We had a lovely Thanksgiving! It was nice to have Z home for four days, the kiddos absolutely ate it up. It was a loud four days! At one point when my head was pounding and my eyesight was starting to shimmer, I told K, "You know you don't have to scream and shriek while you're playing, right?" She stopped abruptly and looked at me, puzzled. "But mommy....yes, I do!" Ol' Santa needs to bring me a year's supply of ear plugs, or at least a supply that will last until K learns what an "inside voice" is. We're working on it.
At K's request, our Christmas tree is already up...I was planning to wait until the first weekend in December, but I looked into my 3-yr-old's beseeching eyes on Friday and folded like lawn furniture. (Actually, her dad was in on the caving, too, so I had company). Whatever, she won't be three forever. The tree does look rather nice and festive, complete with colorful clumps where the kids hung their own ornaments. Why space them out when you can hang six on one branch, right?
So...the tree is done, but there are still some things I'd like to do this month. I figure if I list them here where other people can see (some of whom visit my house), I'll be more motivated to actually get them done.
December list, 2009:
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1) Finish decorating house. I have to find new homes for my Christmas decor, mostly because I don't like to do the same thing two years in a row, but also because I don't have a lot of the furniture that I used to (got rid of a lot moving twice in 6 months) so flat surfaces are few this year. We put up extra strings of lights in the kids' rooms, and A and K are soooo much fun to watch when we turn them on. Childlike wonder and awe are so breathtakingly beautiful to see, especially when they're your own urchins.
2) Figure out the "sweet spots" with the woodstove's flue damper and air intake. See the previous post.
3) Create a December Daily album, like this one. I like the idea of jotting down a little something of each day until Christmas, starting December first, and pair it with a picture or two. There is no way I have time to sit down every day to complete that day's section, though, so what I'll probably do is take a picture every day and write down something in a notebook, and get to the project later after the holidays are over. For me, this will probably be, like, June. I like the eclectic, collage style of this particular project and look forward to coming up with my own unique ways to create pages out of unusual materials (envelopes, part of a partially eaten winter hat (thanks dogs), etc). And it's a neat way to look back at that year's holiday since I know my kiddos won't be little forever.
4) Take time to enjoy the season, and chill. I don't typically get caught up in the hectic busy-ness that seems to plague a lot of people this time of year. That isn't to say that I don't stress over some things, perfectionist wench that I am, but we don't host Christmas parties at our house (A doesn't handle large noisy crowds well), we live too far away from family to have their presence a regular occurance (last year was the exception, we had family from both sides stay with us) and we don't gear up for mall warfare and commando shopping 1) because we like to keep it simple, 2) again, A can't handle crowds like that, and 3) because we don't have the funds to do so anyway.
This is not to disparage those that engage in those activities, I love parties, and I love shopping. The Lord knows if we had funding I'd be getting something for everyone I know, I always see things for other people on the rare occasion I actually enter that shrine to shopping, the mall. The thrill of the hunt! The adrenaline rush of having something new! The sound of the cash register ri-- Confession time: OK, so, I'm not a shopaholic, but I can see myself doing that easily, given the opportunity. God? Please??
I do have a tendency to get caught up in the minutia of daily life, though, and really do need to just relax sometimes.
5) Try something(s) new for Christmas dinner. We always do the things traditional to our family backgrounds: turkey, dressing, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, etc. The menu for Thanksgiving and Christmas are actually identical most years, and I want to change that this year. Shake things up. It doesn't have to be flamboyant or fancy, it can be a simple thing -- but I do want it to be a special addition because Christmas is a celebration. I don't know if that means making a different dessert than pumpkin pie (I'm thinking either my great-great-aunt's coconut pie or a pear-cherry crumble), or if I need to shake up the side dishes a bit. Turnip gratin? Corn souffle? I've got nearly a month to figure that out. So I guess that means I should start now so it's done by Christmas.
6) Keeping tidy. For those of you that know me and have been to my house, you know that I have clung to a certain Victorian ideal in the past. Victorian homes were clean, but they had clutter. Many families passed down houses full of furniture and knickknacks for generations -- and each generation added its own knick knacks to make the home "theirs". More is more, right? Packrats of the world, unite! And all that. So, in an unprecedented assault on my treasures (do I really need this? Have I used it in the last year? Five years?) I've killed (most of) the clutter, although the mail does tend to congregate by the front door. The usual dumping ground is on the rolling dishwasher, the flat surface that's the closest. There's usually one day during the week when I do a double-take at the pile...I swear, sometimes I think the mail reproduces on my dishwasher. Most unsanitary. I have heard the "handle once" philosophy, wherein you get the mail out of the mailbox, immediately throw out the junk mail, and sort the bills to be paid. *snort* That hasn't worked out in my favor, yet, but I'll keep trying.
But I digress. We are clean, for the most part (a pair of my son's socks discovered under the bed recently notwithstanding), just largely untidy. I tend to pick up an item to put it away, go into the next room, see something else that needs done, drift into yet another room. By the end of the day, I haven't sat down except to eat, but nothing is actually completed. I have tried the "basket technique", where you gather everything that doesn't belong in a room and tote it all at once to the next room, but the basket fills up in each subsequent room and it never quite gets emptied. My three-year-old loves to help me, so it takes a bit longer. More than twice as long. It's good that she's learning to be a good steward of her stuff, but there are some days my patience stretches thin. That's usually when my husband arrives home, the house is in shambles, and I get the urge for a drink (even though I don't do that any more).
A Domestic Goddess, I ain't. I really do feel awkward about the chaos in my home, and want to get a handle on it. Somewhere, there is a book (possibly more than one) that states something to the effect of, it takes a month to build a habit. I'd really like to batten down the hatches, ready arms, rattle the spears, and [insert battle phrase here] this month in an effort to beat this. That way, if someone shows up unexpectedly, Blitzkrieg cleaning of the few random toys is so much easier to achieve and I don't stress out. In theory.
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So, that's this year's list. Not overly ambitious, but it will take work nevertheless. And it's now posted in cyberspace for the two people who read this to see, so now I have to do it. Right?
Monday, November 30, 2009
The Great Woodstove Adventure
As the saying goes, 'Where there's smoke, there's a fire!"
Let me regale you with The Great Woodstove Adventure:
We got all the remaining parts and tools in on Wednesday before Thanksgiving, and my pyromaniac hubby decided that he simply HAD to put it all together and get it working after church that night...of course he did...so he started messing with it while I got some preliminary Thanksgiving cooking out of the way: cranberry sauce, biscuits and cornbread to go in the dressing, jello salad, etc. I try to do some of the baking, like pies and fresh sweet potatoes, the night before to make the next day just a smidgen less hectic. It makes it much easier to get the other dishes ready to slide into the oven as soon as the bird comes out if I don't have to juggle pies or components of the finished dishes (like the cornbread) too.
I could hear the scraping of the pipe as it was put together and drilling sounds emanating from the living room while I puttered around the kitchen for a couple of hours. I decided that I was tired and poked my head in the living room before heading upstairs. My dear husband, with a gleeful expression, was still intently working on getting everything lined up with the chimney. He was so cute, he looked like a little boy with a new toy. In retrospect, this observation may not be so far off...what's that saying? "The only difference between men and boys is the price of their toys?" Something like that.
