him away from us. It gave me time to deal with the fact that I would come home one evening and his light by his chair in the living room would not be on, and he would not be sitting in it reading or watching the Discovery channel. I knew that sometime soon, I would walk into the kitchen for a glass of water in the night, and he would no longer be there, listening to James Taylor until he grew sleepy.
And that's pretty much how it happened. Those little moments after his death, when I would walk into the kitchen at midnight expecting him to be there, brought a subtle grief with them. Did they accumulate into those stages of grief that you hear about? No. I feel as though I didn't really grieve his death until years later. Something as silly as my first breakup brought that on. I didn't even like the boy that much, but I suppose I just really wanted my dad there to console me, or beat him up, I don't know which. Either would have been nice.
I still miss him, but six years later, the missing is different. I would love to have him here working with Alan and I on the house. He knew a lot more about this stuff than we do. I recently read about Roseanne Cash's book, Composed, on a friend's blog. My friend's brother recently passed away, and she had read the book and had this to say about it. "...Most of the memoir seems to be about Johnny Cash and growing up in reaction to him. The things Rosanne chose to do or not to do mostly seem based on a desire to either get away from or get back to what her father did. I guess that’s the way it is with most of us and our parents, only most of us don’t have to do it under a spotlight.
There was one particular passage towards the end of the book that I read several times. She is talking about her reaction to the death of her father and she writes,
“You begin to realize that everyone has a tragedy, and that if he doesn’t, he will. You recognize how much is hidden behind the small courtesies and civilities of everyday existence. Deep sorrow and traces of great loss run through everyone’s lives, and yet they let others step into the elevator first, wave them ahead in a line of traffic, smile and greet their children and inquire about their lives, and never let on for a second that they, too, have lain awake at night in longing and regret, that they, too, have cried until it seemed impossible that one person could hold so many tears, that they, too keep a picture of someone locked in their heart and bring it out in quiet, solitary moments to caress and remember. Loss is the great unifier, the terrible club to which we all eventually belong.”
I feel this everyday. I think of my dad every day. Although the grieving process is done, and I dealt with it long ago, I still miss him like any daughter would. But I feel that what Roseanne Cash has written here is so true. I feel it every day.
I still believe that I preferred knowing the cancer would eventually take him away from us. It gave me time to deal with the fact that I would come home one evening and his light by his chair in the living room would not be on, and he would not be sitting in it reading or watching the Discovery channel. I knew that sometime soon, I would walk into the kitchen for a glass of water in the night, and he would no longer be there, listening to James Taylor until he grew sleepy.
And that's pretty much how it happened. Those little moments after his death, when I would walk into the kitchen at midnight expecting him to be there, brought a subtle grief with them. Did they accumulate into those stages of grief that you hear about? No. I feel as though I didn't really grieve his death until years later. Something as silly as my first breakup brought that on. I didn't even like the boy that much, but I suppose I just really wanted my dad there to console me, or beat him up, I don't know which. Either would have been nice.
I still miss him, but six years later, the missing is different. I would love to have him here working with Alan and I on the house. He knew a lot more about this stuff than we do. I recently read about Roseanne Cash's book, Composed, on a friend's blog. My friend's brother recently passed away, and she had read the book and had this to say about it. "...Most of the memoir seems to be about Johnny Cash and growing up in reaction to him. The things Rosanne chose to do or not to do mostly seem based on a desire to either get away from or get back to what her father did. I guess that’s the way it is with most of us and our parents, only most of us don’t have to do it under a spotlight.
There was one particular passage towards the end of the book that I read several times. She is talking about her reaction to the death of her father and she writes,
“You begin to realize that everyone has a tragedy, and that if he doesn’t, he will. You recognize how much is hidden behind the small courtesies and civilities of everyday existence. Deep sorrow and traces of great loss run through everyone’s lives, and yet they let others step into the elevator first, wave them ahead in a line of traffic, smile and greet their children and inquire about their lives, and never let on for a second that they, too, have lain awake at night in longing and regret, that they, too, have cried until it seemed impossible that one person could hold so many tears, that they, too keep a picture of someone locked in their heart and bring it out in quiet, solitary moments to caress and remember. Loss is the great unifier, the terrible club to which we all eventually belong.”
I feel this everyday. I think of my dad every day. Although the grieving process is done, and I dealt with it long ago, I still miss him like any daughter would. But I feel that what Roseanne Cash has written here is so true. I feel it every day.
October 13, 2010
Repainting the Kitchen
Heyo! Kitchen is all painted. AGAIN. It turned out that my super exciting plan to paint the kitchen pumpkin orange was not such a good one. The kitchen is so small, that I really hated the whole kitchen being such a bright color. I decided that having one wall orange, and painting the rest of the kitchen an off-white would be the way to go. So, I did. Yup...two months after painting the kitchen, I repainted it. But I love it now. It looks great. So...I got that going for me. Just three more rooms to paint. Ugh.
October 10, 2010
Our Family is One Larger
Last week, our family grew by one. We adopted an adorable 9 month old Lab/Redbone Coon Hound mix. He is absolutely adorable. Shelby, as we've named him, has some serious magical powers. His main power is being able to turn me into a Jewish mother. Seriously. Right now I believe he is God's gift to me. He is the smartest dog ever....and Good Lord, look at that face! Most handsome boy ever!(Not so) Little known fact: Alan and I are crazy about animals. Shelby's addition to our family now makes it a menagerie. We now own: 1 dog, 1 cat, 2 rats, 2 guinea pigs, and we also feed and care for 2 stray cats. And did you know our home is only about 800 square feet? Shelby makes it 36 feet walking around those 800 square feet. Good thing we have a big very spacious backyard that Shelby really seems to enjoy.
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