- Tiling completed in kitchen, laundry room, small entryway, and Butler's Pantry.
- Caulked all baseboards & quarter-round in above areas.
- Seal all grout in above areas.
- Paint ceilings,walls, baseboards & quarter-round in above areas
- Put in new toilet in laundry room and new faucet
- Put in new light fixtures in laundry room and small entry
- Replace washing machine & dryer and frigerators (presently, they are in the middle of my den)
- Remove furniture from every room of the house, except the aforementioned rooms (this includes all items in closets in these room (yuck!) Furniture will go in the garage, but that's AFTER we have a garage door installed, which will be AFTER we get Tom's new outdoor shed installed to house his bass boat.
- Begin ripping out carpet in all other rooms
- Rip out particle board in most of those rooms
- Lay hardwood floors in den, dining room & hall (hardwood is already under carpet in bedrooms)
- Escape from my home for the few days while a crew comes in to sand, stain, and refinish all hardwood floors.
- Add base molding & quarter-round to all hardwood floors.
- Strip wallpaper from my bedroom, Tom's bath and the border in Ab's old room.
- Paint fireplace brick in den
- Put in new ceiling fan in den and new chandelier in dining room
- Frame out three new openings in the den
- Paint hall, master bedroom & Ab's old room
- Tell Ab for the 100th time to come over and remove nails from the crown molding in her room that she just HAD to put up years and years ago . . . . she told me then that she'd remove them and I'm making her stick to that promise!
- Replace all the furniture that we removed from the house earlier.
- Check our pulses to be sure we're still alive after doing all the bullet points above!
Are you tired from reading this? Are you overwhelmed for us? How do you think Tom & I feel? We both decided this weekend that we cannot look too far ahead b/c we'd get deliriously depressed. We need to take it one day or one week at a time. Needless to say, it will be several months before this house is back to order, but the house will be clean & orderly and I won't have to deal with nasty carpet ever again!! My sinuses will love that.
All tiling is done! After this picture was made, we added the base molding & quarter-round.
Ok, and another thing: I don't do well with changes. Facebook just changed its format, yet again. Don't like it. This blog site changed its format and it drives me completely MAD! Can't find the spellcheck icon. And after I post a picture, I cannot for the life of me get the posting to align left. It won't get off CENTER alignment. Why? Don't have a clue. So, and this makes me crazy, the rest of this blog will be centered.
Ok, now I'm really going crazy. I just went back to the first word of that last paragraph and I hit "align" left. It went left. Now I'm in different font and it's going in the center again! I hate this! I'm not ever going to try to left align this blog again. It is what it is.....
Next on this blog are some pictures of the little girls.
Sweet Cadence
Abby kept Aubrie one day. Cady & Brie had a great time together.
Lunch time!
Brie is cracking up!
Cady is not happy, but she's still precious.
Brie at home
Cady & Brie sharing a chair
Silly little girl
She looks lost here.
Papa stealing a kiss from sick Cady.
Brie is pretending to be is shy with Papa.
Eating a snack.
Brie loves to read.
Cady is talking on the phone.
Cady is sharing her "food" with Papa.
Now I'll tell you about my mission trip to New Orleans the end of January. I went with my church. There were 4 women and 8 men. We worked hard and laughed harder! I had a blast. Yesterday in Sunday School someone asked me to briefly tell about my trip. I said, "Well, I learned to use many tools: circular saw, reciprocating saw and two different handguns." Of course, I meant nail guns. The class just erupted in laughter. But I really did use lots of tools that I've never used before. I helped frame out a new closet, frame up windows, hang new doors and put down hardwood flooring. Impressed? You should be! I'll tell you about the lady we helped.
Our trip was through Samaritan's Purse. We helped a lady named Geneva, 74, whose home was ravaged by Katrina. She said she'd been through many a hurricane, but Katrina was devastating. She & her adult son were going into the attic as the flood waters followed them up the attic stairs. She didn't know how high the water would rise. Thankfully, the water stopped when it reached the top of the door frames. She & Fernando spent one night on a small piece of plyboard b/c the rest of her attic was just rafters. In the morning her son kicked out part of the front gable and a neighbor picked them up in his johnboat. They were taken to an overpass right in front of her home. They spent 3 nights there before any help arrived. Her home is in the upper 9th ward. Geneva should be back in her home in just a few weeks - the first time in 4 1/2 years. Here are some pictures.
Geneva talking with my friend Nancy
This is the overpass where she stayed for 3 days.
Homes like this are still everywhere. Geneva only has one neighbor. . . all the other homes are unoccupied like this one.
This is a home next door to Geneva. Trying to sell it for $24,000 cash. I took this picture on Tuesday.
3 days later it was going for $17,000. Very sad.
One afternoon before cleaning up, we drove to the lower 9th ward. Most of the homes here were just washed completely away, leaving nothing except for an occasion stoop or steps once leading to homes.
A lonely stoop. This land once had wall to wall houses.
Another set of lonely steps.
If you think that since 2005 things are probably getting back to normal for the people of the upper and lower 9th ward in New Orleans, I'm here to tell you that's just not the case. So much devastation still remains. It's unbelievable. However, there are good things going on. Samaritan's Purse is doing a terrific job rebuilding homes. They have been there for some time and have commited to continuing to build homes through Dec. 2010. Another bright spot in New Orleans is . . . . ta da. . .
Brad Pitt
Brad, we're good friends ya know, has committed to building many homes in New Orleans lower 9th ward - the hardest hit area of Katrina. His new homes are, well, quite odd yet very interesting. Here are some of his homes:
This looks like a roof gone haywire, but it's a Brad Pitt special. Looks like modern art to me.
We stayed in the Franklin Avenue Baptist Church. Our accomodations were very comfortable. Here was our ladies' "barracks".
Cindy, Nancy & Jennifer from my church. There were a total of around 55 people working that week and a total of 35 from the great state of S.C.!!
The church was flooded during Katrina, too. See the colored, horizontal board across the back of the choir area? That's the high water mark. They put the board there as a reminder of the devastation within their walls. It is a great church!
The leader from our church was Bram. He's made over 30 trips to Mississippi and New Orleans since Katrina hit. He really has a heart for these people. He's a very hard worker and expects that from people he takes. He also can be slightly bullheaded, hence his nickname, Bull. The last day some of the guys altered a sign and posted it in front of Miss Geneva's house.
Bram laughed, thank goodness!
Okay, it's taken me over an hour to post this blog. Don't know when I'll be able to do this again. But when I can I'll try my very best. Over & out.
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