So, my husband was still tinkering with the thing when I went to bed around 11:45 p.m., only to be awakened about 20 minutes later to the unfamiliar, insistent screeching of the upstairs smoke alarm and a terrible chemical smell. I turned on my bedside lamp and saw that my room was full of smoke, yelped (yes, I yelped), and in my still-half-asleep state was poised to dash across the hall, snatch my daughter out of her room, and do something dramatic like dive through the second-story window, letting my body cushion her fall -- when my husband ran by the foot of the stairs and yelled that everything was OK, there was no fire in the house it was just the stovepipe. Just the stovepipe? How was metal on fire? What?
I blinked a couple of times, just to wake up fully, coughed, and made my way down the (smoky) stairs to find out what in tarnation was going on. The issue was a simple one, apparently, but us being woodstove newbies didn't know all the subtle nuances of the art of the woodstove. Or, apparently, its pipes. It would seem that brand new stovepipe has a coating on it that is supposed to come off, yes, but my hubby (did I mention that he's a pyro?) built the hottest fire he could (of course he did) and as a result, ALL of the stovepipe coating came off...at once. And because it was external coating, all that smoke and fumes had no way to get out through the chimney, so it filled the house instead.
I will say, that stove puts off some heat! We had the front door wide open, letting the 36 degree air (and windchill in the 20's) pour in -- and our thermostat (located on the wall at the foot of the stairs by the door) still read 79 degrees. A few stragetically placed fans and open windows later, our house was smoke- and stench-free. My husband decided he was sleeping on the couch, just to keep an eye on things and make sure nothing bad happened. His choice, mind, I don't make my husband sleep on the couch if I'm upset with him -- and I wasn't really upset with him, just exasperated and wondering why this couldn't have waited for daylight the next day...but what was done was done and there was no use getting mad if I'd wanted to.
*cough*
So, it's up and running, really isn't that difficult to use, and heats our house better than the oil furnace-driven central heat did! The downstairs heated nicely with the central heat, but the vents upstairs were always anemic and our room was always freezing. Plus, we never raised the thermostat above 64ish in the winter just to keep the costs down (we were spending about $3,000 on heat last year).
Not any more! Thanks to the woodstove, the whole house stays between 71 and 74, upstairs stays about 69. That little woodstove heats the upstairs better than the "superior" central heating system did! Now we just have to figure out the best positions for the draft and air intake, to let it burn as long as it can overnight.
The only hassle with the thing is that it tends to burn down after about 3 or 4 hours. This is no biggie during the day, I just chuck a log on there every couple of hours or so...but we have to stoke the fire and rebuild it if we get up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom. This is easy if there are a lot of hot coals, it takes like 5 minutes to get a roaring fire again and is no big deal. My Girl Scout camping trips are paying off. But. It's frustrating if there aren't any coals to speak of, it's 3:00 in the morning, and you have to coax a new fire to start from scratch and the tinder refuses to stay lit, so you don't get back to bed for a half-hour. Like this morning.
Since we're still new to the whole process, we are just going to have to learn the idiosyncracies of this particular stove to get it right, and hopefully we won't have any more evil glaring at the stove in the wee hours of the morning.
Here's to a new adventure! May we stay warm and toasty without becoming crispy critters. Laura Ingalls Wilder could do it, so I should be able to do it, right?
Let me regale you with The Great Woodstove Adventure:
We got all the remaining parts and tools in on Wednesday before Thanksgiving, and my pyromaniac hubby decided that he simply HAD to put it all together and get it working after church that night...of course he did...so he started messing with it while I got some preliminary Thanksgiving cooking out of the way: cranberry sauce, biscuits and cornbread to go in the dressing, jello salad, etc. I try to do some of the baking, like pies and fresh sweet potatoes, the night before to make the next day just a smidgen less hectic. It makes it much easier to get the other dishes ready to slide into the oven as soon as the bird comes out if I don't have to juggle pies or components of the finished dishes (like the cornbread) too.
I could hear the scraping of the pipe as it was put together and drilling sounds emanating from the living room while I puttered around the kitchen for a couple of hours. I decided that I was tired and poked my head in the living room before heading upstairs. My dear husband, with a gleeful expression, was still intently working on getting everything lined up with the chimney. He was so cute, he looked like a little boy with a new toy. In retrospect, this observation may not be so far off...what's that saying? "The only difference between men and boys is the price of their toys?" Something like that.
So, my husband was still tinkering with the thing when I went to bed around 11:45 p.m., only to be awakened about 20 minutes later to the unfamiliar, insistent screeching of the upstairs smoke alarm and a terrible chemical smell. I turned on my bedside lamp and saw that my room was full of smoke, yelped (yes, I yelped), and in my still-half-asleep state was poised to dash across the hall, snatch my daughter out of her room, and do something dramatic like dive through the second-story window, letting my body cushion her fall -- when my husband ran by the foot of the stairs and yelled that everything was OK, there was no fire in the house it was just the stovepipe. Just the stovepipe? How was metal on fire? What?
I blinked a couple of times, just to wake up fully, coughed, and made my way down the (smoky) stairs to find out what in tarnation was going on. The issue was a simple one, apparently, but us being woodstove newbies didn't know all the subtle nuances of the art of the woodstove. Or, apparently, its pipes. It would seem that brand new stovepipe has a coating on it that is supposed to come off, yes, but my hubby (did I mention that he's a pyro?) built the hottest fire he could (of course he did) and as a result, ALL of the stovepipe coating came off...at once. And because it was external coating, all that smoke and fumes had no way to get out through the chimney, so it filled the house instead.
I will say, that stove puts off some heat! We had the front door wide open, letting the 36 degree air (and windchill in the 20's) pour in -- and our thermostat (located on the wall at the foot of the stairs by the door) still read 79 degrees. A few stragetically placed fans and open windows later, our house was smoke- and stench-free. My husband decided he was sleeping on the couch, just to keep an eye on things and make sure nothing bad happened. His choice, mind, I don't make my husband sleep on the couch if I'm upset with him -- and I wasn't really upset with him, just exasperated and wondering why this couldn't have waited for daylight the next day...but what was done was done and there was no use getting mad if I'd wanted to.
*cough*
So, it's up and running, really isn't that difficult to use, and heats our house better than the oil furnace-driven central heat did! The downstairs heated nicely with the central heat, but the vents upstairs were always anemic and our room was always freezing. Plus, we never raised the thermostat above 64ish in the winter just to keep the costs down (we were spending about $3,000 on heat last year).
Not any more! Thanks to the woodstove, the whole house stays between 71 and 74, upstairs stays about 69. That little woodstove heats the upstairs better than the "superior" central heating system did! Now we just have to figure out the best positions for the draft and air intake, to let it burn as long as it can overnight.
The only hassle with the thing is that it tends to burn down after about 3 or 4 hours. This is no biggie during the day, I just chuck a log on there every couple of hours or so...but we have to stoke the fire and rebuild it if we get up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom. This is easy if there are a lot of hot coals, it takes like 5 minutes to get a roaring fire again and is no big deal. My Girl Scout camping trips are paying off. But. It's frustrating if there aren't any coals to speak of, it's 3:00 in the morning, and you have to coax a new fire to start from scratch and the tinder refuses to stay lit, so you don't get back to bed for a half-hour. Like this morning.
Since we're still new to the whole process, we are just going to have to learn the idiosyncracies of this particular stove to get it right, and hopefully we won't have any more evil glaring at the stove in the wee hours of the morning.
Here's to a new adventure! May we stay warm and toasty without becoming crispy critters. Laura Ingalls Wilder could do it, so I should be able to do it, right?
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
A Thankful Heart
I must confess, I've had kind of a rough time over the last few days.
God has this unique way of putting things into perspective.
