Wanna see our kitchen?????

We finally got water in the house which meant we could wipe down the countertops, which also meant that Joe let me take pictures of the work we have done in the kitchen to show off a bit :) I think it looks pretty darn good. We still need to do curtains, finish up one outlet, remove all the tape from the stove, replace some of the drop ceiling tiles, level the stove, and wash our dirty, dirty windows.

We ordered pulls for our top cupboards from Anthropologie. We decided to have a whole lot of fun and order a different one for each door :)

And just incase you couldn't remember what the kitchen looked like before (just imagine a layer of filth on everything that the camera didn't pick up):

I am pretty excited about the way it looks now. It is fun and cheerful and bright. Joe and I are not very formal people, we just like to have a good time. Now our kitchen matches our personalities :)

What is wrong with being average?

Here is a post that will have nothing to do with our home renovations :) It is something that I have spent a lot of time considering while painting. My kids are average. They are not exceptional athletes or of incredible intelligence. I accept this as perfectly ok. Yet, when I am surrounded by mothers who are bragging about their kids and I say that mine are just average, I am looked at like I said that I hate my kids.

I appreciate all the unique and quirky things about my kiddos. However, I understand that they are special to me, but not really all that special to the rest of the world. I feel like I would not be doing them any favors to pretend differently. I think my kids are funny, weird, interesting, and lovely. I point out to them when they say or do something that I think is great, but I don't gush on and on about how exceptional they are to the greater population or how much better they are than the average kid. To the rest of the world, they are just normal.

Would it help them out if I were to tell them the lie that they can be or do anything they want with their lives? Should I tell my child who has less than perfect pitch that she should definitely continue to pursue her dream of being a professional singer? Or is it kinder and more realistic to encourage her to continue singing because it makes her happy, but to realistically consider doing it on the community level? My children, in all their average glory, will be able to have wonderful careers and enriched and beautiful lives. They should not expect to be famous, but they will be able to be proud of their accomplishments some day. I expect my kids to go to a state school and  work hard and get normal sorts of jobs.... teaching, social work, middle managers of a paper mill, working in admissions at the local college, nursing, etc. Again, I think this is ok. I think it is great. My kids won't be the president of the United States. So what? Am I a bad mom for realizing this? Am I a bad mom for stating this?

We also have had to have many discussions about when others are better. I know many parents, when their child is passed up for something they want, will cut down the child who got that solo for the concert and will tell their child that it should have been them because they are so exceptionally talented. I refuse to do this. My oldest has experienced be passed over quite a bit in the last year. It is hard to see her be so disappointed, but I really try hard to teach her to be happy for the child who did so well and is getting recognition. We won't all be the lead in a play or the star basketball player on the team or the artist who is featured in the school newsletter. I won't even tell her that her day is coming for these things, because it may not be. There are only so many lead roles, only 1 star basketball player, and only a few school newsletters and there are many, many children who aspire to take on these spots.

I have been trying to get my children to embrace being average.... and even sometimes less than average. I tried to teach Amelia how to play tennis, but since she wasn't instantly amazing at it then she decided she never wanted to play again. I keep encouraging my kids that they can suck at something and still do it for fun. The average person doesn't just pick up a tennis racket and immediately rock the court or strap on running shoes and run a 5 minute mile. The average person wants to cry after their first run because their lungs hurt and their legs ache. What builds character is going out and doing it again and again and trying to enjoy the things you aren't so great at (says the very slow runner).

I don't know, maybe someday I will see that I have gone about this parenting business all wrong. Until that day comes, I think I will just embrace and love my very average family.

New skills and solar camp showers

I got 1 more coat of paint on the kitchen cupboards today. 1 more tomorrow night should do the trick! I worked on that with the kids in tow, which was not easy. They all get whiney pretty quickly and start fighting. Joe picked them up towards the end of my painting and they all got dinner made and the house picked up. I walked into a prepared dinner and set table. I could get used to that ;)

I was super excited after we went back to the house tonight. Joe taught me how to replace electrical outlets! Not just the covers, but the actual outlets. I felt so handy :)  Then we talked and joked about how much our communication with one another has improved with all these years of marriage. When we were newlyweds, Joe tried to teach me to drive stick and that was a nightmare. His mother had to teach me (thanks, Karen!) because him trying to teach me was such a bad thing for us. Now, I guess we just know one another well enough to know how to teach things in a way that the other can learn. We still have a few more outlets to get changed out, so I believe I will get to continue to practice my new skill :)

We are beginning to get nervous that our bathroom won't be complete before it is time for us to move. Our contractor is a hard and good worker, so it isn't his fault. It has to do with the kind of loan we have for the home and the home improvements. The type of loan doesn't allow for the contractor to get any money upfront, but they can get paid certain percentages during the process when draws are done by the inspector and paperwork is submitted to the bank. Unfortunately, our inspector has gone AWOL, which means no draws with the paperwork are being done, which then means no money for the contractor. He has done all he can do until he gets paid for what he has completed so far and I don't know how long that will take since the inspector guy won't return any of our phone calls or emails. As of right now, we still don't have a working bathroom. We began to feel stressed about it, but then I really had to adjust my mindset about it. There is nothing we can do about it if that is the way it is going to shake out. I guess we will have to get one of those solar camp showers and shower in the backyard. There is a port-a-potty across the street until softball season is over. I guess then we might just go old school and dig a hole in the backyard (I kid, I kid). It is an interesting journey, this house. It is an excellent teacher of the lesson of letting go and becoming a bit more zen.

