last day of the year

Wishing everyone a happy, stress-free wind down to the holidays this new year's eve. May your 2010 be happy, healthy and may you not lose any teeth unless, of course, they're baby teeth.

dining room update

Currently battling my own personal dementors. Nothing like a little stress for the holiday season no? What December would be complete without it though, honestly? I don't want to elaborate on the soul sucking dementors just need to figure out my own personal patronus, a sea otter would be lovely.

My dining room ceilings have been denuded of stalactites and painted white. I painted the walls a soft fern (nice muted green) on Monday but soft fern looked more like mint chocolate chip ice cream and soft fern on the walls. So I trudged back to Home Depot, where all my money goes lately, and took waaay too many paint chips to looks at what looked best in the dining room light. This can be very difficult because the frontrunner in daylight can quickly lag to last place by evening light. I'm very on top of this since painting my living room a color that I love by daytime but that I abhor by night. I was thinking of sueding the walls, Ralph Lauren specialty finish, because I thought my 100 year old plaster walls could use the equivalent of, I don't know, mederma? fraxel? but none of the suede swatches looked good by evening. So I settled on a nice light beige/grey/with green tints called cotswold breeches or some godforsaken crazy angophilic name like that. Ralph Lauren and his wasp envy. Let me tell you Ralph Lauren's paint blows. Blows I tell you! How can a paint be simultaneously of skim milk like consistency yet get those skins of clotting paint in it. Lovely colors horrible horrible paint. You been forewarned never buy that crap. The only downside is you can't get them to use the Ralph Lauren color formula on Behr paint. They have to color match it and it never winds up matching completely (it's the photo retoucher in me I see the hint of blue that shouldn't be there that made my soft fern not so soft, nice or muted). So I sucked it up and spent 50% more to buy Ralph's beautifully colored crap ass paint. I still need to do the trim, clean the floors, put the furniture back in there and hang some pictures, oh and finally put up some curtains which I haven't had up since (gasp!) July. I'll do the big reveal in a week or two, to build up anticipation for the big day in blogland.

I've included that picture of me, which has nothing to do with the post aside from showing my exhaustion on repainting said dining room, because it's funny how large my lips look in the photo, Angelina Jolie eat your heart out. I think it's the lighting (which is obviously lacking) and the fact my lips are really chapped from the winter weather so probably a good half of my upper lip is really chapped red skin above the lip. It looks better than normal though, maybe I should consider restalyne or perpetually chapping my upper lip.

christmas eve

What am I doing blogging at this hour on Christmas eve? I'm waiting for Owen to go to sleep so I can bring down the presents from the third floor. Poor little Oona is sleeping in my bed, for the fourth night in a row. She's been sick with a cold that this afternoon kicked her butt, she lay on the sofa and at one point this evening just fell asleep on the living room rug. Now it seems her cold finally devolved into an ear infection. It just sucks to be sick when you're a child at Christmas. Well, here's a picture from earlier today when I filled them up on bagels and chocolate milk at Panera. The last picture, where Oona looks like she's been goosed, is what happened when I asked Oona to sit up and open her eyes. We couldn't stop laughing over that picture and she spent the rest of the day walking around with her eyes like large saucers of surprise.

No longer need to really and truly study for, which I was really and truly doing in a half-hearted, procrastinating, what else can I do with my precious free time type of way. I passed! It's all the Christmas present I need. That and for Hugh Laurie to leave his wife, hit show, and move out to Pittsburgh to be with me, hopefully he's handy around the house too.

Remember when I wrote this in my previous post

my mantra is 'it will get better' because, honestly, how much worse could it get?