After my last post, regarding all the things I'd like to fix up in our home, I had to help create a presentation for my husband, to be shown this week at church during the Youth Takeover Sunday. This presentation shows photos of times when it's hard to understand where God is in the situation (even though we know He's everywhere), and includes pictures of houses burning to the ground, our troops in the Middle East with fallen soldiers, street children in the Phillipines, and starving children in Africa. The message one of our college-aged students will be giving is titled, "Our God, His Love".
I had to comb through the photos to make sure they weren't too graphic because we will have 5-yr-olds present when they're being shown on the screen. By the time I was done gathering the requested images, I felt like I'd been through a wringer on an old-fashioned washing machine. One particular image (that could not be used for this presentation) is still indelibly burned into my brain. I won't share the link, but the gist is starving people will eat anything, even if it means holding onto the back of a living animal to get it. And then my husband came home from work early for a doctor's appointment and brought me McDonald's for lunch. I choked on it while I was trying to eat it, and then had to go upstairs for a good bawling session. For the next two days every time I saw a cow, I'd start tearing up again. And I live out in the country, so you can just imagine. I know that if my human heart was breaking over the world situations, then God's heart must be so much exponentially more pained.
I think we Americans are so unbelievably blessed, and we've been spoiled to the point that we take a lot of things for granted. Even the poorest and homeless here in this country have it better than a lot of people that live in other countries around the world.
I have seen images like these before, and know the situations, and we do what we can to support relief efforts. They always touch my heart and make me upset that I can't just go to their countries, pack them all in my suitcase, and bring them home with me. We don't always have a lot of extra ourselves and have felt leanness from time to time, but we still also know that we have so much more than a lot of others around the world. And we're grateful for it.
I think the reason that this time has hit me so particularly hard is that my husband and I have been discussing adopting another child. So to see all these children in these conditions, after having recent discussions about adopting one to take it out of that type of situation, really made hamburger out of my heart. If we want more children, adopting is the way to go, and while we realize that there are a lot of children that need families here in our country, we also realize that the American kids -- even those who are in poverty by American standards -- are so much better off than a lot of international kids are.
I have some issues in the birthing department; we have lost several babies due to miscarriages, and I almost died the first time and had severe complications the second time I actually carried our two living kids to full term. A friend recently asked if I was pregnant again, to which I responded, "NO! I'd be crying if I was." Not because I'd be upset to have another kid at this point, but because I do have a habit of losing them and/or have the chance to die if I'm pregnant and I just really don't want to/can't go through that any more. I admire people who are foster parents, but I know that I could never do it -- to keep a child for a short time and give them up again would tear me up every time I had to do it, very probably because I have lost a few of our own. So....adoption, at some future point.
Through all this, I also feel deeply ashamed for feeling frustrated with our house, which by any other country's standards would be considered fabulous. Perspective, perspective.
We are still going to be doing the eventual renovations to the home, and we will still be working on adopting at least one more child (we have to do some of the renovations before we can even think about more kids, though). I also know that we are blessed to live where we are, with the provisions we have -- and to deny receiving those blessings isn't right, either. While I am always thankful for the blessings we are given, I think perhaps that these last few days will provide a more lasting...reminder for me. It is good to have a reminder every now and then, lest we become complacent or spoiled. Like I apparently have become, without realizing it.
This week is our Thanksgiving celebration. What are YOU thankful for?
God has this unique way of putting things into perspective.
After my last post, regarding all the things I'd like to fix up in our home, I had to help create a presentation for my husband, to be shown this week at church during the Youth Takeover Sunday. This presentation shows photos of times when it's hard to understand where God is in the situation (even though we know He's everywhere), and includes pictures of houses burning to the ground, our troops in the Middle East with fallen soldiers, street children in the Phillipines, and starving children in Africa. The message one of our college-aged students will be giving is titled, "Our God, His Love".
I had to comb through the photos to make sure they weren't too graphic because we will have 5-yr-olds present when they're being shown on the screen. By the time I was done gathering the requested images, I felt like I'd been through a wringer on an old-fashioned washing machine. One particular image (that could not be used for this presentation) is still indelibly burned into my brain. I won't share the link, but the gist is starving people will eat anything, even if it means holding onto the back of a living animal to get it. And then my husband came home from work early for a doctor's appointment and brought me McDonald's for lunch. I choked on it while I was trying to eat it, and then had to go upstairs for a good bawling session. For the next two days every time I saw a cow, I'd start tearing up again. And I live out in the country, so you can just imagine. I know that if my human heart was breaking over the world situations, then God's heart must be so much exponentially more pained.
I think we Americans are so unbelievably blessed, and we've been spoiled to the point that we take a lot of things for granted. Even the poorest and homeless here in this country have it better than a lot of people that live in other countries around the world.
I have seen images like these before, and know the situations, and we do what we can to support relief efforts. They always touch my heart and make me upset that I can't just go to their countries, pack them all in my suitcase, and bring them home with me. We don't always have a lot of extra ourselves and have felt leanness from time to time, but we still also know that we have so much more than a lot of others around the world. And we're grateful for it.
I think the reason that this time has hit me so particularly hard is that my husband and I have been discussing adopting another child. So to see all these children in these conditions, after having recent discussions about adopting one to take it out of that type of situation, really made hamburger out of my heart. If we want more children, adopting is the way to go, and while we realize that there are a lot of children that need families here in our country, we also realize that the American kids -- even those who are in poverty by American standards -- are so much better off than a lot of international kids are.
I have some issues in the birthing department; we have lost several babies due to miscarriages, and I almost died the first time and had severe complications the second time I actually carried our two living kids to full term. A friend recently asked if I was pregnant again, to which I responded, "NO! I'd be crying if I was." Not because I'd be upset to have another kid at this point, but because I do have a habit of losing them and/or have the chance to die if I'm pregnant and I just really don't want to/can't go through that any more. I admire people who are foster parents, but I know that I could never do it -- to keep a child for a short time and give them up again would tear me up every time I had to do it, very probably because I have lost a few of our own. So....adoption, at some future point.
Through all this, I also feel deeply ashamed for feeling frustrated with our house, which by any other country's standards would be considered fabulous. Perspective, perspective.
We are still going to be doing the eventual renovations to the home, and we will still be working on adopting at least one more child (we have to do some of the renovations before we can even think about more kids, though). I also know that we are blessed to live where we are, with the provisions we have -- and to deny receiving those blessings isn't right, either. While I am always thankful for the blessings we are given, I think perhaps that these last few days will provide a more lasting...reminder for me. It is good to have a reminder every now and then, lest we become complacent or spoiled. Like I apparently have become, without realizing it.
This week is our Thanksgiving celebration. What are YOU thankful for?
Thursday, November 19, 2009
House Overview
We purchased this home, 1) because it was the only thing in our price range that let us have a home with a yard for the kids and dog, now dogs (our other option was an area of downtown that was not desirable from a safety perspective), 2) because it was very close to the church and community that we are actively involved in, and 3) because it was a fixer-upper and we like a challenge.
Good thing! Because we're challenged now. I have actually dithered over whether or not to do a post like this. I don't want to sound like we're complaining, and I know the written word does not have the same communicative punch that a one-on-one conversation complete with facial expressions has. Quite simply, working on this house will probably be a very large part of our lives for a very long time so I'm going to share what we'll be working on. This blog will, in addition to following A's challenges, also follow our home improvement saga -- if for nothing else then to have something that indicates progress, for those occasions when I want to dash my head against a wall, in tears over the frustration of living in drywall dust, paint spills, and cooking over a hot plate while we re-do the kitchen...whenever that happens. I don't know anyone who has attempted a renovation (large or small) that hasn't wanted to cry or choke something at some point in the process. I'm sure people exist whose renovations went perfectly, but I don't know any of them.
