Saturday, September 6, 2014
The window renovation is beginning to wear thin! Attila worked till almost midnight last night, and then was so wound up that he had trouble sleeping. I think he is overworking, but he is determined to wind this job up as quickly as possible, and I cannot argue with his logic.
The kitchen table and chairs were moved to the living room days ago, the kitchen cupboards around the kitchen window were emptied yesterday, and the contents are scattered around the available horizontal spaces in the kitchen and living room. Chaos reigns. Meal preparation must be done around tools and ladders. The verandah is a temporary workshop, and it is not a relaxing place for a contemplative sit. I have no place to setup a project of my own, such as sewing curtains, which is the downside of the small size of the house.
Attila says, “go out and do something you want to do”. Well, what I want to do is spend time with Attila! He will be back to working six days a week very soon, and I will have lots of time to do something I want to do. The intensity of these large renovation jobs precludes spending time together, as Attila prefers to work alone, and does not need or want my presence.
So, although I am enthusiastic about these new windows going in, I am also resenting the intensity and intrusiveness of the project. Hopefully it will be completed today, and we can leave off any further large projects for this renovation vacation.
And, just so you know, it is a BAD idea to go grocery shopping as a way to kill time on a Saturday morning, a BAD idea. It wasn’t my idea, it was Attila’s idea, to help me kill time until he has completed the window project. When will I learn not to follow along with well-meant but misdirected suggestions! I wasn’t in a great mood when I left the house, and by the time I got back with those few non-essential items I was downright cranky, perhaps one might even go so far as to describe my mood as foul. Thank goodness it was lunch time, a hot chicken sandwich can cure just about anything.
To keep myself busy I have enrolled in a short on-line course at the University. This type of course is pure pleasure, as one can work at one’s own pace, and it is setup so that each test can be taken twice, so that you have the opportunity to learn from your mistakes. My goal is to attain 100% on all quizzes the first time round, and not need to take the quiz a second time. So far, I have submitted one wrong answer, and learned something new in the process!
Not every day is a great day, and this was not a great day. But is was a productive day, very productive!
Oh, and just a note about the kitchen colours. I love them. I get the distinct impression that not everyone who loves me, loves these colours. Attila likes them though, and since he and I will be living with them, all is well. The flooring as seen in the photo will be replaced with red pine planks, painted white. That will complete the colour scheme.
Worldly Distractions
Weather
Nope, didn’t get to the weather report, the weather carried on without me, it never missed a beat!
Quote
“If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.”
Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121 AD – 180 AD)
This fellow had obviously never been a slave in a mine! Or a woman in labour! Or… well you get the picture. There is pain that is due to the thing itself, and there is pain that is not due to the thing itself. Maybe there should be different words for the type of pain referred to in the quote, and since it is a translation, as Marcus probably didn’t say or write this in English, there is a possibility that the general word “pain” does not convey what he actually said.
I will say though, this quote hits the nail on the head for the kind of pain I experienced today, my cranky day. Really, it was all down to me, grappling to gather the power to revoke.
I love living in greens and yellows too, so I’m of a similar mind to you. When we painted the interior of our house here at GGFarm I asked for suggestions from friends, thinking maybe they’d have ideas that didn’t occur to me but that I might like. Alas, no. I still like light colours and bright colours, nothing dark or white or even blue. Interestingly, one friend commented that my colour choices weren’t “adventurous.” Really? There is such a thing as adventurous colour choices? In the end I went with what I feel good when I’m in, which makes perfect sense to me.
What is on the window of your kitchen door — the vertical white bars. Is that a curtain, or …?
I agree Kate, it is all about feeling good! I love bright colours, always have, and probably always will. Eventually I will enjoy adding a few other accent colours to the kitchen, which will be a lot of fun.
Ah, the kitchen door! Well, you see, originally there wasn’t a door there. But we wanted to keep the Grandbabies, Mist and visiting dogs out of the basement, it is a bit yucky and not child or pet proof down there. So we needed a door. We had one, from our house in the city, where we lived before we moved to the country, a pre-2004 door that we had been carrying around with us through our moves. It was a bifold door, with spindles, and was a dark brown. So, since we are on the Plan X, “spend no money on renovations” plan (HA HA HA), we painted the old bifold door white and hung it in the kitchen entry. It works well for us, keeps kids and pets where they need to be, lets the air and light flow through, allows chatting through the back door, has a small open footprint, and, and, and… it was free!
I like your kitchen colors! And the white painted pine sounds nice, too. Over the years, I’ve gotten interested in pickled boards or white-washed boards, where the grain still barely shows through a thinner white. Not sure if I’ll end up doing that with our current home, though. I’ll have to think about it as originally I was planning on our upstairs flooring being a darker color.
We’ve had our own renovation nightmare here the last few days, although it was foisted upon us rather than planned. The city had turned off the water a few weeks ago for some repairs in the street. When it was turned back on we had something lodge in the aerator of our bathroom faucet. Well, DH went to twist off the aerator to empty it and the entire pipe inside the faucet fell out! If you look at the pipe it actually almost looks like it exploded, with curls of metal at the broken end of the pipe.
We were without a bathroom faucet for almost a week, this last week. Thank goodness we were able to get a nice faucet and DH was able to replace the faucet within an hour or two, today.
Hope your window replacement adventure is now behind you and kitchen is once again available for meal preparations.
I love it that you aim to spend as little as possible on things! Paul is like that and I am the spendthrift around here (is that word right? doesn’t spendthrift mean you spend money like crazy? but you would like it means you are thrifty with money). Oh well.. if he didn’t have me, he’d be a rich man by now! I asked him the other day if he wanted me to order him a twin sized duvet for his bed as he downsized from a queen size to a twin size last year, and the duvet he is using is for a king size bed! Too big. He said “No more stuff into this house! No more!” So that was that.
I love your green kitchen Maggie. We have dark wood in ours (cherry) because Paul loves wood a lot. We have a lot of wood in our house, too much really, but he is adamant about it so I go along. But I would love a dream kitchen where it was all white and bright with only pops of colors here and there…
lol Bex!
“spendthrift |ˈspen(d)ˌTHrift|
noun
a person who spends money in an extravagant, irresponsible way.”
We are unusual, but not unique in our approach to recycling! Although I enjoy the aesthetic of new, perfect homes, perfectly decorated, and feel it is a nice place to visit, I wouldn’t want to live there. We enjoy our found objects and building materials, particularly when they function for us. If they are not functional, we pass them along.
Eventually we will need all new furniture in our little house in the city, that is, if we ever live here as our principal residence. Our large pine dining set, custom made for me, is already slated for Terra’s dining room. The little house in the city needs storage, only two small closets in the whole house. So that is where we will focus our energies, optimizing storage space. Terra thinks she might try to construct a built in shallow cabinet in the small kitchen dining area, she drew me a plan and it looks fantastic. Not this year though, too many other things on the go.
Wood is beautiful! Our little house is just too small to handle dark or brown colours though, it closes up in these tiny rooms very quickly. It was all wood and brown when we bought it, and it made the place seem very small indeed. Our country house has a lot of wood, which I really like, as the house is so much larger and can carry the darker colours with grace and beauty. It is fun to look at all the ways one might decorate!
I am still having trouble picturing that door. Howzabout a closeup sometime?
Will do Kate, off to look for images of it right now, will add to future post!