Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Light at the End of the Tunnel

The stress of building a house is incredible and as we are coming down to the wire, we are feeling the full brunt of it. Somehow, you have to put it all in perspective and know that someday, somehow, our lives will be back to normal again. It helps to have a 18 month old, whose life is so simple and innocent. When things are getting us down, he usually does something like a little dance, or gorilla-chest thumping that can bring us back to a happier place. Tonight, he was walking around the backyard and stopping to sniff every blooming flower, including the blooming weeds. It made me think about how life is too short to not stop to smell the flowers. Call it life lessons from a toddler.

Today, we shifted our move day one week and will now be making the big move on July 2. Although we were pushing for next week, we don’t want to move into a construction zone. No doubt there will still be incomplete work, but the extra week gives everyone a bit more time- including giving us more time to pack all those boxes. I’m longing for the day where everything I owned and needed could fit into the back of a Ford Escort (that was my freshman year in college). Now, apparently we have enough stuff that the 2 Men and a Truck that we hired to move us will actually need to be 6 Men and 2 Trucks. How did this happen to us?

Quite a bit of work happening this week……The exterior and interior railings at the balconies were installed yesterday, making our house instantly a whole lot safer. I was always in constant fear of having a kid fall off one of the openings. We used a cable rail system for its simplicity and minimal esthetic.

The exterior painting is adding a bit of color……

Kevin has become a regular at IKEA with about 5 trips so far. He has put together a number of shelves and closet systems and has a number of war stories....

4 comments:

sjaw said...

Stay strong- you're almost there!

Shawn

Corey said...

Looks like everything is really coming together!

Anonymous said...

It looks great!!!
Very impressive!

Our move is in August, no construction, just too much stuff!!

I checked out our walkability for the new place- a 46, most everything is just over a half mile away - so more bikeable than walkable!

Kevin & Roxanne said...

Thanks for the encouragement all! We are almost there and in the end, everything will be fine. Yesterday was just one of those days where most things were going wrong- someone made a nice sawcut into the new hardwood nosing at the kitchen step, the mirror I mail ordered arrived all dented , the blue being painted on the back of the house was the wrong blue and I could go on! Keeping perspective is important as our family is healthy and happy and all those little issues at the house can be fixed.
Roxanne