This home has beautiful potential, and we really do love it. The view across the street of the mountains is stellar, we have just over 1/2 acre of land that I can hopefully garden on soon, with room leftover for kids and dogs to play. The bones of the house are good, although there are a few minor cosmetic issues that we thought were just that: cosmetic. We love the space inside, if not the exact layout, and it keeps the rain out. We have been so blessed living here, the kids love the backyard (as do our dogs). It is located conveniently to pretty much any amenity we could wish for, within 10 minutes. This includes our church, friends' houses, movie theatres, the grocery store, and parks and fishing holes. There are some things that we have noticed, though...
In our last year and a half, we have discovered that: we blow through a nearly 300-gallon tank of heating oil in a month -- keeping the temp at 65 degrees or lower. This was confounding to say the least; we could understand if we were trying to simulate the Sahara, but 65 degrees? Z and I couldn't figure out why it was so cold all the time when we were burning through that much heating oil, and then so darned hot once summertime came and soon discovered the reason.
We never did get that second load of insulation, and we can't fit any of it in at the top of the stairs because of the way the wooden beamwork is over the metal acoustic tile grid -- much of our heat still goes right on up and out the roof. We do have the R-19 stuff over the bedrooms, though, which helps a lot. We have discovered that using electric space heaters, we can effectively heat individual rooms OK. The mommy in me cringes to leave one on in either of my kids' (OK, they're still my babies) rooms overnight, though, and we only have two heaters. We usually put one on each floor of the house, and then I cook or bake during the day, adding heat from the kitchen.
This is why the acquisition of a woodstove is such an enormous blessing! We have calculated, based on neighbors' wood consumptions, that we can heat the house the entire winter for a total cost of $330 in logs, give or take a few (and adding the cost of getting the woodstove and accessories needed like stovepipe, etc). $330 sure beats the heck out of over $3,000, especially with our cash flow these days! I know it's "inconvenient", but I'll deal with the ash and constant reloading; besides which, humans have been doing this for thousands of years so I figure I can handle it. Plus, bonus: if the power goes out, we still have heat and I can cook on top of the thing. We won't have running water, but we'll stay warm and be fed while we stink from a lack of showering. : )
We have also discovered that: all the electricity in the house is "slaved" off other appliances and outlets in the room, sometimes multiple rooms. For example, we can not run the overhead light in the living room if the ceiling fan in the kitchen is on. And my son's closet light can only be turned on IF the overhead room light is in the "on" position and you unscrew its bulb before you screw in the closet light to turn it on. The reverse is also true. Also, if you run the microwave in the kitchen off of two particular outlets and the television is on in the living room, you'll blow the fuse. Our electric wiring and box have inspection stickers slapped all over it but no inspector number or name...someone did a "Harry Homejob" (as Z and I are starting to call these things) and got a roll of stickers somehow. As the inspector said, though, "It's not unsafe...just not practical". So, we don't have to deal with potentially lethal consequences, just fuse-blowing irritation. So at some point, you will be regaled with rewiring stories. Yes, "stories", because undoubtedly there will be more than one.
Moving on to the ceilings: the acoustic tile ceilings in a metal grid are purely a cosmetic dislike. Do they stop the room at the top of the walls? Yes. Do they look like the playing field for some sort of space-aged game, or hopelessly outdated relics of the 1960's? Yes to both. So at some point, likely after we get the wiring done, we'll tackle putting up real, live drywall on the ceilings. Of the non-popcorn variety.
We'd also really like to raise the ceiling height upstairs, because my 6'+ (some days he's an inch taller than others, depends on his back) can walk through the doorways with a mere inch or two to spare. All of the upstairs ceilings are between 6' and 6'5". This doesn't particularly bother me, because I'm only 5'4", but it is a little weird to see your otherwise "normally heighthed" (is that a real word?)husband look like the giant from Gulliver's Travels when he enters a room. And he unconsciously ducks through most of the doorways, even though he clears the frame by an inch or so.
All the walls currently end at the upstairs ceiling (natch), so we'll have to completely redo all the walls while we're raising the ceiling to avoid an odd one and a half foot gap if we do standard 8' ceilings.
And while we're tearing down the walls, we'll have to shore up the flooring. We have that lovely "vintage roll" effect right now -- meaning that you can go uphill both ways crossing my daughter's room. The peak is in the middle of the room, so at least it's symmetrical. Apparently in 1960, they had different standards of how far apart your support beams could be, as compared to today's much closer requirements. And we're finding particle board and other, shall we say, inexpensive materials used throughout the house. We're betting on finding more under the carpet, which we haven't had the heart to rip out yet. Mostly because we can't afford to replace it yet. And we're scared to see what's underneath.
Speaking of carpet, our tenants had rabbits and cats who, for all appearances, seemed to have had some directionally challenged issues with regards to litterbox location. Most especially in my daughter's room. Our dog did not decorate in this manner while we lived here before, and the previous owners had no pets (and they're the ones who installed the carpet), so logically the smell must be from the tenants' critters. That all needs some replacing, too, because both of my dogs all of a sudden feel the urge to...ah, relieve their urge in that room since our return from TX. We'll let you know what we find when we replace it all. That will likely have a posting all its own.
Drywall will need to be replaced throughout the house, as we have some...dents...and other places where the seams are not quite lined up right. We're not sure if our tenants were slam-dancing or what, but there are quite a few spots that need a little attention at some point. They're not outright holes, so this is wayyyy down on the repair list.
Paint is easy, we've already managed to cover over the Play-Doh blue color bequeathed to us by our tenants, although that took us until about 3 weeks ago to accomplish. Of course, the tenants had to deal with my fire-engine red hallway, so tit for tat I suppose. (It's now brown).
Bathroom ~ is functional. We do have 2 sinks that sit on top of white laminate cabinetry. Whoever installed the cabinets didn't measure very well because there is a huge gap between the back wall and the cabinets, and several inches of open space in the corner, and the doors won't hang quite right. Just for aesthetic reasons, we'd like to have something a little more ... together. Also, it looks like someone bought a home kit shower replacement dealie and had some interesting caulk technique. Again, cosmetic. The bathroom, as mentioned above, is fully functional so we really don't have anything to complain about. At least we have one, right?
Kitchen -- well. The cabinets hold the dishes, so their function is fine. I do have three different colors of wood, and two different door styles going on, which I'd like to simplify to one color and one style if possible. I could just reface them, probably, the only exception being the section between the refrigerator and the stove. Despite multiple bleach treatments, we have a mold problem under there that just won't go away. I'd take pictures, but it ain't pretty; you could film a horror flick under there without much additional cost for set construction. And if you could find actors small enough to fit in the cabinet. Heh. The kitchen is pretty much all cosmetic issues so it's also way down on the priority list. I use the top of the (rolling) dishwasher or our table to prep food on so I have my "work triangle" going on. For an interesting story about the dishwasher, go here.
The countertops are faux marble in a dark hunter green, and none of them are actually attached to the cabinets underneath. The floor coordinates nicely with peel-and-stick vinyl tiles, also in dark green "marble" -- but the tiles aren't lined up too well and the finish has worn off over time. Again, purely cosmetic; just not my color preference. Still work just fine, and I actually feel a little rotten mentioning it. The floor doesn't have to shine, even if the Mop'N'Glo bottle says it will.
