Oh, hello there

At long last, the kitty crapper is no longer the first thing you see on this page. That’s because I finally have something to report. And it’s good news! (no, I’m not pregnant)

More work has begun on the house. It’s been almost two years since the first phase of the renovation ended, and then we spent months and months painting the entire first floor plus our bedroom and bathroom on the second floor. Then we took a bit of a break. Money might have had something to do with that. OK, and laziness. We have been trying to find a contractor to continue with the renovations, so that also took some time. The contractor who completed Phase One is, unfortunately, unavailable. However, over the summer Michael just happened upon a contractor at the farmers’ market where we pick up our CSA shares. Now, we’re scheduled to finish the second floor plus do a little work on the third floor. We can’t afford to do everything we want to finish the interior of the house, but this will at least makes things a little more comfortable. So here’s a summary of what’s on the horizon…

Second bedroom:
New floors
New drywall on some walls, to cover electrical stuff
New baseboards
New window

Second full bath:
Everything - Michael already stripped this room down to the studs

Hallway: New baseboards to match others installed during Phase One
New window at the top of the stairs

Third floor: Install HVAC unit and frame a bench around it
Replace windows at the top of the stairs, in both bedrooms, and in the walk-in closet

Of course, this will be followed by lots and lots of painting, something we are paying someone else to do this time. I was really not looking forward to painting the wall that goes up along the stairs to the third floor; we already have 12-foot ceilings on the second floor, which extend to lord knows how high going up the staircase.

An issue we were pretty concerned about was keeping dust out of the spaces where we live. The first time around, we were living two floors above the work, so it was never a problem. Fortunately, Chris, the contractor, has installed some plastic sheeting upstairs to keep our living spaces dust-free. Here's what it looks like going up the stairs to the second floor:

From the top of the stairs looking down the hallway:

Just outside our bathroom and bedroom:

The "doorways" are two sheets, the one on the outside of the work area slit down the middle, the one within the work weighted down, so it's a little tricky getting through them, especially when carrying a basket of laundry. When we came home on Monday, when all of this was installed, we heard a tiny "mew" coming from the other side of the sheeting just outside our bedroom. Apparently Tanga was "trapped" in the bedroom all day before figuring out the new doorways.

The plastic sheeting reminds me of that scene in E.T., which always freaked me out as a kid. So it's a little creepy upstairs in the hallway.

Some work has started in the bathroom. This room used to be the bane of my existence. The plan is to move the shower across the room, then put the sink and toilet across the room from the shower. We've already picked out a toilet, pedestal sink, and shower stall and all the fixtures.

This room is awfully tiny, so it's hard to show the work going on. Here we have the framing for the wainscoting along the brick wall, where the sink and toilet will be:


We're planning to keep the brick exposed above the wainscoting, but we'll paint it white. The subfloor is in as well. Funny thing: there's still a remnant of one of the old layers of flooring:

The work is moving along, so it won't be another six months before there's another update.

True love is...

...your significant other buying you one of these:

...because he/she can no longer stand the sight and sound of you almost barfing every time you clean the litter box.

In a few days, a Litter-Robot will arrive at our door, and that day cannot come soon enough.

Due to the adjustment period with the cats and the lack of air conditioning where we used to keep the litter boxes (fact: heat plus poo equals the smell of death), we've moved them down to the laundry room, right off the kitchen. Not the ideal spot, but we can deal temporarily. I'm the one who usually takes care of cleaning up after the cats, which has never been a big deal. However, the addition of not-so-little-anymore Elvis has made this chore almost unbearable. I won't go into any details, but she's disgusting.

So when Michael told me after work the other day that he ordered a Litter-Robot, I declared him the best. husband. ever. And then laughed because this could count as an anniversary present. We've talked about buying better living room furniture (new sofa and a love seat and/or chair) in leather, which would be perfect since the traditional three-year anniversary gift is leather and we didn't buy each other gifts this year. But I'll take a Litter-Robot over better furniture any day. It's that bad.

Very funny...

This little gem is courtesy of The New Yorker, via my mother:

The evolution of a dining room

We finally have a put-together, grown-up dining room, mostly thanks to my awesome family and their generosity. But before I post pictures of that version, here's a look at the transformation of the dining room.









It's come a long way from that room with the chimney about to collapse to an interrogation room to a formal dining room. My favorite part is the china cabinet, where I am finally, after almost three years, able to display our wedding china.

(I don't usually have flowers on the table; I hosted a book club meeting this past week, and while shopping for the food at Trader Joe's, decided to buy some flowers for the get together, since they were $5.)

There's also another addition to the kitchen - it's a bookcase from IKEA that fits perfectly in one corner to store cook books and display some pottery (and keep the recycling bin accessible but out of the way).

Meet Elvis

We have a new addition to the family:

This is Elvis, and if you look closely, you'll see why we named her that:

Elvis was a stray(?) that started coming around occasionally, then we started to see her more and more often until it was a daily occurrence. She was extremely friendly, and so tiny, and so stinking cute. She had on a flea collar, but no tags, and looked pretty healthy, so we suspected she belonged to someone (so we also assumed she was already spayed). Then we noticed that she was either putting on weight (we were feeding her every day, so she was probably eating more) or she was pregnant. Then it became pretty obvious by the way she was carrying the weight that she was pregnant, so off to the vet we went. She was early in the pregnancy, and since she's so tiny anyway, the vet took care of that issue (which, while sad, was a also great relief, and honestly, Richmond does not need more kittens to find homes for). The vet also spayed her, gave her shots, etc. She's healthy, and now, after dropping almost $200 at the vet, she's ours. She seems to be OK with this:

Guess I'll have to add another stocking to the mantle this Christmas.

