Nov 8, 2011 | This Life
Foamy lattes always make the list
Counting My Blessings
We are a week into living in chaos and it’s frighteningly easy to become overwhelmed by this situation. I’ve cried more in the past week than I did in the previous 3 months of hotel life.
But it is November, and November reminds us (albeit often conjoined with a little gluttony) to stop and count our blessings. To be thankful. To cherish the moments in front of us and express gratitude for the moments passed. Oh, and to post those blessings on Facebook. Hello, a month of status updates. Done.
Too cynical? Maybe just a little?
Sure, there’s a line. And it’s easily crossed into “my life is so awesome, I just have to brag about it.”  Judging by my facebook stream it’s a line most of us don’t even know exists!  But it’s just as easy to cross over into that cynical space of thinking nobody can be that perfect, hopeful, lovely, etc. . . and chalk up their efforts to express their gratitude to narcissism.
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Nov 3, 2011 | This Life
Love from Paris: Gorgeous gifts from the amazing Elizabeth Germo of En Route.
To say Sunday morning was bad, well, would be short selling it. As I sat waiting for IZ to come back with breakfast, the reality that our 3 month stay in a clean hotel was coming to an end, and that I, mother of a teenager, was moving my child and assorted pets back into this distasterpiece sunk in. I felt like the worst mother in the world. I mean, who lets their kid live in this filth and destruction?
“Baby, it’s going to be OK. Here, eat a chocolate croissant,” as he hands me a pastry and an almond latte. But there are some things that pastry can’t solve. Â With the realization that all my hopes and plans to have our space somewhat sorted, or at least my child’s room cleared of construction debris, were just pie in the sky dreaming—the universe clearly didn’t get the memo— came a flood of tears. IZ kept saying, “Sweetie, think of it as camping in your own house.”
Um.
No.
It’s not camping. It’s a freakin’ obstacle course. If I get a chance to video the horror, I will. But in the meantime, trust me, you don’t want to live here right now.
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Oct 31, 2011 | This Life
The Brawny Guy says, “Have an Extra Strong Halloween.”
This is his last year trick-or-treating. He’s only going because one of his best buddies is a bit younger and wants to uphold their long standing tradition. But, you know it’s time to stop* when you’re bumming your dad’s footwear for your costume. Happy Halloween, everyone. Stay Safe. See you soon.
*or when your mother says, “let’s take some photos” and you just give her that teenager angst look. Yeah, time for YOU to stay home and hand out candy. Good thing you’re living out of a hotel right now, buster!
Oct 31, 2011 | This Life
Photo via Susie Harris. You can win this sign!
This is it. . .
Well, folks, this is it. Halloween. And the day before we “occupy our house”. (IZ has been  joking with me all weekend about that. He’s using our real address, which makes the joke funny… er?)
Our house, sigh. It’s a freakin’ war zone. And it’s no place to be living. As in no kitchen, no bathrooms*, no laundry, no nothing. We emptied out a kitchen, laundry/pantry, and two bathrooms into the remaining spaces of the house with the promise that SOMEONE else would put it all back, clean my house from top to bottom, before we moved back in.
Um.
So.
Today I will be multitasking. Doing last minute laundry, carving a space for my kid to sleep, making sure everyone including the dog gets a good bath, and staging tomorrow’s exit, while trying for some semblance of normalcy on a day that isn’t normal. It’s Halloween, after all. And while we didn’t carve pumpkins or decorate the house (Although, talk about a nightmare! Here trick-or-treaters, you get candy. You parents can walk through our disasterpiece and be haunted by the shades of home renovation.) I’m determined that we celebrate in our own small ways.
I don’t know when I’ll be back online for the next few days. You’d think vacating a hotel room would be easy, but . . . I have fears, people, real fears that have been invading my dreams. We brought all this stuff over in a course of 3 months and now I have to get it out of here in one day. (with no place to put any of it at our home.) With a kid and a dog and a cat. So, if you touch bases in the next week and discover I’ve not updated the blog, please pray for my little family??
Every little thing is gonna be alright. Just not yet.
* there is a tiny powder room in my studio on the lower floor. That means a two flight hike in the middle of the night. I’m thinking no more water after 9 pm for the next few days. Heh.
Oct 27, 2011 | This Life
Photo Caption: This post is going naked. You can imagine whatever image you’d like and insert it in this spot, m’kay?
What I’ve Learned:
Despite my facebook declarations to save my melt-down for New Year’s Day, I met my end yesterday. Stood in the hallway in front of the kitchen door and just wept.
What’s worse, (yes worse than missing deadlines by months) I melted-down in front of the very nice guy who is plastering our walls. Two days after I stood in the very same spot and told this same plaster artist, “I don’t know how I feel about the plaster. I can’t think about that right now, because IZ is in the ER and they think he’s had a heart-attack.”
Yeah, it’s been that kind of a week.
Let me put you out of my misery. IZ is fine. Well, he’s not, but he’s not having a heart-attack or a stroke or anything dire. He’s just under the immense pressure of trying to finish our house and work full time and parent and hold the hand of his wife who cannot keep her “stuff” together.
