Peace can become a lens through which you see the world. —W. Dyer
There is another story about this looking glass and jasmine-oiled feather; given to my daughter in the grocery store…it has brought me some wonder this week, but I think I like my cousin Emily’s take best: “a sweet smelling feather and a looking glass. For a journey through life that is full of sweetness and insight…
The story can be found in its entirety by clicking here!
Show me the inside! Begs Aunt. Here you go Aunt! (But just so you know, the addition that I took pictures of a few days ago is now inside!)
Yes, we are up to the task of painting. For the past few days, we have fallen into a new routine: my Dad drops me off at the new house on his way to work (7:30am) and I paint until about 11:00, when Ryan arrives with the girls. The he and Dan take over the construction projects. So with some of this paint and more of this line, we now have the bathroom, living room, and entire upstairs painted. Hopefully I can convince my Dad to come over and do the touch-ups.
This shows that wall coming from the living room to the upstairs. The living room is entirely the peachy color, and this upstairs section is light purple. I’ll have to look up the catchy names… The bedroom is a darker purple with one green wall. You’ll like it, trust me.
Whew! Now for the bathroom. It is not yet complete, but here is the first sneak peak, of an unfinished tub surround and the blue ceiling. I am trying to convince Ry that I should paint some constellations on the ceiling, but I have a feeling that’s the least of his concerns…
So that is where we are on this Friday. Sometimes it seems like we could move in shortly and at other moments, moving day seems miles away…
And this is what we returned to find:
This pile is growing, which means moving in day is approaching.
Overall, we want this house to keep its small footprint. I do not think that excessive floor space is necessary. In keeping with a smaller house there is simply less: less to fix, less to clean, less to heat, less to fill with stuff, less to worry about. If we were starting with a blank slate, we would have started with a completely different layout, but instead, we are starting with what we have. The two biggest improvements that we need to make in order to make living in a small space more comfortable are improving lighting and increasing storage. However, there are a few key ways that we are adding physical space as well. As you will remember this has already included removing an unnecessary chimney and subsequently raising the ceiling to match. In the future, we will need to fix the front porch and hopefully we will end up with a screened version that is slightly larger than the current one (which has fallen away from the house). The biggest change is an addition to the back entry.
The previous entry was already an addition to the original house. It was tiny (just large enough for a washer/dryer space, but the door could not open all the way without hitting the appliances) and poorly built. A roof leak resulted in mold and the room was basically not salvageable. Luckily, the damage was isolated to only this small entryway. The addition will extend a couple feet past the cement patio seen in the above picture and will result in approximately 40 square feet (5 x 8).
I am excited to see the old moldy mess down and the new wood going up. This means that we are quite close to being ready for a dumpster. All the remains now is the kitchen carpet (yes, the kitchen is carpeted).
Just returned last night from a trip to Philly with my Mom and the girls. We left Papa here to work on the new house, but we missed him muchly. It was a wonderful long weekend full of visits with the people we love, eating at our favorite places, and lots of running/crawling/playing in parks. Just what we needed! PS: Many thanks to the special people who helped us enjoy our time.
Wandering about the streets of Philadelphia this afternoon in a blur of thoughts…thinking of the people I most dearly love and lamenting the geographic distance that leaves me perpetually homesick…this quote came to me; on one of Philly’s many many murals. So it seems rather appropriate for today.