We have a very unfinished addition that someone put on one side of the house, with a concrete subfloor. It works as a kind of "mudroom", a place to unlock the door without getting drowned when it rains, and where we currently are storing cardboard boxes, the recycling bins, and firewood. The walls need finishing because you can see outside between the boards, and the roof is too flat and needs a higher pitch (per the house inspector). The roof does leak, and raising the angle is supposed to fix this issue. We'd love to turn it into a screen porch or even a dining room in the distant future, because we don't have either right now.
Our garage...has a very nice concrete floor, holds two vehicles, and has a work area to one side. The fake brick asbestos siding is coming off, and we're not entirely sure what to do with that. I know asbestos is bad stuff, but not much beyond that, so we have some research to do.
Most recently (and of course having both the highest cost and necessity) is our septic system. We don't have one. What was listed on the deed of the house as a septic system is, in fact, a big concrete pit three feet from our house with a slit in one side. And the rock and clay in the ground just won't hold any more...stuff...after 50 years.
To put in a new (real) system, we have to move it out at least 10 feet from the house. Which puts it too close to our well, which we'll have to subsequently move. We can't put the septic or the well in the side yard, because that will be too close to our neighbors' well. After several visits from the county health department, our ONLY option is to take off the front part of the driveway and install a system in a 10 x 15 spot, using a new biometric system -- and provided they can blast a hole big enough through the rocky ridge we sit on. This ridge goes up into New York and down into the Carolinas. This will be potentially cheaper because it means we don't have to move our existing well, but will also be more expensive than a regular septic system, which could normally be installed for around $5K in these here parts. There's always the possibility that we'll have to move the well anyway, and that's where it gets expensive -- $30K for the whole job is a conservative estimate given by the inspector.
We're not entirely sure how we're going to do this; we're already not taking A to outside OT and speech appointments because we can't afford to, even with insurance. We are barely keeping our heads above water as it is, so this is most unwelcome news. Blessedly, the county is giving us some time to correct the problem and isn't making us get it done NEXT WEEK. We're hoping maybe by spring time to a)win the lottery we don't play, b) have a miracle happen and it fix itself somehow, or c)be able to get a loan to cover it, which is unlikely at this point.
Anyone looking to off-load a year's salary? Just checking.
Compounding all of these issues is my husband's back issues. Z has the back of a 70-yr old man even though he just turned 29. If his time in the Army had not come to the end of his enlistment, he would have had a medical discharge. He can't handle a lot of the DIY stuff we'd intended to do, and neither can I due to a bum hip from a car accident a few years ago.
So, this will be an interesting saga indeed! I am interested to see how things develop, chiefly because it's my house, but also from a detached scientific point of view. This is our Mad Scientist experiment. Let the fun begin! And I promise to share most, if not all, of the gory details.
Good thing! Because we're challenged now. I have actually dithered over whether or not to do a post like this. I don't want to sound like we're complaining, and I know the written word does not have the same communicative punch that a one-on-one conversation complete with facial expressions has. Quite simply, working on this house will probably be a very large part of our lives for a very long time so I'm going to share what we'll be working on. This blog will, in addition to following A's challenges, also follow our home improvement saga -- if for nothing else then to have something that indicates progress, for those occasions when I want to dash my head against a wall, in tears over the frustration of living in drywall dust, paint spills, and cooking over a hot plate while we re-do the kitchen...whenever that happens. I don't know anyone who has attempted a renovation (large or small) that hasn't wanted to cry or choke something at some point in the process. I'm sure people exist whose renovations went perfectly, but I don't know any of them.
This home has beautiful potential, and we really do love it. The view across the street of the mountains is stellar, we have just over 1/2 acre of land that I can hopefully garden on soon, with room leftover for kids and dogs to play. The bones of the house are good, although there are a few minor cosmetic issues that we thought were just that: cosmetic. We love the space inside, if not the exact layout, and it keeps the rain out. We have been so blessed living here, the kids love the backyard (as do our dogs). It is located conveniently to pretty much any amenity we could wish for, within 10 minutes. This includes our church, friends' houses, movie theatres, the grocery store, and parks and fishing holes. There are some things that we have noticed, though...
In our last year and a half, we have discovered that: we blow through a nearly 300-gallon tank of heating oil in a month -- keeping the temp at 65 degrees or lower. This was confounding to say the least; we could understand if we were trying to simulate the Sahara, but 65 degrees? Z and I couldn't figure out why it was so cold all the time when we were burning through that much heating oil, and then so darned hot once summertime came and soon discovered the reason.
We never did get that second load of insulation, and we can't fit any of it in at the top of the stairs because of the way the wooden beamwork is over the metal acoustic tile grid -- much of our heat still goes right on up and out the roof. We do have the R-19 stuff over the bedrooms, though, which helps a lot. We have discovered that using electric space heaters, we can effectively heat individual rooms OK. The mommy in me cringes to leave one on in either of my kids' (OK, they're still my babies) rooms overnight, though, and we only have two heaters. We usually put one on each floor of the house, and then I cook or bake during the day, adding heat from the kitchen.
This is why the acquisition of a woodstove is such an enormous blessing! We have calculated, based on neighbors' wood consumptions, that we can heat the house the entire winter for a total cost of $330 in logs, give or take a few (and adding the cost of getting the woodstove and accessories needed like stovepipe, etc). $330 sure beats the heck out of over $3,000, especially with our cash flow these days! I know it's "inconvenient", but I'll deal with the ash and constant reloading; besides which, humans have been doing this for thousands of years so I figure I can handle it. Plus, bonus: if the power goes out, we still have heat and I can cook on top of the thing. We won't have running water, but we'll stay warm and be fed while we stink from a lack of showering. : )
We have also discovered that: all the electricity in the house is "slaved" off other appliances and outlets in the room, sometimes multiple rooms. For example, we can not run the overhead light in the living room if the ceiling fan in the kitchen is on. And my son's closet light can only be turned on IF the overhead room light is in the "on" position and you unscrew its bulb before you screw in the closet light to turn it on. The reverse is also true. Also, if you run the microwave in the kitchen off of two particular outlets and the television is on in the living room, you'll blow the fuse. Our electric wiring and box have inspection stickers slapped all over it but no inspector number or name...someone did a "Harry Homejob" (as Z and I are starting to call these things) and got a roll of stickers somehow. As the inspector said, though, "It's not unsafe...just not practical". So, we don't have to deal with potentially lethal consequences, just fuse-blowing irritation. So at some point, you will be regaled with rewiring stories. Yes, "stories", because undoubtedly there will be more than one.
Moving on to the ceilings: the acoustic tile ceilings in a metal grid are purely a cosmetic dislike. Do they stop the room at the top of the walls? Yes. Do they look like the playing field for some sort of space-aged game, or hopelessly outdated relics of the 1960's? Yes to both. So at some point, likely after we get the wiring done, we'll tackle putting up real, live drywall on the ceilings. Of the non-popcorn variety.
We'd also really like to raise the ceiling height upstairs, because my 6'+ (some days he's an inch taller than others, depends on his back) can walk through the doorways with a mere inch or two to spare. All of the upstairs ceilings are between 6' and 6'5". This doesn't particularly bother me, because I'm only 5'4", but it is a little weird to see your otherwise "normally heighthed" (is that a real word?)husband look like the giant from Gulliver's Travels when he enters a room. And he unconsciously ducks through most of the doorways, even though he clears the frame by an inch or so.
All the walls currently end at the upstairs ceiling (natch), so we'll have to completely redo all the walls while we're raising the ceiling to avoid an odd one and a half foot gap if we do standard 8' ceilings.
