My Friend Clare

I have a friend named Clare, Clare-Hecla to be exact.  And I like to push Clare's buttons, particularly if they're red.  Pushing Clare's red button makes me all warm and fuzzy, literally (well not fuzzy, just warm).

This is Clare. 

This is Clare's red button.

Finding Time

I can hardly believe that it has been over a month since I last posted.  I've been trying to think of some of the things that keep me from posting.  The reason that I wish it was is that I've been so busy getting other important things accomplished that I simply haven't had time to be on the computer.  Unfortunately, that isn't exactly the case.  Part of it is having to share the computer with four other people in the house.  The other part is the challenge of time management with young children - and older ones.  Much of the time that I do get to spend on the computer is with a baby in one arm, I really dislike one-handed typing.

So what does all this mean?  I need to make time for what's most important.  It's like the story about the rocks and the jar.  The short form is that you take a big jar and fill it with large rocks.  It appears full.  However, if you then take smaller rocks you will find that you can fit them in the spaces.  Now it's full . . . except that if you take sand and pour it in you will find that you can fit quite a bit of sand in the jar.  Is it now full?  Not quite.  Now you can take some water and slowly pour it in and it will fill the spaces between the grains of sand.

Now if you did it the other way, put that amount of water in, followed by the same amount of sand, then small rocks and finally large rocks, you would find that you would not be able to fit as much in.  And the things that would be left out are the big things.

I find that when I feel like I'm not getting as much accomplished as I would like it's because I'm trying to put the water and sand in first.  I'm doing the extras without focusing on the essentials.  The trick is figuring out exactly what is an essential for you because it's different for everybody.

Now, lest anyone think that I haven't done anything for the past month, here's a short list of some things that I have accomplished.  Hosting a birthday party for my older daughter (complete with hand beading leather pouches), making a gift for a friend, helping my parents get settled in their new home, sending some clothing to the donation bin, repotting several of my plants and, most importantly, helping my children when they need it.  Some things that have been done around the house but I didn't really do myself (but supported the efforts) are the building of 2 bookcases in each bedroom and in the living room (with many thanks to Elder Bevans from our church for his help and expertise), weatherstripping our doors and doing various minor repairs to the house.  Some of these will likely make their way into individual post but for now this will have to be it.

One last thing that's quite exciting.  Our baby got his first tooth today.  Yay!  He thinks it's so cool, he keeps rubbing his tongue over it.

What Were They Thinking?!

So, it's pretty much an established fact that no two people think exactly alike.  In general though, most people try to use common sense; that's why they call it 'common'.  In our new home there have been several times when I've been really confused as to what the previous owners were thinking.  Now some things, I'm sure, were simply a case of not having the means of taking care of things, ie. the screen door that was just leaning against the back deck with one of the panes of glass broken.  With others, it was likely a case of preparing for renovations that were never done, ie. the kitchen cupboard doors that were removed and put in the basement long enough to gather dust.  Some were, hopefully, a lack of knowledge that, thankfully, did not turn disastrous, ie, the wood stove hooked up to the old oil furnace chimney without ensuring that it was up to code (which it wasn't).

Another thing that I found very odd was the number of phone jacks in this house.  There's one in every bedroom, one in the dining room a whole bunch in the basement and what I thought were three in the living room.  What's that you say?  How could you think there were three and that not be the case.  Well, that brings me to another "What were they thinking?!".  When I was preparing the living room for painting I was taking the outlet covers and phone jacks off, pretty standard.  When I took it off I was so surprised that I put it back on so I could take a picture.  I didn't put the snap-on cover back for the picture just the part that  screws on.

And this is what I found behind the phone jack.  Now my big question is, where do those wires go?  It doesn't look like there was a light in the living room that would need a switch.  More importantly, what were they thinking?!

On a different note, we also learned of something else today that made us, once again, wonder what they were thinking.  DH was visiting our neighbour to check out what they're doing with their basement.  (That brings up a whole other topic craziness on the part of the previous owners here - yes, we can see that the subfloor wasn't really done correctly but that's no reason to just make random saw lines and leave it).  Anyway, the contractor doing the basement at our neighbour's said that there used to be a nice row of spruce trees along the back fence of our place, actually a few rows of spruce.  So when Hydro One came to trim them a bit so they didn't get in the way of the power lines, the previous owner had them cut them all down, apparently so she could use them as fire wood . . . in the not completely safe wood stove.  Did I mention that it was spruce?  In an area where hardwoods are plentiful and much preferred for burning. 

With the spruce trees gone this is what we get to see out of our living room window.  What the #### were they thinking?!!!!!!!!

Living Room Painted

When we moved into our house most of the main living areas were painted a light grey-blue. I felt like I was living on a naval vessel with all that grey around. Where it wasn't grey it was white patching - even better! These pictures were taken when we had just moved in before Christmas, hence the Christmas tree.