Well, that was like tempting fate because worse it got. They stuccoed my ceilings. A very sloppy but light application in the bathroom and kitchen. Heavy duty, messy cave-like stalactites in the dining room. I came home from cleaning a home this past friday and was this close to having a breakdown for Christmas. Instead I sent the kids off to my Mom, she's staying at a hotel due to the renovations here, and cleaned my house until one in the morning. I spent a good part of Saturday hopping around like I had ants in my pants, trying to convince myself it wasn't that bad (it was) and then trying to figure out a way to call and have the situation rectified (but they already had their check, they could just blow me off). I called the head drywall guy and left a message that I wanted to talk to him, that's all I said. He called me back and I explained the situation. He had been out most of the week (back issues, how we all collectively suffer from these back issues) and had an assistant do the work at my home. I had never discussed textured ceilings because I just assumed they'd be smooth but the assistant said the ceilings had to be stippled because there was too much bowing of the drywall due to the age of my home and joists that settled unevenly. I was very concerned when I even heard mention of texture on the ceilings. What? I don't want stuccoed ceilings I said I hate that look. Owen's karate teacher, who recommended these guys, told me they stippled his ceilings and it looked very subtle. I don't know I said, what about doing knock down, no the assistant said, that will just emphasize the bowing. I had a very bad feeling about this, especially since the drywall was already up on the ceiling. I didn't think I had time to see Owen's karate teacher's home but we managed to get there and back real quick and yes, his ceilings looked very subtle, not peak like or stucco at all, so I held my breath and said okay to the texture. And, oh boy, did I ever pay a price for it. But when I was on the phone with the head drywall man and explained the situation, he went above and beyond in terms of professionalism. He said he was very sorry that I wasn't pleased with my work and that they would be out Monday morning to correct the problem, sand down those peaks (yes I will have another late night of cleaning). I cannot tell you what a weight (the full weight of my heavily stuccoed dining room ceiling!) was lifted when he was so receptive to my concerns. No defensiveness, no hesitations, totally professional and quick to want to have a satisfied customer. We'll see how it turns out tomorrow. I'm not going to jinx myself by saying anything like this my mantra is 'it will get better' because, honestly, how much worse could it get? because do I really want to see what could be worse than this ceiling?

motivational forgetting

I learned in my Clep book for Human Growth and Development that sometimes repression is called motivational forgetting, which I just love. It seems happier, more active, self help groups could be dedicated towards it. God knows I'd like to channel some motivational fogetting towards erasing the month of December from my mind. And I had the worst dream last night, that I slapped Owen on the face (I've never slapped anyone ever) and it was so hard it left red marks, like a handprint and I wanted to hide it so I wouldn't get in trouble. It was so real and so awful, I woke up feeling spent. My word. Things are beyond panic producing right now, which might explain the dream, my guilt. I don't know that I've been this stressed before, aside from when I was pregnant with Oona and then I was crazy and stressed. Now I'm just normal (which probably qualifies as mildly crazy) and in full on panic mode. My downstairs is beyond disastrous - drywall is going up but Christmas is next week and my kitchen is essentially gutted and I, um, dropped the cabinet above my sink on the faucet and broke the spigot so even the sink is inoperable. Let's see... my Mom came out because my Grandma appeared to be dying once again but either I'm living Peter and the Wolf or my Grandma is a cat with nine lives because she's perking up? without antibiotics? when her breathing sounded like someone sucking on a bong just yesterday? What else, what else. Oh, I'm to take the CLEP next Tuesday, wish me luck because I haven't really and truly been studying that well admist this perfect storm of events all taking place in the holiday season. I could kick myself for being so dumb about the home renovations. But I don't like to do things half way so I kept picking apart at the kitchen, sort of the way you do at a scab when you're a curious, masochistic child, and now it's an angry pus filled wound. Needless to say, I don't have a tree up yet or presents wrapped. So... if you're into schadenfreude by all means enjoy the pictures below while singing it's the most wonderful time of the year to yourself. I do it, glutton for punishment that I am.

my mantra is 'it will get better' because, honestly, how much worse could it get?

you know how anthropologie and other catalogs will pose models next to decrepit plaster walls and it looks so pretty and arty? not so in real life.

dining room. my neighbor, the firefighter, helped fix a last minute leak on the roof over the box window, allowing the drywaller to finish hanging drywall in the room. i need to buy him something special, i'm thinking alcohol, to thank him.

beyond the plastic wrap is ground zero in the house, our living room.

can i recommend getting a man to help take out a toilet and put it by the curb if you have a nice strong man around? good thing i go to a chiropractor for trigger point therapy.

i plan on replacing the small window with one that will fit within the original, larger, frame. but i need to f*cking take a breath first.

