burned out

Wait, that already happened. Look at me.....cracking jokes about the fire, at my own expense. Expense is certainly an appropriate word to use right now. Anyway, I really am burned out - as in extremely tired of the last four years of house insanity. This project was not my idea and I'm ready for it to be over.

So that was the tired me talking. I love our house and it is going to be amazing. And it will all be finished soon. How soon I couldn't tell you, but I can definitely say that it will be relatively soon.

There has been a flurry of activity during the past couple of weeks. We work really slowly and carefully because we are not professional housebuilders and we want to do it right in spite of that fact. When we have people coming in to do some of the stuff we are usually either one step ahead of them or two steps behind where we ought to be. That is both stressful and embarrassing, yet fairly typical. It is almost a relief when somebody says they are not going to show up because it gives us extra time to get caught up.

So after the radiant floor heat mats were installed, Cyndy got right on installing the floating wood floors. It's a pretty simple operation because the pieces just snap together. The ends get trimmed with a miter saw. No real skills required. Here you can find a picture of her handiwork.

Doug finally realized that Cyndy was not making it up when she mentioned two weeks, I mean two months, oops I mean two years ago that the subfloor in the piano room was creaky, bouncy, and felt kind of weak. Doug pretty much blew this off until two days after the floor heat people arrived from Georgia, at which time he decided that the subfloor needed to be removed and replaced. Now typically this is the kind of thing you would do before the wallboard is installed instead of waiting until three weeks afterwards. I guess I'll just leave it at that. It was a difficult project, was very messy, and took a week for him to complete.

Cyndy was not able to continue with her flooring project due to certain complications not of her choosing, but is looking forward to resuming this as soon as possible. Painting, an activity that she very much enjoys, is also on the immediate horizon. Why is she referring to herself in the third person all of a sudden? She does not know. Maybe she is having an out-of-body experience, possibly a sympathetic reaction to the out-of-house experience with which she is all too familiar.

The tile people came. They did a fantastic job. The bathrooms are beautiful. So are the floors in the laundry room and the hall. Sorry I (Cyndy here, I'm back) don't have any photos. I'm way too tired to post any pictures right now.

The kitchen countertops are stunning. Doug will no longer be allowed in the kitchen after we move back in. I've got to protect those magnificent countertops that he picked out. Can you believe it? Actually he ended up picking out all of the countertops in the entire house - in the kitchen and both bathrooms. What is up with that? I approved of his choices, except for the expense.

The electrician is supposedly starting his final batch of work tomorrow - putting in all of the outlets and light fixtures that we've had sitting around for the past year. That will probably take at least a week the way things seem to go around here.

I started back to school yesterday. I already feel a million times more energetic because the time spent in school is time I am not working on the house, abusing my hands and my back. What a relief!

The work we are doing right now is so much more visually rewarding than most of what has happened previously. I'll try to get some new pictures up soon.