More remodeling, some painting, and a touch of bad parenting

Some days I am convinced someone is playing a prank on me.  I stop and look around certain that Ashton Kutcher is hiding behind a door ready to walk out and reveal that I have been “punk’d”.  But wait, do they only “punk” celebrities?  I suppose that is not an option then.  Regardless, this week I felt that way…several times actually.  So much of it I can’t blog about, I wish I could, you would be highly entertained.  Some things however are best left “unblogged”.

This semi-truck that pulled into my driveway last week is not one of those things however.  I stood at my front door in a robe, towel in my hair, and coffee cup in hand; while the driver of the truck asked if I had a fork lift to get the 18ft crate that he was delivering, off the the truck.  I said no, though I really wish at that moment that I owned a fork lift so that I could have driven it from around the back while wearing my robe and towel.  He then asked the next logical question, “Where is your general contractor?”, I replied “You are looking at her”.  That really isn’t completely true, my husband does most of the general contracting around here; but at this point I was just having fun with the situation.

So I called my husband away from his real full-time job, to come home and deal with his non-paid full-time job of GC’ing this house remodel, so that he could deal with the semi-truck and the man with the bad attitude.  It turns out, we didn’t need a fork lift.  The delivery was our garage door that came in much more manageable pieces once the crate was opened.

Also this week, I decided that we needed to seal the ceiling on the porch. Though the raw, unfinished timbers are beautiful and didn’t require finishing, I wasn’t quite satisfied with my level of self-torture for the week, so I convinced my carpenter husband we needed to apply a touch of sheen to that ceiling.  He tarped the space with the worlds largest tarp (why do we own a tarp this big?), I strapped a camouflage baseball cap to my head, and starting spraying.

It only took about half a day for two coats:

And now she looks a little more dignified and refined in my opinion:

And so today we switch gears inside.  Here is a shot of my existing family room.  The new family room is on the other side of that wall; and as I type, our brick masons are jack hammering through the fireplace.  The one fireplace is becoming two fireplaces today.

Here they are on the other side trying to figure out the best way to go about this. Notice the blue tarp again. It is now being used to contain dust. I’m getting tired of dust.

This project is wearing on me, and I’m learning that I do not handle chaos as well as I should. It’s all good chaos, and I remind myself of that daily…shame on me for all the times of complaining.  For the most part, my husband and I keep it all in good humor, but there are days when we think we might loose it. At one point last week in the midst of my frustration, I pulled into Harris Teeter with all three of my children (in the rain), looking for a parking space. A sporty little car beat my kid-packed SUV to the reserved “parking with children” space.  I waited in the distance, watching, prowling would be a better word for it.  I just knew she did not have children in that car with her.  As she marched her lone self into that grocery store with a darling polka dot Kate Spade umbrella in hand, I wanted to run her over with my truck.  That probably would have been inappropriate, so instead I chose to leave her a note.  I beckoned to the backseat and asked my girls if they had a piece of paper.  Caroline started crying.  Ella said “you better believe I have a piece of paper”!  As I claimed un-given authority to write such a note , Ella was so excited she offered me colored pencils from her book bag so that I could “make it pretty”.  I considered it, I certainly admired her for it, but ultimately decided that this moment of bold assertion on my part was no time for adding artwork.  And I’m not gonna lie, I kind of regret that decision a little.  Adding color is really always the right decision.  At this point, Caroline is now begging me not to write the note.  I refused her wishes, and before I could deliver the note to the windshield wiper of the vehicle; Ella had snatched it from my hands and did it herself.  Caroline began wailing.  Do you think my girls are different?

Caroline spent the entire grocery trip hiding behind me in horror that we might run into the person, Ella marched in front of me with fists clenched, daring the woman to approach us.  Clearly, not one of my finer moments, but I have been wrestling with whether or not it was really all that bad of parenting.  Ella high-fived me when we left and saw that the car was gone and so the driver had most certainly seen our note.  Caroline told on me to her Father the second he walked in the door from work, and then prayed for me that night during prayer time.

Like I said, this project is wearing on all of us….

Amy

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