And while we're tearing down the walls, we'll have to shore up the flooring. We have that lovely "vintage roll" effect right now -- meaning that you can go uphill both ways crossing my daughter's room. The peak is in the middle of the room, so at least it's symmetrical. Apparently in 1960, they had different standards of how far apart your support beams could be, as compared to today's much closer requirements. And we're finding particle board and other, shall we say, inexpensive materials used throughout the house. We're betting on finding more under the carpet, which we haven't had the heart to rip out yet. Mostly because we can't afford to replace it yet. And we're scared to see what's underneath.
Speaking of carpet, our tenants had rabbits and cats who, for all appearances, seemed to have had some directionally challenged issues with regards to litterbox location. Most especially in my daughter's room. Our dog did not decorate in this manner while we lived here before, and the previous owners had no pets (and they're the ones who installed the carpet), so logically the smell must be from the tenants' critters. That all needs some replacing, too, because both of my dogs all of a sudden feel the urge to...ah, relieve their urge in that room since our return from TX. We'll let you know what we find when we replace it all. That will likely have a posting all its own.
Drywall will need to be replaced throughout the house, as we have some...dents...and other places where the seams are not quite lined up right. We're not sure if our tenants were slam-dancing or what, but there are quite a few spots that need a little attention at some point. They're not outright holes, so this is wayyyy down on the repair list.
Paint is easy, we've already managed to cover over the Play-Doh blue color bequeathed to us by our tenants, although that took us until about 3 weeks ago to accomplish. Of course, the tenants had to deal with my fire-engine red hallway, so tit for tat I suppose. (It's now brown).
Bathroom ~ is functional. We do have 2 sinks that sit on top of white laminate cabinetry. Whoever installed the cabinets didn't measure very well because there is a huge gap between the back wall and the cabinets, and several inches of open space in the corner, and the doors won't hang quite right. Just for aesthetic reasons, we'd like to have something a little more ... together. Also, it looks like someone bought a home kit shower replacement dealie and had some interesting caulk technique. Again, cosmetic. The bathroom, as mentioned above, is fully functional so we really don't have anything to complain about. At least we have one, right?
Kitchen -- well. The cabinets hold the dishes, so their function is fine. I do have three different colors of wood, and two different door styles going on, which I'd like to simplify to one color and one style if possible. I could just reface them, probably, the only exception being the section between the refrigerator and the stove. Despite multiple bleach treatments, we have a mold problem under there that just won't go away. I'd take pictures, but it ain't pretty; you could film a horror flick under there without much additional cost for set construction. And if you could find actors small enough to fit in the cabinet. Heh. The kitchen is pretty much all cosmetic issues so it's also way down on the priority list. I use the top of the (rolling) dishwasher or our table to prep food on so I have my "work triangle" going on. For an interesting story about the dishwasher, go here.
The countertops are faux marble in a dark hunter green, and none of them are actually attached to the cabinets underneath. The floor coordinates nicely with peel-and-stick vinyl tiles, also in dark green "marble" -- but the tiles aren't lined up too well and the finish has worn off over time. Again, purely cosmetic; just not my color preference. Still work just fine, and I actually feel a little rotten mentioning it. The floor doesn't have to shine, even if the Mop'N'Glo bottle says it will.
We have a very unfinished addition that someone put on one side of the house, with a concrete subfloor. It works as a kind of "mudroom", a place to unlock the door without getting drowned when it rains, and where we currently are storing cardboard boxes, the recycling bins, and firewood. The walls need finishing because you can see outside between the boards, and the roof is too flat and needs a higher pitch (per the house inspector). The roof does leak, and raising the angle is supposed to fix this issue. We'd love to turn it into a screen porch or even a dining room in the distant future, because we don't have either right now.
Our garage...has a very nice concrete floor, holds two vehicles, and has a work area to one side. The fake brick asbestos siding is coming off, and we're not entirely sure what to do with that. I know asbestos is bad stuff, but not much beyond that, so we have some research to do.
Most recently (and of course having both the highest cost and necessity) is our septic system. We don't have one. What was listed on the deed of the house as a septic system is, in fact, a big concrete pit three feet from our house with a slit in one side. And the rock and clay in the ground just won't hold any more...stuff...after 50 years.
To put in a new (real) system, we have to move it out at least 10 feet from the house. Which puts it too close to our well, which we'll have to subsequently move. We can't put the septic or the well in the side yard, because that will be too close to our neighbors' well. After several visits from the county health department, our ONLY option is to take off the front part of the driveway and install a system in a 10 x 15 spot, using a new biometric system -- and provided they can blast a hole big enough through the rocky ridge we sit on. This ridge goes up into New York and down into the Carolinas. This will be potentially cheaper because it means we don't have to move our existing well, but will also be more expensive than a regular septic system, which could normally be installed for around $5K in these here parts. There's always the possibility that we'll have to move the well anyway, and that's where it gets expensive -- $30K for the whole job is a conservative estimate given by the inspector.
We're not entirely sure how we're going to do this; we're already not taking A to outside OT and speech appointments because we can't afford to, even with insurance. We are barely keeping our heads above water as it is, so this is most unwelcome news. Blessedly, the county is giving us some time to correct the problem and isn't making us get it done NEXT WEEK. We're hoping maybe by spring time to a)win the lottery we don't play, b) have a miracle happen and it fix itself somehow, or c)be able to get a loan to cover it, which is unlikely at this point.
Anyone looking to off-load a year's salary? Just checking.
Compounding all of these issues is my husband's back issues. Z has the back of a 70-yr old man even though he just turned 29. If his time in the Army had not come to the end of his enlistment, he would have had a medical discharge. He can't handle a lot of the DIY stuff we'd intended to do, and neither can I due to a bum hip from a car accident a few years ago.
So, this will be an interesting saga indeed! I am interested to see how things develop, chiefly because it's my house, but also from a detached scientific point of view. This is our Mad Scientist experiment. Let the fun begin! And I promise to share most, if not all, of the gory details.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Ketchup
OK....the long promised catch-up posting is about to commence!
There are so many things that have happened to us since July, it will probably take a few subsequent postings to really flesh things out.
In a (really big, colossal) nutshell:
We moved back from TX to MD, made the trip in TWO DAYS -- in two vehicles (one of which was a small moving van), with two kids and two dogs. Perhaps it was for the best that I didn't have a computer in August; it took me until September to be able to hold a rational line of thinking again! ; )
Z went back to TX; I unpacked the house and got A enrolled in school, got busy with our local church. Our church family helped us unload the truck in a half hour! Plus, some delightful ladies helped us scrub the house out to get the cigarette smoke glaze off our walls, and get some of the unusual odor out. Those lovely acoustic ceiling tiles absorb all sorts of things, not just water from leaky roofs -- but some sprays with hospital grade Odoban did help. **now that we've been heating the house for fall, some smells are coming out again, so we'll have to find a new tactic to deal with it. The church also got our pantry started, the last item of which I used last week! (I love me some Italian cooking, but I can't do 15 boxes of spaghetti all at once -- my thighs need me to space it out some!)
I have been having some weird nerve and muscle issues flaring up in the last year or so, and have been undergoing lots of fun tests while the doctor tries to figure out what in tarnation is going on. Most confusing is the come-and-go nature of the symptoms, a few of which range from extreme fatigue, severe headaches on the left side, electric shocks and numbness, to shaky "Jell-o" muscles that don't want to work. Some days everything's normal, others it's not. They did do an MRI of my ol' noggin back a month and a half ago, proof that I actually do have a brain for those that might wonder, but it was inconclusive other than there is brain matter in the right place. Which is good! That means I likely don't have MS, and I don't have a brain tumor -- which were the two main options that they were looking for.
