Moving In and Moving On

It’s been four months, so it’s about time that I post about our move into our house!  We had a crazy last few months of building – delays were the word of each of those days.  At times we wanted to just lose it and while Mom and Dad were so kind, we had far out-reached Ben Franklin’s adage that in three days guests and fish start to stink!  We felt like we were at the end of a very frustrating pregnancy and that we had been in labor for a good month.  However, we did eventually get to push that metaphoric baby out when we finally got to push ourselves in, and boy were we happy!  And while it was a long and crazy process, we did learn some interesting lessons on the way.

Lesson #1: Painters do a lot more than paint.

In my last post about the house we talked about all the crazy sweat-equity we did.  We were really proud when it was done and felt a great satisfaction.  However, did you know that painters do a lot more than just that?  We found that out as we inched our way closer to moving in.  It seemed like every amount of small detail work we asked about was met with the phrase “That’s the painter’s job.”  I really liked our builder, but I swear if we had to hear “That’s the painter’s job” one more time there would have been blood on my dirty tile floors.  Did you know that painters have to caulk the wood trim? Why, I ask, is this necessary, when we had nothing to do with the wood trim? So if you’re going to paint your house, be prepared to be doing that right until the end!

Lesson #2: You have to learn how to laugh.

Dave’s catch phrase this summer became “My life is like a sit-com, except it’s not funny.”  We had to learn to find the humor in the everyday craziness that occurred or really end up going crazy.  A few gems are as follows.

One thing was the comedy of errors that led to our house finally being finished.  Our good friend did a swap for eye surgery and so did our carpet and cabinets.  It was a lot for him to do in his free time and we were worried that his poor wife would leave him by the end of it!  But it just seemed as though both he and we couldn’t catch a break.  His workers wouldn’t show up, the supplies wouldn’t come, his long-suffering wife would tell him he had to eat dinner with the family or she’d kill him, we were not done painting trim, and so on.  Finally he set aside four days to come in, get it done and wish us a frustrated goodbye forever, and amazingly, frustratingly and perhaps inevitably he got JURY DUTY!!  In those situations we had to laugh or else we would have died crying.

Another thing that we had to learn to laugh about was our crazy neighbor.  His name is Larry and when he isn’t drunk and angry he’s sober and angry.  From the very start he was combative and rude, but we learned to deal with it.  He called the cops on us at least 4 times when stuff blew into his well-tended garden of rusting cars in various states of undress.  That was fun, especially when the cops were our friends (or even just rational thinking human beings).  We would just try to be polite or simply ignore his rants.  Then, something happened that changed everything: Larry got a roommate.  The roommate was weird but nice, came over to chat sometimes and while he still kind of creeped us out, he was drunk and happy to Larry’s drunk and angry and they kind of balanced each other out.  However, the best part was his name.  Amazingly, he was also named Larry!  We had Larry and Larry next door and as images of Newhart (a little altered) came to mind we found a great way to laugh about our crazy next-door-neighbor!  Mean Larry and Nice Larry were born and we found that when we said that we couldn’t help but laugh.

Lesson #3: If you take pictures for your blog it will scare your neighbor into leaving you alone!

We were fairly close to finishing on our project when Maggie was diagnosed with diabetes and so we had a week or two where almost nothing got done.  While we were in the hospital and not around much, Mean Larry got so sick of the pretend rocks and trash that were being thrown in his yard that he lost it.  He spent an evening in a drunken rage throwing rocks, trash and other sundry items on our driveway.  We came by on the next Sunday morning to find our driveway covered in this mess and I was laughing so hard all I could think was “I have to document this for my blog!”  So, I took Dave’s phone and started taking pictures and Mean Larry caught sight of me and rushed out of his house.  He boldly told us that if we thought taking pictures to the police was going to do anything, we were wrong.  It was our crap he threw up there and he was totally within his rights.  I just said whatever, and rolled up my window.  Dave asked him to stay off of our property and we took our sick girl home to grandma’s house.  Well, Mean Larry was so freaked out that we would go to the police that he made Nice Larry get out there and clean it all up.  After that he has kept mostly to himself.  I guess pictures are not just worth 1000 words, but are worth making the loud to finally shut up.

Lesson #4: Wood and carpet really make a construction project into a home.

With each cabinet that went in during September I found myself feeling more and more like we had a home.  The cupboards, the trim and the doors just really made everything seem so much closer to finished.  The stair rails were amazing to add that homey feel as well.

Finally, when David left for a conference in late September was when we finally got our carpet.  With each room, each hallway and stair that got its nakedness covered in lovely soft carpet, our home really became a reality.  It was so fun!  My kids all took turns rolling around the family room and each bedroom in pure, carpet-loving joy!  (OK, there may have been some rolling done by Mom as well!) We sent pictures to Dave and got ready to move in at last!  It’s amazing what one final touch can do!

Lesson #5: Moving in makes all the bad go away!

Almost the moment we moved in, the frustrations and the crazy seemed to disappear! As soon as you move in, all the problems, pains and sadnesses simply fall away, leaving only the fun, the joy, the excitement and eventually the quotidian details of life left over.  We have loved our house, been annoyed that the kids make it dirty and even see it as normal, and not as the exciting novelty it began.  As it is, we are so grateful to be here and thank Heaven each day for the abundant life we live!