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December 21, 2004
Deck the Halls
Boughs of holly. Check. Be jolly. Check, check. Gay apparel… anything not covered in paint will have to do. Yuletide carols, 9 hours worth. Check. Oh, Christmas tree… uh, wait… that would require finishing the family room to put it in…. Check? Not quite. We've been busy the past few days, too busy for me to post anything sooner. Bah humbug, you say? Blame the season – we pushed hard this week to get the kitchen, family room and dining room ready so we could spend our first Christmas in this house sitting on our sofas in front of a tree… and not be in the garage. No tree as yet, and the sofas are still hosting mice, but tonight we're feeling like we've made it. Here's what we've accomplished so far…. |
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twelve coats of paint… eleven pairs of knobs… ten trips to Kamloops… nine ruined sweatshirts… |
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eight hours of trimming… seven fluorescent light fixtures… six months deferred payments… five, gorgeous wall colours… |
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four tubes of caulking… three new doors… two replacement windows … …and a great room ready for a tree. |
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Not bad for six weeks of renovating. This weekend felt like the most progress though, with the kitchen finished and unpacked last Wednesday, trim and baseboards selected on Thursday night and painted on Friday, the two old windows removed and new ones installed along with the front door on Saturday – thanks to Jonathan (in the red hat) and his brother Bill, and then sills, trim, and baseboards cut, shimmed, sealed, nailed and caulked yesterday and today. Last thing tonight we cleaned and primed the old plywood floor, because we're going to wait a while for tile and hardwood and live with the existing laminate and painted plywood for now. Hopefully the colour we chose for the floor will look okay and hold up under heavy traffic for a year or two. And dry fast – we need to put the last coat on by bedtime Wednesday, so we can bring our furniture in on Thursday night and go find a tree. |
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There are still a few things to finish besides the "cardamom" paint on the floor. This shot of our new, custom front door doesn't do it justice: you can't see that it arrived deeply scratched, with brass instead of zinc fittings, and since it was a custom special order (because they don't stock 34 1/2" width doors), they are avoiding replacing the door and want to make us remove and replace the glass part ourselves. And fix the scratches with "special primer". But as you know, Richard is very good at dealing with this kind of thing. So I'm not worried, and in the meantime it's wonderful to have all that light through the door and be able to see my visitors. |
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We've had two visitors this week, Maria who dropped in Wednesday and today, and Rob, who arrived last night. He got suckered into helping finish the moldings before dinner and clean up afterward before spending the night on a spare mattress on the floor. Sorry folks, no guest room yet. We're being warned, though, that visitors will descend on us next Christmas! Our neighbours, who welcomed us to their brush-clearing bonfire out back on Saturday night, also have visitors: Smoky the llama and her 6 month-old son. Smoky is penned up in the newly fenced off area behind our property with the good-natured, knock-kneed Supper. Smoky will return to her owner up the mountain once she's carrying a new bloodline, but so far they've just been cropping the brush and the lower leaves of the pines and firs. Also in the photo, the white blob is one of the goats, who roam around and get through just about any fence they please this time of year. Remind me to tell that story over the holidays… |
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It's late and I'm working another full day tomorrow, so I've left out much of the descriptions. If you comment with a question, I'll post a comment in reply and fill it out that way. Just not enough hours in the day, and nine photos hardly does it justice (I took 39). But we're feeling good and on schedule to make our first, quiet Christmas here comfortable and memorable. One more post before Christmas Eve, I think. Happy holidays, everyone! |
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Posted by anita at December 21, 2004 12:30 AM
Comments
Love your carols, hehe! and your place looks transformed from ugly duckling to swan. Good for you getting all that done. Now if you can get that snow....
Posted by: Marja-Leena | 02:02 21 December 2004
It DID snow! Just a dusting overnight, but we might get a little more tomorrow. Back to unusually mild weather again for Christmas Eve, though. It may even rain on Christmas Day, which would be terribly unfair, I think. Not in Vancouver any more! So I'm keeping my fingers crossed...
Posted by: anita | 09:04 21 December 2004
I came across this wish on someone else's blog, and thinking it sounds right for you, have borrowed & modified it:
At this Solstice, I wish you and Richard a full renewal of spirit as you reconstruct things around you. And I continue to imagine that someday your writing is channeled into a book of fiction. It's what I see when I read a post like this one, pieces of a future fiction.
Merry Christmas!
Posted by: Marja-Leena | 13:26 24 December 2004