Stairs as of 9:56pm, 9/30/10

The stair project starts tomorrow. Get pumped for big changes. Goodbye, Jed Clampett stairs!

Job Benefits...and a squirrel friend

If you follow us at all, you'll know that I am a teacher. Well, without getting too specific, I'm a teacher in a vocational high school. We had an awesome professional day on Wednesday where we could choose to try out a technical area and see what it was like to perform some different jobs. I hemmed and hawed on this and decided to try my hand at masonry. The freshmen students do a really cool project in there with tile and I was hoping to pick up some tips for that pesky upstairs bath. Well...the best laid plans...

I got in there and was told that we were building a patio. Awesome! Just my luck! And you'd be amazed to know that a patio is on our short list for next summer...so let's do this. 

My teammates and I decided to choose the most difficult pattern for our patio: herrinbone. I was so surprised to see how easy it was once you got going. Now I'm not heading towards anything with a diamond tipped wet saw anytime soon, but this was really straightforward and easy to manage on a small scale. Hopefully Chris and I can figure it out...and if not, at least I'm buddies with the masons at school now!

 I know you're sick of Penny's birthday, but she deserves a birthday-food-eating pic post:

Ben and Jerry's...only the best!

We also misplaced her favorite orange squeaker on her birthday (damn that lawn extention!) so we had to go out and find her a new favorite toy. She now has Squirrel Friend that goes everywhere she does. She loves him and snuggles him and sometimes tries to rip his feet off. That's love. 

BFFL

Happy Birthday, Penny

A year ago today, we brought home an incredibly shy and neglected dog not knowing whether or not she would ever really fit into our family. A year later, we can't imagine life without her. I am a total believer in the idea of having an animal being better for your health. Chris and I are happier and healthier sharing our lives with this furry little girl, and all the years we get with her will be lucky for us. She waited a long time to be loved and we are so happy to do it. We love you, Penelope.

Penny on her way to her new home, 9/26/09

Penny after having lost most of her hair after whelping. She looked greasy. 

Penny as of today, driving into her future!

Honestly...

Penny and I chillin' on the porch

New Year, New Directions, Lots of Links

(No, Ashley, this is not a Glee reference.)

Every teacher knows that September, not January, is the real start of the new year. And we were hoping to start this new year off lounging on our deck at the end of a hard days work, enjoying the luxurious new backyard while Penny frolicked in the safety of our newly fenced in yard.

Well...

The money keeps rolling out in all directions. We're experiencing some technical difficulties in the new bathroom that need fixing. The basement windows are a blog post in their own that I'll get to. The bedroom paint is still a mess. The lawn is growing in spottily at best and giving Chris nightmares. One tree leans threateningly over the kitchen roof. Penelope's one-year visit to the vet looms. The stairs are still being dramatic and demanding to be fixed. Yet...

We've never been happier in our deck-less, fence-less home.

Exciting news this week, at least. We can finally afford to have the stairs fixed! Chris' dad suggested we use the contractor that built his house in Gloucester and he is a great guy, a real professional. It's amazing how much better things go when you use an actual professional. The guys we used before got the job done well, but the hassles and the waiting and the mess...I'm hoping to leave those behind. This guy has fantastic ideas for our old staircase.

Some facts about our stairs:

The railing is really old and beautiful. And totally out of code. Standard code is a 36" railing from the ground; ours is 29". Off by a mile. Going to have to go, but it will be while I kick and scream about losing it.

The existing treads are EXACTLY the color I want on the floors eventually. I'm hoping that we can keep the color on the new treads. Hoping.

You'll remember that we had some issues with these old stairs during closing. Their nasty habit of swaying back and forth prevented occupancy for awhile. And we were so excited when the bank 'fixed' them for us in order to get occupancy. Well, they did this:

which fixes the swaying, but not the structural integrity. Turns out that you need four 'runners' underneath a staircase, and we have two. And one is rotten. Fantastic. So the stairs are old, rotten, and LOUD LOUD LOUD as can be seen in this video of me walking:

So hopefully, we'll have new stairs soon! He may also take down the trees out back...Chris and I are sleeping on the numbers to decide about tree work and finished painting from the crew. (My vote is yes, his is no: guess who does the painting around here? Humph.)

Quick note about the basement windows: We hired a very well-referenced handyman company to come and fix them as Chris and I weren't sure what to do. They have done nothing but be unreliable, messy, and stupid since we hired them. One window was put in so shoddily that Chris could have done it himself (and done a better job), and the other window was ordered in the wrong size so that we still have a wooden window, just on the other side. They also left a giant bag of trash in our yard. They still have yet to finish the job and I still have yet to write them any checks. We'll see how this goes. For now, it looks like this:

But you know...things are great. It's great that we're lucky enough to have the jobs we do to have the money to do these projects. It's great that we have each other to lean on when we feel like we're taking crazy pills. It's great that we have friends and family to crash with while our stairs get rebuilt. It's great that the leaves are turning and my students are just sweet as pie this year. Life just seems a bit more beautiful today especially after the arrival of Madeline Lee Witts-Linsner...welcome to the world, darlin'. It's a wonderful place to be. :)