Week in review, #5

Summertime

When it was raining...and oh how it rained, that's when we opted to work indoors instead.

• - Once the work was complete on and below the larger deck, all of the patio furniture and the gas BBQ were to be moved and settled onto its surface. Problem? They were in the back corner of the garage....so the entire double garage was another task on the list.
  

Our garage, on a good day last March

Garage; every single item was tossed out of the large wooden opened garage doors and myself and two others rolled up our sleeves, donned our ipods (because it was such an unpleasant detail and we were all grumpy), and began to melt and sweat to bits in the 87 degree humidity stricken, monsoon rainy day, which alternated with more heat when the sun actually shone throughout the summer storms of the day.

Once all was removed, we could begin anew, something we haven't been able to progress with since our move into the house in the dead of winter with three feet of snow on the ground, thus is the reason why the detailed task took so long in the first place. Freezing in the depths of the garage never felt too great initially anyway.

Success at last!
We can now park both vehicles in here! Yes!

This too was our third attempt at creating order in the garage, but still a final (!) grand detailing began by first sorting, organizing, and then purging much! Oh sure, the easy part was moving the deck items to the back deck, but the fallout with an entire day necessary to finish the job was unexpected.

• We used straw twine to wrap up the garbage cardboard flattened stacks.
• We gathered all of the items for charity and packed them into my vehicle immediately for removal later in the day. And they did go that day!
• We sorted much and sent a large box westbound with items for the grandchildren; hockey helmets, ice skates and life-jackets now too small for our brood still living at home.
• We began to feel "lighter" around the general working area.

We are still celebrating a week later at the fact that although our moving company failed to arrive as promised to recycle and reuse all of our many moving boxes, during a break this day and shortly after posting all on FREECYCLE, one very sweet couple came to rescue us (and bless themselves) by happily removing all of moving gear which was taking up almost 25% of our garage space in total after being condensed in size THAT EVENING! Can you say happy? Enough space was created for the first time, both my hubby and I have been able to park our vehicles in our own garage. YES! Sweet and simple accomplishments render much pleasure. So much more order, and space was created when all was in its true place and the load of moving items were GONE.

Our basement cold storage room now
required work with the junk shuffle

• As the day wore on, and fatigue began to reign high, I remembered one thing - the cold storage room in the basement was the area with MORE belonging in the garage. The garden tools were stored in there and now belonged in the garage for the seasons ahead. The snow shovels, toboggans and other assorted winter items from the garage needed to be hauled down there for storage until winter arrives.

The good ole staircase became the dumping ground

• And then there were other misc items not belonging in the garage at all, the ones I just got out of my way by tossing them all down the staircase from the garage to the basement for easy retrieval later on. The thought of next having to work my way into that storage room for sorting, organizing and purging possibilities was like a dark cloud hovering over my head, but somehow we pressed onward and by the next evening, all was checked off, done, complete and all were so happy, happy to have those chores behind us.
  

• - Our builder's service guy came to fill me with delight (NOT) when he began to plaster drywall putty around the house, areas he left like that for us to continue with. So the sanding and repainting began in earnest...all over the house! Somehow puttering about with only bits of painting details takes longer than painting an entire room, but it's now complete too.

Patching the walls went way beyond my level of comfort, not to mention all the colored re-painting necessary from happy go lucky wall mudders.

- Weathershield foam was in full use to fill up all of the gaps found in many areas of the outdoor pipes and throughout the home around plumbing, heating and sump pump areas. What we thought would take one or two cans to complete the task, it actually took three full cans to do the deed. We are now ready for winter and hopefully there will never be any more mice in the house from entering these zones again.

Necessary items for necessary tasks ahead

• - All of the tiled flooring areas inside of our home were never sealed, a dilemma one of our older son's noticed when he visited shortly after we moved in here. He found himself sealing the basement bathroom floor tiles, and then he also painted the walls in there (all of the basement drywall was only whitewashed, never painted so it's all to come).

Re-purposing yogurt containers came in handy

Sealing tiled flooring grout and tiles

• After a short tutorial, another son has been spending many hours using a scrub brush along grouting areas in between tiles, and sealing the flooring. It's great to have tiles in the house, a very organic and healthy flooring for allergy sufferers but in order to be installed correctly - they must be sealed. Each wee drop of water actually stains the tile, not a good thing when they are on the bathrooms and laundry room floors. Each day (when rain falls outdoors), one more floor continues to become sealed and eventually ever-complete.
  

• Our blinds are all installed and thankfully so as we were able to keep the house cool until the late afternoon when sun entered these back windows and the thermometer in our home fluctuated and heightened to highs of 80 degrees by the dinner hour. We now have a great reprieve from the sun's warmth without losing the view to the back forest with the special blinds we chose. Even though we love the warmth of the sun, somehow the air conditioning begins working overtime and canned air is just no fun all day long. It's a necessary thing though when the humidity climbs, something new to us here in the east, something we never had before and something we are so grateful for as a serious bonus to our time living here.

And this my friend is another update for our week in review. There will be more to come, I assure you of that. :-)