The Little Things Mean Alot

Although the weather has put a damper on the construction and we have our own swimming pit we have had opportunity to reflect this week on the "little things."

When we first planned this addition 12 years ago it was with the hope of having an expanded kitchen. But over the years as the plan evolved it was, "perhaps we can add a fireplace" or "wouldn't it be great to have a half bath on the first floor." Sometimes you can get lost in the details but the little things can make a big difference.

The past week or so found us charting into new territory as we expanded the footprint of our house and also gave us a dose of reality when we took Scott's Mom to the hospital for stroke like symptoms. We were lucky in that we realized the little things like slightly slurred speech and an unsteady gait as symptoms of something that wasn't quite right. With the help of friends and family and a wee bit of tough love we got her into the hospital across the street from her apartment which, by sheer luck or divine intervention, happened to be a Primary Certified Stroke Center. We are happy to report she is doing well and already released into a physical therapy/inpatient rehab program.

The progress on the addition ground to a halt late in the week as Mother Nature turned against us, dumping rain onto the jobsite Thursday and Friday. We did get the forms removed on Tuesday, revealing the monolithic walls of what will be our new basement. This was followed by a relatively quiet day on Wednesday which brought the preppy nightmare of waterproofing and insulating the foundation. The waterproofing material is sprayed on; a thick viscous layer of glop that solidifies into a rubbery, waterproof coating. Maybe it was the fumes, but I am convinced it was the brilliant kelly green color of the coating that made me a little lightheaded. This lightheadedness escalated to mild nausea as they adhered the pepto bismol-pink insulating panels to the tacky coating. Now I will admit to having worn more than one polo shirt at the same time, and I did own a total of two argyle sweaters back in the day (The were in fashion at the time, thank you!) but I never was a fan of pink and green and really can't wait until they backfill the foundation and bury that nastiness.

Although the rain did shut down the job and give us a moat as well as a pond, we were not completely idle.

In the "out with the old" category Kim used her Craigslist powers to sell our family room furniture as well as our refrigerator.

Wading through the morass of scam replies, Kim artfully plucked the legitimate potential buyers out. The buyer of our "This End Up" furniture was Bob. Bob is a father of two boys and had recently remodeled their basement to be a den for the kids. Familiar with the solid construction of crate-style furniture as he already had "This End Up" bunkbeds for his kids, he was happy to find we had everything he needed for the den. Kim and I wrestled the unruly furniture up from our basement, through the country's smallest kitchen and into the dining room and living room beyond. Even the sofa was no match for us! Despite putting a dent in our livingroom ceiling when he and his friend were picking up the furniture, it was a worthwhile transaction for all.

Our fridge went to an equally worthy recipient. Hanna is a college student moving into a new apartment with the help of her parents, up from Virginia for the day. Her third floor apartment has a "kitchen", as she put it (she made the quotation marks with her fingers) that consisted of a small stove and one cabinet. I assume it also had a sink but her point was she would have to use the fridge in the common kitchen on the first floor. Not looking forward to the prospect of having to run down and then back up two flights of steps just to grab something from the fridge, she checked out craigslist Sunday morning and found the listing for our appliances that Kim had just relisted that very morning. By mid-day, Hannah and her parents were pulling up outside to pick up the fridge. Having cleaned it up and moved it to the living room, I knew getting it into their SUV was not going to be the easiest task of the day and my heart sank when Hanna got out of the car in a fetching neck brace and sporting a semi-healed abrasion on her forehead. I knew she would be playing the role of supervisor in the appliance loading that would be taking place. Her father seemed quite fit, if somewhat slight of build, and thankfully he had brought along a dolly. We managed to get the fridge loaded into their SUV with minimal damage, all of it was done to the SUV's interior. I stiffled a laugh when Hannah's father said to his wife, " Remember when Hannah was small and she used to ride on your lap?" My efforts at stiffling laughter turned into a near choking when the wife asked, as she and her daughter were piling into the passenger-side bucket seat, "How are you going to get the fridge up the stairs?" to which the eternal optimist replied, "It will be a piece of cake!" I know the fridge worked well when it left here; I only hope they were able to get it into her apartment with no further collateral damage.