On Friday we painted the living room. We were fortunate to have two missionaries from our church come to help out. They arrived at our home in time for some lunch and then the painting began. I had washed the walls that morning to get rid of all the cobwebs and dirt. As I mentioned a previous post, we took inspiration from our puppies for the paint colours. I'm so pleased with how it turned out. We still have accents to do but the overall feeling is so much warmer. I wish we hadn't put the dark brown as high as we did. We had stopped at 3'4" but I think 3' might have been better. We'll be putting a border between the two colours though so I think it will all work out. I thought that I had taken some more pictures of the finished product but I guess I didn't. At the point in this picture the bottom needed one more coat of paint. I finished that on Saturday, as well as a few minor touch-ups.

Now I know that I'll be showing just how much of an amateur I am but I decided that I'd use a paint edger that I had in my tool box. I had used it a few years ago and figured I'd give it a try here. I really like it. Maybe my problem is that I don't use good enough quality paintbrushes but I find that the coverage with the brushes is never quite as even as I would like. The coverage with the edger is great.

My Handy Man

I finally uploaded pictures to the computer. I've put the moving pictures with teh "Unloaded" post from January 8. I didn't want to do a whole new post just for the pictures.

The pictures I'll be treating you to today are of my handy man setting up the dog kennel. You may remember me mentioning that our dogs broke their ties while we were out of town getting our belongings. We had been keeping them in our enclosed shed overnight and then tied up during the day since our return.

We had been planning on getting a kennel for them when the spring came so we just moved that purchase forward and bought one earlier. We ended up getting this Petsafe kennel from Petsmart. As the description suggests, it can be set up in a 10' by 10' configuration or a 5' by 15' configuration. I'll say first off that 15' is not as long as I imagined. Our original plan was to go with 5' by 15' so they could run more. When we realized how short 15' is, we decided to go with the 10' x 10' simply because that would give them the most area. In the picture is the base set up for the 5' by 15'.

Here we have our younger son watching his dad hard at work. We made sure that we put the doghouse in the kennel before putting the chain link around.

I like to call this "The Last Spike" even though there weren't really spikes involved and this wasn't exactly the last thing to be done before the kennel was ready for the dogs. It was done just in time. Just after I took this picture one of our dogs came to play with me. . . . trailing the bit of rope that had been tying her up. She had broken it. The kennel was finished enough that she could go in while the rest of the chain link was being secured - thank goodness. Now all I need is a picture of the dogs in their kennel. I'll have to take one tomorrow.

Good Eats

Tonight was date night. It was so nice to get out by ourselves (with the baby). It's so nice that our oldest child is old enough to babysit, she's quite happy to earn the money as well. We went to the Paudash Lake Motel and Restaurant just down the road. It was fantastic, I would highly recommend it. The food was great and the service was even better. They are wonderfully family friendly which is so important when you have four kids. An added bonus is that they do an all day breakfast, perfect for my husband. Wednesday is pancake night so we'll definitely be taking the whole family one of these days.

During the day I was able to get quite a few boxes out of the garage. Since we won't be painting our living room until January 28th, I'm leaving a lot of our decorative things boxed up. It's nice to get some of our other things out of boxes though. I'm also finding that as I'm some taking things out, I realize that I don't really want them in our new home and they go straight to the donation box. It feels so good!

Dan's the Man

Back on my January 5th post I mentioned our friend, Dan (and his sister, Denise). Now I'll give the details (and not because I just sent him a link to this blog). This takes a bit of history though. Before we moved here we lived in a remote community. To get there you need to drive a long way then take a train and then take a boat in the summer, ice-road in the winter or helicopter in between. We were fortunate when we moved there because my husband's employer provided furnished housing for us. What that meant, though, was that when we left, we had very little furniture. we had a couple of desks, chairs, bookcases and a sideboard. So to the rescue comes our friend Dan.

It just happened that Dan's sister was needing to find new homes for some furniture that belonged to their grandmother. Since nobody else in their family was interested, she thought that we might be able to use them. My response was an enthusiastic, "Of course!" We now have a wonderful dining room table with matching chairs and a china cabinet, two dressers and a make-up table and an old singer sewing machine. Dan also brought a tv stand and has a sewing table that he'll be bringing/sending later on. Dan has also given a lot of his time unloading the boxcar and packing the storage unit in October and then loading the moving truck a couple weeks ago. We have been so blessed with his generosity.

And speaking of generosity, we are so grateful for the bunk-beds/mattresses that my sister gave us (and for storing them for the past year till we moved). They fit perfectly in the girls' room. It was such a relief to not have to worry about getting a bunch of beds for everyone. Which reminds me of how grateful we are that my parents lent us their camp cots and air mattresses for when we first arrived.

I also cannot forget our friend's Steve and Heather. When we bought this house the bathroom sink was in a closet. The owners had taken the old one out but hadn't yet installed the new one. Steve worked his magic and installed it for us which was not as straightforward as we had hoped. And we love the faucet that Heather picked. They have also helped us in many ways while we were settling in and have given us many things to help us get our home set up - yay for them remodeling their kitchen and getting rid of cupboards.

It feels so good to be living here. We have been richly blessed, not just with the material possessions that make life easier, but with good friendship. Our neighbours are friendly and the people at church were ecstatic to see us. Life is good.