For that, I’m terribly sorry.
I kept my “stuff” together in the ER. There’s that. I kept looking at this man I love, this PARTNER (because we don’t define our relationship in terms of husband and wife. We’re best friends, lovers, PARTNERS.) and I kept thinking “I don’t do so well with this role reversal stuff.” I’m usually on the gurney, he’s usually holding MY hand. And well, he’s really amazing at that. How does he keep so calm? How does he crack jokes and not look worried and not sit down in a puddle of his own snot and tears and lose it?
He will tell you he’s Danish and it’s in their natures to be stoic and solid and perfectly calm.
I will tell you he’s a rockstar.
A rockstar who is stressed out.
So, yesterday comes along (see this page, last post for details) and I faced my end. You know, the proverbial straw that breaks the camel’s back? That straw came in the form of an email break-up note and turned on the tear spigot.
I cried. I stood in the hallway and IZ, the rockstar that his is, both held me and cracked jokes to the poor plaster guy watching me come undone, about how his wife didn’t weep a tear in the ER, but is crying over the tiler. He’s keeping it all together, because he is IZ.
Because the love of my life is Danish. And he’s eating his stress. And he’s holding my hand. And he’s making everything OK for everyone.
And I love him for all that and so much more.
Oct 14, 2011 | In Photos
IZ’s beer of choice. . . which always makes me smile.
Oct 11, 2011 | This Life
The weather has turned and I’m feeling that need to bundle up just a bit. Not ready for heavy wool jackets really, but an extra layer wouldn’t hurt. So, I ran up to the house today to grab a stack of cozy sweaters. I forgot exactly what was in my sweater stash, (Tall piles of pale neutrals) and what it smelled like (balsam sachets keep the moths at bay) Â Does that happen to you? You know, put things away for a season, only to rediscover them later? Â It will be like this again next year when I pull out the summer clothes. Until then, I’m breathing deeply; inhale balsam, exhale bliss. (Take a big sip of latte)
Has summer left your world yet? Have you put away your summer frocks in exchange for cozy sweaters?
Oct 10, 2011 | A House A Home
Main Floor:
Second Floor:
Margaret asked for a paint palette, so of course, I spent way too much time this morning creating our own custom paint chips. Â (love you, Marge!) For the record, this is what’s on the agenda RIGHT NOW. I reserve the right to completely wig out and change this thing up. Though, I’ve promised IZ that I’ll stick with whatever decision is made once the paint is bought in gallons and applied to the wall. (I’m never going to live down making him paint our kitchen 5 times to find the right color.) Â I’ll list names and sources when I’m absolutely sure this is direction we’re headed. 😀 Â But this should give you a feeling for the tone we’re attempting to achieve.
Diga adiós amarillo, azul hola! Ya!!
Oct 9, 2011 | A House A Home
Ann Taintor never fails to elicit the truth. . . or a smile. Her work here.
Go!:
It’s not that we lack news to relate. It’s that I’m struggling how to put into words what needs to be said without putting it in print on the internet. It’s taken me 2 weeks to stop being dumfounded!
Let’s just say, for now anyhow*, that IZ is our new General contractor. He’s doing a bang up job of it, despite the fact that the budget is now 14K lighter than it should have been! He’s lined up amazing people to put our home back together again and the tradespeople we’ve been working with have been so compassionate about our circumstances.
There will be sacrifices. Like the real potential that not everything will be done on our hotel vacate date (10/25). And some of our finishes are, well, maybe not quite what we had imagined going into the process. I’m sure we’ll continue to tally up the damage done to our jobs and businesses by being out of our home for nearly 3 months.
But, y’all have seen the before photos?! It could be cheap vinyl on the floor and be better than what was in the space before! And the upside is that our electrical will no longer be a fire hazard. (say goodbye Knob and Tube) Our plumbing will be legal and, at least theoretically because plumbing has a way of misbehaving, flowing properly. We’ll have a REAL tub in the master bath.
A REAL TUB. And not any tub. . . a gorgeous claw foot thing that is heavier than heck and has to come up a flight of stairs. I’m already wondering what I can do to soften the blow for our construction crew that will have to haul that thing up to the top floor. Cupcakes? Latte runs? Vodka? Ok, maybe not the vodka!
So, this is it. The plumber arrives tomorrow morning. The electrician is scheduled for Wednesday. All our finishes are chosen and most are ordered. And now we make a mad dash in the last two weeks to finish a project that started July 1 and promptly stalled for two months. I really shouldn’t be surprised by this, since procrastination is a state of mind this family inhabits. But just the same, I’m bracing myself for all the work to be done in the next two weeks.
Oh, and did I mention I’m changing the color palette of 90% of the house. Uh. . . hang on, it’s about to get BUSY up in here.
* for those of you who have heard part of the story, I’d really appreciate it if we kept the details out of the comments. I’m happy to share our experience off-line, but it’s probably best to keep it there. Thank you! 😀
Sep 27, 2011 | This Life
The photo isn’t blurry; you’ve been drinking. (Sazerac with real Absinthe from the amazing Astoria Coffee House and Bistro.)