The fatties are not so OK with this new arrangement, however. Elvis quickly became the dominant cat, which is hilarious because she's half the size of the fatties. But we're all adjusting slowly and soon, I hope, things will settle down. In the meantime, I don't exactly hate the fact that she snuggles with me at night.

I love you, IKEA

Last weekend, we went up to northern Virginia for an engagement party, and while we were there decided to hit up IKEA on the way home. We went specifically to buy some shelves for the kitchen, but while we were looking, we came across several things we've decided we just couldn't live without. One thing it turns out we can live without? The shelves we intended to buy and the whole reason for going there. We couldn't buy everything we liked because the Camry can only hold so much, so we'll have to go back to get the rest.

So last week we walked away with an island and two stools, and we are quite pleased with this decision.


We've always planned to get one - our kitchen space just begged for an island. But we couldn't afford one when we picked out the cabinets and decided to wait and just buy a stand alone island at a later time. After a couple of years of searching for one that wouldn't break the bank, we happened upon this one at IKEA and, in a rare occurrence, both of us really liked it. I'm so glad to have some seating in the kitchen now. I can talk to Michael while he cooks, instead of watching The Real Housewives of Orange County or something equally trashy and feeling guilty because I just want to sit.

Patience, patience

Yes, it's been a while. The house is exactly the same as last time I posted, but more updates should be in my not-so-distant future. The tax refund gods are being extremely kind this year; so kind that our refund will cover almost 75 percent of the costs to finish the second floor. Hooray! This means we don't have to take out a loan or wait until we save up the cash, delaying the process even more. It'll probably be a few months before work starts again, assuming our contractor is even available. In the meantime, we will enjoy our painting-free weekends by playing video games, watching Netflix through the Xbox (my current addiction is America's favorite serial killer, Dexter), and napping (with or without a cat). Our Christmas present to each other was a new flat screen TV - one big enough that I can actually read the scores during football and basketball games. We really should enjoy the TV while we can.

On eating better, or trying not to become a fatty

I have nothing to report on the house. We've basically stopped with the renovations for the time being while we figure out how to pay for the next phase - that being redoing the second full bath and finishing the second bedroom and hallway all on the middle floor. We are doing little things here and there, like replacing all of the switch/face plates a few at a time. Those things are pretty expensive when you buy a whole bunch at once, which, like everything else related to this house, we learned the hard way. We bought all of the kitchen ones at the same time and dropped $100 on them. Although, I should disclose one thing: we actually had switch/face plates everywhere, but somebody (hint: not me) didn't like them and insisted on upgrading. Which is how we ended up spending $100 in just one room.

I don't think I've mentioned The Curtains yet. Michael hung up curtains by the stairs on the first floor to keep the warm air from going upstairs and keep the cold air from going downstairs, since we don't have HVAC for the second and third floors yet. He also hung curtains up outside of our bedroom and bathroom, where we have space heaters to keep us warm, to keep the warm air from escaping. They're not the most attractive things, but they do seem to help.

One of the benefits of the curtains, at least for the time being, is they hide the treadmill, which Michael brought in from the shed and put next to the stairs. We will start using it one of these days. Michael and I both have got to be the two laziest people when comes to exercise. I. Hate. Exercising. I've been blessed with a seemingly high metabolism my whole life, plus good genes (thanks, Mother) but my pant size is telling me that my metabolism is probably starting to slow down a bit. I've also been on a healthier eating kick, and exercising more seems to go in hand with that.

I'm trying to cut out as much processed food as possible, and while I've made some significant changes in my diet, it's going to be a long process, no pun intended. And it's not just cutting out processed foods; it's also being more aware of where our food comes from. I'd read some articles about industrial farming when Jonathan Safran Foer's new book, Eating Animals, was released. He wrote the book after questioning the food he ate as fatherhood approached and how he would have to make food choices for his child. Reading all of this got me thinking about the food I eat, so I finally started reading The Omnivore's Dilemma, which had been on my list for a while anyway.

So in addition to actually reading food labels and cutting out foods with high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated oils, and various other corn-derived fillers and preservatives, I've cut out a lot of meat and certain dairy products. I think I'm on my way to becoming a vegetarian, which saddens me because I can't imagine never eating NC barbecue or a Bojangle's chicken filet biscuit again. I might make exceptions for those things. I have no qualms about eating animals; I just have a problem eating the meat from ones that might have been injected with ammonia, hormones, or antibiotics or might contain traces of feces, not to mention the cruelty and awful living conditions of factory farms.

So my rule for meat now is that I have to know where it comes from before I'll eat it. I'm more lenient when it comes to seafood, though I'm trying to be more environmentally friendly and eat fish that's low on the food chain.

I only buy organic milk and eggs now (which is totally worth the exorbitant costs), and I would like to include butter and cheese on that list, but...baby steps - this is a very expensive lifestyle change. I eat a lot of cheese and I hate to think of the amount of money I would spend if I just ate organic cheese. But it seems to me that the costs, and benefits, in the long run are worth it. I also want to get in the habit of shopping for this kind of food before we have kids so that when we do start a family, our kids won't grow up eating the same crap we've been eating our whole lives. We're really lucky to have Ellwood Thompson's and the Belmont Butchery in Richmond, as well as several CSAs to choose from; otherwise, making these changes would be much more difficult. I don't think I could drive out to the Whole Foods in effing Short Pump every single week.