Wednesday, July 18, 2007

And the Walls Came Tumblin' Down...

Ugh. If it's not one thing it's another around here.

I simply can not keep up with the deficit of home improvements that we've gotten behind on around here.

I had totally planned to start remodeling my kitchen (as soon as I finish the downstairs bath. If I ever finish the downstairs bath). It's ugly. Real ugly.

But in my massive frantic attempt to try and get my house to look like....well....a nice house....if was trying to scrub our old, faded shower surround back to white (not going to happen) and noticed something. Something bad. The shower surround is not quite bug enough. And the edges of the wall near the shower that get damp every time someone showers...well, they've started rotting away.

What the crap am I supposed to do about that? Well, I know what I'm supposed to do...I'm supposed to fix it. But WHEN am I supposed to do that? I can't even finish the bathroom I am working on! I spend an hour scraping dried grout off the shower floor tiles (I'm sure I've ranted about that somewhere.....but if I haven't let me just say, PLEASE, if you're going to tile anything, start wiping the grout off right away. Do not wait. It's bad.) until I had blisters all over my hands. It's getting there...but it's a very slow, frustrating project.

And I can't rip one bathroom up until I have the other completely functional.

Meanwhile, the wall slowly continues rotting away.

So I'm trying not to completely lose it....trying NOT to think about the boiler that needs replaced, the shingles that have blown off the roof. The gutters that need cleaned (and repaired). The window in the basement that is broken. The floors that are scratched and nicked. The yard that needs mown, the gardens that need weeded, the basement that is leaky, the paint that needs touched up in almost EVERY room, the gas log that won't work, and the fact that every single closet is a disaster that needs cleaned and re-organized.

Today, I'm just going to try and concentrate on removing the coupon that Celia shellacked to the floor with milk last week (so everyone will stop walking in the door and trying to pick it up. Don't you think if I could pick it up, I would?)...scrape some more grout, and try and complete the 40 or so reports that I'm already behind on this week.

2 Comments:

Anonymous said...

Shhhh...everything will be ok.
I would start by making a nice list of everything-in order of importance/urgency and costs. Then just do one thing at a time.
Can you put a plastic window in the broken one for now?
Closets can be cleaned one week at a time BUT wait for winter.
And ok, I understand you want one bathroom to be perfect before you move onto another project. But isn't it functional even with a little grout on the floor tiles? Perhaps you could keep it there and use it as a pumice for your feet?
Someday you will be living in your version of your dream house, looking back on all of this and you'll laugh. Reminded of the blood, sweat, tears and LOVE that went into it all!!

Wendy said...

I thought I had a lot to do. None of it involves home repair. I leave that to the hubby and he leaves it to the paid professional. Trust me our house would fall down, if we ever tried to do anything ourselves.