We have color in the kitchen!

We have a whole lot of color in the kitchen now, but I am not going to show you pictures until it is done so we can have a more dramatic reveal :)

Yesterday we sanded the cabinets and doors and wiped them down while also vacuuming up any dust and spiders we could find. Today was a longer day as we used deglosser, primed them all, and managed to get 1 good coat of paint on. I think I am liking how it is coming along. The color looks really pretty on my arm! :)

In order to finish the kitchen up we will need to: put 1 or 2 more coats of paint on the cabinets, install the new dishwasher and range that are being delivered this week, get new pulls put on, put in new electrical outlets and light switches and covers, and clean up the sink and floor once our water comes back on. In the future we would like to replace the range hood, sew curtains for the windows, and replace the drop ceiling tiles. Well, in reality, we will want an entire new kitchen at some point :)

Joe also got all the adhesive removed from the stairs and they are sanded. Now we need to clean them up well, prime, and paint. Maybe next weekend???

Need to get on track

One of the hardest parts for me of this whole home renovation business is that I have fallen WAY off course with eating and exercising. I have been eating crap and just not finding anytime to work out at all. This is not good and makes me very nervous as anyone who has ever struggled with these issues knows it can be a very easy slide back. I need to get back on course. Today. Fortunately, my weight is still doing ok-ish. It is still within the range that I like it to be in, but it is on the higher end of that range as I guess I gained 4lbs. I am hoping most of that is water retention from the extreme heat. I still need to get back on track though, regardless of what the scale says.

Today I am back to cruising my favorite nutrition blogs and planning out my meals/snacks so I don't just end up grabbing the first thing I see when I walk in the kitchen. I need high protein and low-ish carbs. I have been slipping with the carbs. A piece of bread here, a few crackers there.... slippery slope.

I need to find time for the exercise thing. Working on the house as been lots of manual labor, but I need a bit more. Hopefully tomorrow I will get a moment to maybe ride my bike or run or something. I have been eyeing up fall races....

Just for comparison

Here are a few photos of the downstairs before we started:

Another batch of pictures with few words

Here is a photo from my office and looking into the living room.

In this shot you can see the living room and the kitchen (and kids).

Another shot of the living room. I LOVE this color. It was not my favorite when we picked it, but it is rich and warm and light and bright all at the same time.

This is our dinning area by the stairs (that still obviously need to be done). The color in here is the same as the kitchen. It is called "Vanilla Milkshake"and I thought I would like it more than I do. I think once we do the stairs and the cabinets then I might dig it a bit more.

I should have gotten a pic of our new light fixture that Joe put in, but I didn't.

Our new fridge :)

Our kitchen needs the cabinets done, but we are getting there!

We put in curtains to the office today. Hopefully that will help keep the temp down a bit.

My 6th Sense

I spent 8 hours painting today. I am exhausted. Joe spent 6 hours painting and another 2 hours catching up on laundry and cooking dinner while leaving me at the house to continue. The WONDERFUL news is that all the walls are now painted. This feels amazing! Once the bathroom is finished we will need to paint that. We also still need to do the stairs, our cabinets, and our bathroom door. That is it, though! (I am going to pretend that we don't need to paint the trim)

Something interesting happened while I was at the house alone. I was working in the living room and heard someone behind me, I turned thinking maybe one of the neighbors came in to say hello or maybe Joe decided to drop in. Nope. No one was there. This happened a few times (4, if I recall). One time I CLEARLY heard footsteps right behind me. I texted Joe at this point to let him know that I was pretty sure that I wasn't all alone in the house. As I moved into the kitchen to paint, I CLEARLY heard someone walk up the stairs. I could see the stairs from where I was standing and no one was on them. No real rational explanation. Perhaps I am nuts. I am  really leaning to the fact that we may be sharing our new space though. The house is 122 years old, there likely have been many people who have been born and died and lived fantastically busy and energetic lives in this home. I think that the construction we have been doing on the home has perhaps stirred up something. It doesn't feel like a bad or scary something, it just feels like someone has walked into the room and then no one is there. I won't worry about it unless it doesn't follow my ground rules.
Ghosts are not allowed to:
1) Sneak up on me in the bathroom/shower  
2) Appear in mirrors
3) Stand over me while I sleep

I will post some photos tomorrow of our painting progress. It was getting pretty dark by the time I finished up today and so the photos won't show the lovely colors well.

P.S. If you see my kids, please don't mention the ghost business to them. I have no interest in scaring them out of the house. Also, if your children play with mine, please don't talk about it in front of your kids either ;)