Renovations!

Oh boy. What an ordeal. Boxes piled high with every little thing, furniture askew and missing. Panicked over time constraints and wondering how it's all going to work out, we are preparing for major renovations at our humble home.

Spices, books, movies, pots and pans, photos, food all are tossed into boxes and then heavily sighed over. Everything, really, just about everything in our house, will eventually make its way into the storage unit, a giant box, parked in our driveway.

Thanks to the proximity of the move, nothing is being truly "packed" or organized, just hastily gathered and shuffled into the giant box in the yard. I am no fan of disorder, even with two youngsters, I manage to keep our house fairly tidy. I like it that way. I don't like it this way...

Once everything is settled into the big box beyond our walls, Gabe has the monster task of ripping out said walls, plus the ceilings, cabinets, sinks and appliances; stripping the house down to the studs. Yuk.

All for good. All for good. Say it with me...."It's all for good and worth it. It will be over soon."

Once he's done, the drywallers will arrive, and soon we will have fresh new ceilings and walls.

YAY!!! Those of you who have visited my house know how badly we need this. I'll post one "before" pic now, just to give you an idea of why we are so excited (excluding present conditions) for this work to be done. I'll save the rest for a grand before and after post in a week or two when it is all finished.

Originally, the plan, when we bought this house, was for Gabe to do all of the renovations. He has completely renovated Elijah's room and partly finished two others, and has done a great deal of work on the exterior of the house, as well.

As a major gift to him and to all us, we chose, with gratitude, to use part of our tax returns to hire pros who will knock this job out in a week's time.

This is the last of the major overhauls for our house. We still have lots and lots of smaller projects left to tackle. All of which will feel worlds more manageable when this project is done.

Tomorrow, the kids and I take off to my Mom and Dad's house until the work is completed. We are sad to be leaving Gabe for so long, especially since he has such hard work ahead of him. He is glad we are leaving, as all renovations are infinitely easier without babies underfoot.

I hope to be posting more often over the next week while I'm at my parent's house in SC. I have exciting news about future plans and new challenges that I would love to tell you all about! It's good to be back.