Guest Post - New House!

I am out of internet connection right now, so mom is graciously writing this for me in 1st person.

We closed on our house today! Tony was so excited last night he could barely sleep. I was so nervous, I thought I could throw up. Today I was telling Mom, "Well, we got married, and that was a grown-up and responsible thing to do. Then we had kids, and that entailed even more responsibility. Then we bought a car, and that was an obligation. But buying a house! You can't get any more committed than that. From now on, if the a/c breaks, there is no calling the maintenance man. The buck stops here, with us. And that makes me kind of nervous! You can't get any more independent than that!"

To which Mom replied, "Well, you could start your own business and then prosper or starve depending on your own efforts." Wow, that could be worse. And the thought was strangely comforting.

So anyway mom and 5 of the kids (my oldest brother still at home works full-time) packed up painting supplies, ladders, buckets of paint, primer, snacks, Mtn. Dew, and water and hauled up to our house.

Veronica, Diantha, Josiah, and I stripped wallpaper in Jeremiah's room completely, and in the living room. Still have to peel the base paper off there.











The bathrooom was deep turquoise. Hannah's room was tan.


Mom cut in around the bathroom and Hannah's room with primer.







Then Diantha rolled the walls with primer.


Meanwhile Tony and Artemas started in on the false, drop-ceiling in the Living Room. The original plan was to paint it. Nope.





Like the deconstruction crew boss said in the movie classic The Money Pit, "Those guys are ANIMALS, I tell ya!" We watched that movie a lot when I was younger, because my parents bought The Money Pit. Twice.




By late evening though, the ceiling panels were all down, the black aluminum supports down and carried out. Tony and Artemas went to the local WM to get Great Stuff to fill in the holes someone made in the ceiling plaster to put in the supports for the drop ceiling. The plan is that tomorrow Tony will spackle over them and then we will give the ceiling (which someone at sometimes painted dark gray) two coats of good ceiling paint. Lovely.

Meanwhile, while the primer dried in the bathroom and Hannah's room, mom mixed a lovely shade of lavender to paint it with. Then while Diantha started on the primer in Jeremiah's room, mom went for a gallon of white paint and some pizza.

Between Diantha, mom, and I (with some marginal help from an occasional munchkin wanting to try to paint), we managed to get Hannah's room walls finished completely, and her ceiling cut in around with a pale blue. I am going to sponge clouds on her ceiling and Jeremiah's. We also got the bathroom completely painted, in nice bright white. Our towels are all bright jewel-tones so we need a bright and neutral backdrop.





We also got the ceiling cut in around and painted completely in Jeremiah's room (Tony helped), the same light pretty blue.

While we were all painting and destroying things, Veronica, Josiah, Jeremiah, Beverly, and Hannah played, mostly running around upstairs in our huge empty bedroom.

It rained today (of course) so there was no going out into the nice backyard.

Veronica helped sweep up, Josiah picked up trash.

Even Hannah helped move paint buckets (repeatedly).

Unbelievably, we painted everything so far (and Jeremiah's walls tomorrow) with only purchasing ONE gallon of white paint.

My dad, a packrat of epic proportions, never throws anything away, even paint, so my parents had gallons and gallons of it, in almost exactly the colors we needed.




And I am BEAT!