Baby Steps

There's so much to do at the house, and I'm officially feeling overwhelmed. I feel sometimes like I just walk from room to room, looking around, not even knowing where to begin, and by the time I realize that I actually am just wasting time, like an hour has gone by. This weekend will be the one month anniversary of when we moved in, and we haven't made nearly as much progress during that time as we should've. Now, granted, we have had some family in town (nothing got done last weekend) and more coming this weekend so we do have a small excuse. But still... things are going too slowly for me to be happy.

But, we have gotten some things done, like I mentioned a couple of weeks ago. I probably shouldn't say "done" because some of these things have been "started" but not "completed". But whatever. Baby steps.

Remember my new stove? You probably didn't notice, but there is a desperate need for some storage on that wall (in addition to the pantry that we don't have). So, a few weeks ago we went to Ikea to see what we could find. About 4 hours (seriously) and a couple hundred dollars later, we had purchased a stand-alone pantry, a cabinet to go over the stove to hold the microwave, and a few other miscellaneous items. To mount the cabinet, we had to find studs to hang this mounting bracket:



Finding studs is no easy task in a house this old. They do things differently now, stud spacing is different, they use nails, drywall, etc. Justyn started drilling all these little holes to try to find the stud, and I said, "Why can't we use a stud-finder?" Well, apparently a stud finder is just a little mini-metal detector looking for nail-heads in the drywall. So, we can't use one. Instead we drill holes. Lots of them. This project took an obscenely long time, and when we finally got the cabinet mounted, we realized the door we bought wouldn't open all the way because of this whacked-out piece of wall that is in the way. So, I don't have any finished pictures for you yet because (like I mentioned before) it's not done yet.

So instead we moved on to the medicine cabinet in the main floor bathroom:

Notice anything missing? How about a DOOR? (And, by the way, check out my new outlet. Heck yeah.) The thing about these old medicine cabinets are that they're all one piece. So we can't just get a new door. We had to rip this one out of the wall and get a whole new cabinet. Luckily there is an amazingly awesome place here in Portland called The ReBuilding Center where people take all their old house crap and you can buy it. So we found a medicine cabinet exactly the size we needed for only 5 BUCKS! How awesome is that? And it's recycled. Woot!

Tangent: (It's relevant, I promise.) So, Justyn has a tool belt. He's had it for many, many years from when he first started working in construction. He loves his tool belt, and I think it's hilarious. He really will not do any project unless he has it on. I have never quite understood it, myself, but he's a dude, so I guess I'm not supposed to understand or whatever. Well anyway, back in our last house, I bought a trusty little tool kit from Target for like 10 dollars or something that has a hammer, pliers, a utility knife, a screwdriver, and a tape measure. It's all a gal like me needs, you know? Well, every time I get something out of it, Justyn looks at me and says, "Oh, you got your little hammer, huh?" or "Hey, can you bring me your little screwdriver?" And so I'm like, "Hey, why are all my tools preceded by the word little? They're just as good as yours." (Granted, they are smaller and not as heavy-duty as his, but that's beside the point.) But since we've been doing all this stuff around the house, my little screwdriver ends up in his tool belt, or I end up with his pliers, etc. It started to become a little bit of a problem.

Anyway, you know already that I have zero construction/remodeling skills. And this medicine cabinet has been in the wall since 1925. And trust me, it was in there. So, I took out the glass shelves (something I can do, thankyouverymuch) and proceeded to score around the edge of the cabinet so as to proceed removing it. But, 80+ years of paint, plaster, and goodness knows what else, made it somewhat difficult. So, Justyn and I are standing there looking at it, trying to figure out how to get it out, and he says, "Aha. I have the perfect tool for this job." And he walks out to the garage. Well, I grab my trusty little hammer, and start prying the cabinet away from the wall. In less than 2 minutes, I had that thing out of there, before he even came back with his whatever he was going to get. You should have seen his face when I walked out with the cabinet in hand. It was awesome! (And, I think he was totally impressed.) He was like, "How... did you... ?" And I said, "Oh, just me and my little hammer." Ha!

When I came back into the bathroom and looked in the hole, I saw this:

I was like, "What is that stuff at the bottom?" And I looked more closely:

Those are used razorblades, my friends. Lots of them. And I betcha they're about 80 years old, too. Gross! I called my mom (because I like to share these odd occurrences with her) and she explained to me that the little slit in the back of the cabinet is for dropping in your used razorblades. So, I asked the obvious question, "Yeah, but how do they get them out?" And she said, "They don't." And, again, all I can say is... Eww. And... Weird. But anyway, we got it all cleaned out, got the new cabinet up, and that project is mostly done, except some of the paint and plaster came out with the cabinet so it's a little rough around the edges. Another project started, but not completed. And thus, no photo for you. I know you're disappointed, but get used to it. This is the reality of fixing a house. It is a lesson you and I must learn together.

And so guess what I got:

Yep, my very own tool belt...check me out! I've already used it once to put on a light switch plate cover. I also got a new nylon coated, self-locking tape measure (because my last one was too short, according to my husband) and a speed square (which I'm not entirely sure of it's purpose). I am supposed to get an upgraded hammer, too, because mine is so small it falls through the loop and almost gouged our new floors once already. I guess it is kind of small, now that I think about it. But, hey! It has been a good hammer for me for many years. It served as a good stepping stone for me. It's all about the baby steps.