Z threw what he could into his car and drove up by himself at the beginning of September when the fatigue was at its height. Everything else got chucked into a storage unit in TX. Which we will get some of....at some point. Because Z left so quickly, items that we had intended to sell or give away (shelves, computer desk, etc) wound up being chucked into the storage unit along with my antique theatre seats, our trunk full of games, and the mirror to my dresser. So that will have to be sorted through, whenever we get a chance to get back down there...hopefully in the next couple of years at the rate life keeps happening. I lament, but I realize that it is just "stuff" -- nothing that is essential for life to go on. If we never get it, again, it's just -- STUFF. I might shed a tear over my new winter boots I got for Christmas last year, though -- warmest things my sensitive, formerly frost-bitten toes ever snuggled in.
On the Toilet Bowl drama: K (finally) decided that she's going to be a big girl and just started using the toilet voluntarily one day a little over a couple of weeks ago. I rarely have to prompt her, and she's only had three accidents in as many weeks (two of which were overnight).
And there was great rejoicing in the land.
What makes this the biggest "D'Oh!" moment is why she decided it was time. Z and I have been making all sorts of statements for the last few months to the tune of "you're a big girl now, it's time to start using the toilet like a big girl...diapers are for babies, you're three!" Money is, like it is for most of you right now, a tight commodity for us and we simply can't afford to keep purchasing plastic/vinyl pants to cover her cotton undies as they wear out, nor are disposable ones financially feasible. A couple of weeks ago, we told her again, "you have to start peeing and pooping in the toilet like a big girl." She looked at me for a moment, cocked her head to the side, and said, "OK, mommy!"
And that was it -- she's done it ever since. And stayed dry and clean through 99% of the time. Thrilling, but frustrating all at the same time. Why hadn't that ever worked before? I guess she just had to be ready on her own time to really do it.
*sigh* Stubborn li'l thang. She comes by it honestly, though.
As far as A goes, with prompting he will keep cotton undies dry about 90% of the time now, and that's what he predominantly wears when he's at home. We do still have to put disposables on him when he goes to school or out in public for the protection qualities...A has enough challenges that peeing through his pants in front of the class would really not help things. We're still working on the #2 aspect, so to speak. A has really crappy muscle control (pun intended) and tends to "streak" constantly. Makes for a lot of laundry, but we're getting there....average age for children with autism to be potty-trained is 5 1/2, and A just turned 6 last week, so we're at least close to being on target.
A is having some difficulties in kindergarten this year. Z and I aren't really sure what is going on, because he usually loves school, but he has been severely disruptive and keeps getting yanked out of the classroom. He is smart enough to do the academic work, he is just refusing to do so or take the tests. Frustrating for his teacher, who knows he can do it but is having to fail him for not completing the tests required by the county for assessment purposes, and frustrating for Z and I who don't know how to "light a far" (spelling intended) under the boy's britches. His teacher has made wonderful concessions to the curriculum to match A's IEP (individualized education plan), and I am having some mommy guilt over my son's behavior because Miss M really is going above and beyond the call of duty for our kid.
A is very smart; he taught himself to read (he refused to let me read to him starting about age 2). A can read at least one grade level up if not two. He does love Dr. Seuss, but is also reading Spongebob Squarepants books that are rated for at least 7 years and up. I really don't care what he's reading as long as he enjoys it and is doing so (and as long as the content is appropriate -- no underwear catalogs of course!). Our hope is that he will be able to use the computer to communicate, since he can also spell random words and routinely does so with the refrigerator magnets. (Not just "cat", but things like "dreamworks" and "guitar").
So imagine our frustration when the teacher tells us that he won't read for the test, won't indicate letter sounds or anything else -- until later, when he'll rattle them all off and smile at his teacher. After the testing period is over.
A is having behavioral issues, as I briefly alluded to above. Lots of screaming, tantrums, throwing things, and waving his fist in the air...also a lot of noisy chatter and refusal to quiet down during work time. Z and I are trying to figure out exactly what our options are, because this isn't working right now.
Oh; and our septic system finally died. As in, spilled into our yard, died. More on this later, when we figure out how in the world we're going to get it fixed -- let's just say that what was on the deed to the house ain't what we got in the back yard. And the county health inspectors feel sorry for us. If anyone has an extra, oh, $30K lying around not doing anything useful, feel free to send it my way. We'd appreciate it; I'll even let you use the toilet first after the new system is installed! ; )
On the upside -- (yes, here's the Little Susie Sunshine portion of the post) -- we are tremendously blessed. Blessed to be back "home", blessed to have good friends and good family. And each other. Blessed to look out the front window at the mountains, enjoying the leaves as they changed in all their fall finery. Blessed that we are all fairly healthy, my weirdness aside. Blessed that my daughter still has her creativity and will wear a ballerina dress, a camouflage baseball cap, striped shoes (courtesy of Michele S) and two different colored socks, three necklaces, and a Hello Kitty wristwatch -- to the bus stop, while carrying a stuffed cat. Now, that is self-confidence! I hope she never loses it. Blessed that we have a brick hearth and a 1-yr old black woodstove in perfect condition at a total cost of $230. Blessed that I have a dear friend who convinces me to buy things like pretty shoes (which are killer, both in appearance and wearability).
Photo posts coming soon....as soon as I figure out how to rig the camera to extract them. The door that covers the batteries split in half a couple of months ago, and I have to press it together with a surprising amount of force on that spot to even turn the camera on -- it's affecting the metal contacts on the batteries; it won't work on the dock and we can't remove the memory. So we're getting our MacGyver on. Hopefully we'll have some results soon.
Speaking of MacGyver, if I don't address it soon, remind me to tell you about how my husband attached our video camera to a broomstick with painters tape (yes, that would be the papery, easily torn blue stuff) and shoved it through the wall of the house into the flue of the chimney. I about had a heart attack.
Another idea rattling around the cranium is adding a cooking section to the blog, or creating a new site for that -- I love to cook, if I'm not making family recipes I make up my own for everything from cookies to pasta sauces, and I do most of it from scratch (less preservatives, tastes better, and it's cheaper). I have a friend that wants me to show her how to make some things, too, which might be fun to chronicle. I frequently check out blogs like The Pioneer Woman and Smitten Kitchen and realize that I am nowhere near their leagues -- but still think it might be fun. My only hang-up is I don't know where some of the family recipes came from, and I have no idea what the legal ramifications of posting something like that are. My own stuff is just that, but as for anything else...I want to give credit where credit is due. Lemme know what you think, and if you have any name ideas for such a venture. You guys are every bit as creative (usually more so) than I am.
Ciao!
There are so many things that have happened to us since July, it will probably take a few subsequent postings to really flesh things out.
In a (really big, colossal) nutshell:
We moved back from TX to MD, made the trip in TWO DAYS -- in two vehicles (one of which was a small moving van), with two kids and two dogs. Perhaps it was for the best that I didn't have a computer in August; it took me until September to be able to hold a rational line of thinking again! ; )
Z went back to TX; I unpacked the house and got A enrolled in school, got busy with our local church. Our church family helped us unload the truck in a half hour! Plus, some delightful ladies helped us scrub the house out to get the cigarette smoke glaze off our walls, and get some of the unusual odor out. Those lovely acoustic ceiling tiles absorb all sorts of things, not just water from leaky roofs -- but some sprays with hospital grade Odoban did help. **now that we've been heating the house for fall, some smells are coming out again, so we'll have to find a new tactic to deal with it. The church also got our pantry started, the last item of which I used last week! (I love me some Italian cooking, but I can't do 15 boxes of spaghetti all at once -- my thighs need me to space it out some!)