in praise of the hula hoop

I never thought I would come across a form of exercise that is so damn enjoyable until I discovered the hula hoop. I bought one about a month ago and it sat in my closet because it is big, too big to do in my bedroom without the hoop hitting the wall, but one night last week I ventured upstairs to my cold, dark, empty 3rd floor and just rocked out with the hula hoop for a half hour. It's weighted which makes it easier to stay up, they say this contributes to an increase in calorie burning too. There's all these claims about the inches you can drop off your waist using the hula hoop for a half hour a few times a week. But you know what? I don't care. It's all about hooping and laughing, because hula hooping makes me laugh a lot. It's odd because it's rather sensual as far as exercises go and connects me to my body in a new way but it's so fun, I guess it changes my preconceived notions regarding sensuality, that it's something serious, because the hula hoop isn't, well it is seriously good fun. Last night I was feeling very antsy and went upstairs to hoop, just for ten minutes to get the steam out of me, well 45 minutes later my shuffle's battery died and that's when I finally stopped. I got my hoop from hoopgirl (I got the reasonably priced power hoop) but this place firegroove sells them too. I love looking at the websites, they're very playful and very west coast. Fire groove also has a bunch of youtube videos, both girls have some enviable taut bodies, by the comments from some of the men I think they're doing something else instead of envying them. So... if you're interested in a super fun cardiovascular exercise and have the room for a hoop I say go for it.

kitchen redo

I don't mean to toot my own horn but I think I should get special props for baking 4 batches of seven layer bars for the school's cookie walk given the current conditions of my kitchen, no?

Another view of the lovely, semi gutted kitchen. It is cold in there. I need to get insulation to put above the drywall ceiling, when it's installed. The drywall guy is supposed to stop by tomorrow morning to check things out and let me know how much this will cost, fingers crossed for a very reasonable price.

The room before Owen's karate teacher stopped by with his sawzall to take down the dropped ceiling frame. He made quick work of taking down that frame and god knows it probably would have taken me all day.

Before version of the kitchen. I'm really hoping it will look much much better once I'm done with everything. right now it looks pretty awful and I'm getting a wee bit discouraged. But just wait until you see my next post with the gutted ceiling dining room. Yes, the only working room on the first floor is currently the living room, taking the name living to a whole other level. I'm sort of having a prolonged panic attack about getting these other rooms as finished as I can by Christmas but I chose to make this mess so I can't really get too bent out of shape by my handiwork? hubris? hallucinatory delusions brought on by shelter magazines?

I feel like I should apologize for my blog turning into 'days of our scarves' because even i'm getting tired of seeing my neck and mouth, if only my cats would model these for me. The reddish stripy one is missoni mohair fabric that I bought in NYC at least fifteen years ago, I'm telling you I knew I'd knit one of these days just didn't know when. The heather grey one is another moss stitch, which I'm addicted to, I want to make a moss stitch hate but I don't know how to make a hat yet. My Grandmother has a cold and, for once, she's not being put on antibiotics so she is sounding horrible. There doesn't seem to be enough air in her lungs to even expel the congestion. But the care managers and hopsice nurses all remark on what a trooper she is and how she's so strong and it's miraculous the way she rallies and I'm not buying it anymore. She has been on this health roller coaster for over a year now and her mind has diminshed even more. It's a fucking tragedy! She is lacking the higher cognitive functioning to be able to make a decision and let go, how is that something to be praised? I think that people who are still mentally sound can make a decision, to some extent, in their death, in terms of knowing it's time; turning away from food and drink, unnecessary procedures. But where she is now they bring her to be fed, slip ensure drinks in her if she misses a meal and she spends the rest of her day asleep in bed; her color is remarkable, she still has a pink blush to her cheeks even if her skin is so thin it flakes off quite a bit. I never realized just how angry and sad I could feel simultaneously. Years ago I saw a bird suffering and picked it up from the train tracks then brought it to the grass and killed it with a stone (and this story wooed my husband, maybe that shows things were just destined to go south in our relationship, I don't know). I feel like I was more charitable to the bird than my Grandma right now, it's horrible to see her like this and I feel so incredibly helpless. I keep praying that she'll die before this week is over (that prayer wasn't answered) or before my birthday (which is wednesday) at the absolute very latest that she'll die before I start nursing school because then it will become much harder for me to go see her. It does make me feel evil in a way to wish someone I love would die, it's definitely selfish and terribly judgemental but it's also unbearable to see a vestige of my Grandmother linger so.