Making A House, A Home

It's the beginning of day 4 of  "Operation Indoor Campout".  That's what I've had to call it to get the kids to stop whining about sleeping on a camp pad upstairs while Mama sleeps in splendiferous comfort on the really, really cold blow-up mattress (see kids, we are all making sacrifices). While I think they have enjoyed having no furniture to play around (it's so much easier to run laps when you're unimpeded by minor things like a sofa or a dining room table), I personally am looking forward to NEW CARPET today, and the delivery of our STUFF tomorrow.  

After 3 days of confinement, complete with hours of unsupervised playtime/ movie watching/ snack/ dressing up Big J in a sundress, the kids were overjoyed to get outside and meet some neighbor kids last night.  The boys next door & across the street are both 3, and I foresee hours of backyard playtime this Fall (cue the Hallelujah chorus and open the heavens).  Big Sis got to run down the cul de sac & back, over & over & over, and then boldly led the pack into the neighbor's yard where they proceeded to circle the willow tree over & over & over. See kids, no toys necessary.  Just grab a friend & start exploring.  They capped off the night by hunting fire flies & getting a little freaked out by the bats which were wheeling and swooping overhead.  The weather was so nice and cool, and not humid, and I opened all the windows, and even emerged from my paint-induced haze to visit with the neighborhood Moms and practice my rusty social skills.  If my stilted sentence structure and primer coated t shirt didn't put them off too badly, then we may have a chance to be buddies.

I've spent my days cleaning, spackling, sanding, cleaning, priming, painting, cleaning.  3 days seems like an enormously long time to finish a bedroom, closet, and hallway, but I had to put a 2nd coat on the bedroom, and then tape it all off so I could take the trim from brown to white (and PS on that one - next time I decide it is a good idea to bring a house into the 21st century and paint all the trim white, just tell me to perform my own root canal instead because it will be more fun & less time-consuming).  The trim alone on those three rooms took me 3 hours to paint, and I didn't even finish the doorways completely because I would have had to remove the doors & hardware, and while I CAN do it, I decided not to, because knowing me, I would have made some critical error that would make it nigh-unto-impossible to hang them properly again, so I just didn't. I didn't, and so now the trim is mostly white except in the doorways, and of course the doors themselves, so while I am enormously proud of how much I've gotten done, it all looks sort of wonky and nowhere near finished. But I love it anyway, and I am excited to get those doors off and make it white and hang some curtains, and maybe change out the glass covers on the ceiling fan, and paint the fan blades white, too......

But carpet!  As I type this, I am waiting for the carpet guy to come with my new glorious carpet.  I cannot wait to have stairs that aren't a tetanus risk and a hallway that doesn't sound like a herd of elephants are descending when the kids stumble out of bed.  Bring it on, carpet guy.  You have 20 minutes until we are at the maximum end of your 8-9am arrival & I start to get irritated because you are delaying my carpet joy.

The bottom line is that it has been 3 days of really hard work, and neglecting my children, and feeling rather frustrated and lonely, and getting really, really anxious to get settled.  But it's been an amazing 3 days because despite the lingering odor of cat, and the sub-par laminate counter tops, and the double coat of primer I had to use to cover up the black stripe in the guest room, I love this house.  Love it.  It feels like home.  I can't wait to keep working on it, and "Make it a home for us".  That's what has kept me painting until midnight each night, and makes it easier to scrub when I keep finding more dirt.  I am making this house a Home, and it absolutely feels like this is what I am supposed to be doing right now.