I have been having some weird nerve and muscle issues flaring up in the last year or so, and have been undergoing lots of fun tests while the doctor tries to figure out what in tarnation is going on. Most confusing is the come-and-go nature of the symptoms, a few of which range from extreme fatigue, severe headaches on the left side, electric shocks and numbness, to shaky "Jell-o" muscles that don't want to work. Some days everything's normal, others it's not. They did do an MRI of my ol' noggin back a month and a half ago, proof that I actually do have a brain for those that might wonder, but it was inconclusive other than there is brain matter in the right place. Which is good! That means I likely don't have MS, and I don't have a brain tumor -- which were the two main options that they were looking for.
Z threw what he could into his car and drove up by himself at the beginning of September when the fatigue was at its height. Everything else got chucked into a storage unit in TX. Which we will get some of....at some point. Because Z left so quickly, items that we had intended to sell or give away (shelves, computer desk, etc) wound up being chucked into the storage unit along with my antique theatre seats, our trunk full of games, and the mirror to my dresser. So that will have to be sorted through, whenever we get a chance to get back down there...hopefully in the next couple of years at the rate life keeps happening. I lament, but I realize that it is just "stuff" -- nothing that is essential for life to go on. If we never get it, again, it's just -- STUFF. I might shed a tear over my new winter boots I got for Christmas last year, though -- warmest things my sensitive, formerly frost-bitten toes ever snuggled in.
On the Toilet Bowl drama: K (finally) decided that she's going to be a big girl and just started using the toilet voluntarily one day a little over a couple of weeks ago. I rarely have to prompt her, and she's only had three accidents in as many weeks (two of which were overnight).
And there was great rejoicing in the land.
What makes this the biggest "D'Oh!" moment is why she decided it was time. Z and I have been making all sorts of statements for the last few months to the tune of "you're a big girl now, it's time to start using the toilet like a big girl...diapers are for babies, you're three!" Money is, like it is for most of you right now, a tight commodity for us and we simply can't afford to keep purchasing plastic/vinyl pants to cover her cotton undies as they wear out, nor are disposable ones financially feasible. A couple of weeks ago, we told her again, "you have to start peeing and pooping in the toilet like a big girl." She looked at me for a moment, cocked her head to the side, and said, "OK, mommy!"
And that was it -- she's done it ever since. And stayed dry and clean through 99% of the time. Thrilling, but frustrating all at the same time. Why hadn't that ever worked before? I guess she just had to be ready on her own time to really do it.
*sigh* Stubborn li'l thang. She comes by it honestly, though.
As far as A goes, with prompting he will keep cotton undies dry about 90% of the time now, and that's what he predominantly wears when he's at home. We do still have to put disposables on him when he goes to school or out in public for the protection qualities...A has enough challenges that peeing through his pants in front of the class would really not help things. We're still working on the #2 aspect, so to speak. A has really crappy muscle control (pun intended) and tends to "streak" constantly. Makes for a lot of laundry, but we're getting there....average age for children with autism to be potty-trained is 5 1/2, and A just turned 6 last week, so we're at least close to being on target.
A is having some difficulties in kindergarten this year. Z and I aren't really sure what is going on, because he usually loves school, but he has been severely disruptive and keeps getting yanked out of the classroom. He is smart enough to do the academic work, he is just refusing to do so or take the tests. Frustrating for his teacher, who knows he can do it but is having to fail him for not completing the tests required by the county for assessment purposes, and frustrating for Z and I who don't know how to "light a far" (spelling intended) under the boy's britches. His teacher has made wonderful concessions to the curriculum to match A's IEP (individualized education plan), and I am having some mommy guilt over my son's behavior because Miss M really is going above and beyond the call of duty for our kid.
A is very smart; he taught himself to read (he refused to let me read to him starting about age 2). A can read at least one grade level up if not two. He does love Dr. Seuss, but is also reading Spongebob Squarepants books that are rated for at least 7 years and up. I really don't care what he's reading as long as he enjoys it and is doing so (and as long as the content is appropriate -- no underwear catalogs of course!). Our hope is that he will be able to use the computer to communicate, since he can also spell random words and routinely does so with the refrigerator magnets. (Not just "cat", but things like "dreamworks" and "guitar").
So imagine our frustration when the teacher tells us that he won't read for the test, won't indicate letter sounds or anything else -- until later, when he'll rattle them all off and smile at his teacher. After the testing period is over.
A is having behavioral issues, as I briefly alluded to above. Lots of screaming, tantrums, throwing things, and waving his fist in the air...also a lot of noisy chatter and refusal to quiet down during work time. Z and I are trying to figure out exactly what our options are, because this isn't working right now.
Oh; and our septic system finally died. As in, spilled into our yard, died. More on this later, when we figure out how in the world we're going to get it fixed -- let's just say that what was on the deed to the house ain't what we got in the back yard. And the county health inspectors feel sorry for us. If anyone has an extra, oh, $30K lying around not doing anything useful, feel free to send it my way. We'd appreciate it; I'll even let you use the toilet first after the new system is installed! ; )
On the upside -- (yes, here's the Little Susie Sunshine portion of the post) -- we are tremendously blessed. Blessed to be back "home", blessed to have good friends and good family. And each other. Blessed to look out the front window at the mountains, enjoying the leaves as they changed in all their fall finery. Blessed that we are all fairly healthy, my weirdness aside. Blessed that my daughter still has her creativity and will wear a ballerina dress, a camouflage baseball cap, striped shoes (courtesy of Michele S) and two different colored socks, three necklaces, and a Hello Kitty wristwatch -- to the bus stop, while carrying a stuffed cat. Now, that is self-confidence! I hope she never loses it. Blessed that we have a brick hearth and a 1-yr old black woodstove in perfect condition at a total cost of $230. Blessed that I have a dear friend who convinces me to buy things like pretty shoes (which are killer, both in appearance and wearability).
Photo posts coming soon....as soon as I figure out how to rig the camera to extract them. The door that covers the batteries split in half a couple of months ago, and I have to press it together with a surprising amount of force on that spot to even turn the camera on -- it's affecting the metal contacts on the batteries; it won't work on the dock and we can't remove the memory. So we're getting our MacGyver on. Hopefully we'll have some results soon.
Speaking of MacGyver, if I don't address it soon, remind me to tell you about how my husband attached our video camera to a broomstick with painters tape (yes, that would be the papery, easily torn blue stuff) and shoved it through the wall of the house into the flue of the chimney. I about had a heart attack.
Another idea rattling around the cranium is adding a cooking section to the blog, or creating a new site for that -- I love to cook, if I'm not making family recipes I make up my own for everything from cookies to pasta sauces, and I do most of it from scratch (less preservatives, tastes better, and it's cheaper). I have a friend that wants me to show her how to make some things, too, which might be fun to chronicle. I frequently check out blogs like The Pioneer Woman and Smitten Kitchen and realize that I am nowhere near their leagues -- but still think it might be fun. My only hang-up is I don't know where some of the family recipes came from, and I have no idea what the legal ramifications of posting something like that are. My own stuff is just that, but as for anything else...I want to give credit where credit is due. Lemme know what you think, and if you have any name ideas for such a venture. You guys are every bit as creative (usually more so) than I am.
Ciao!
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