A good surprise

I really needed a good surprise this week.  I got one, too.

I was standing on the deck, looking into the backyard, when I saw some flowers in bloom that I had no idea were even there.  Seemingly overnight and out of nowhere, these pink flowers were popping up in patches of monkey grass.  They looked like some type of lily, but I had never seen them before.

I say out of nowhere, because the flowers have no foliage at all.  They’re just stems with flowers on top.

I discovered another great new app from my friend April, who lives near the House of Goodwill.  It’s called “PictureThis” and it’s a free plant identifying app.

It told me my mystery flower is a Belladonna Lily, a member of the Amaryllis species.  I prefer the other name it’s known by, the “Naked Lady Flower” (due to its lack of leaves).

I also learned that the Belladonna Lily is “very temperamental” and making them thrive can seem to be a matter of luck.

So I guess I’m doubly blessed that these beautiful lilies are all over the place, and seem to really like it here. 

I just love when a yard is so flower-filled that you can put a few indoors in vases, with some left over to enjoy outdoors!

(I’ve tried to get my Christmas Amaryllis bulbs from past seasons to rebloom each year, faithfully following all the required steps to do so, but never with any luck.  I get super tall foliage, but never flowers.  So I extra-appreciate how these lilies here are thriving, without any particular care.  I haven’t given up on the Amaryllis bulbs though – maybe this will be my year…)

Thank you God, for a good surprise.

A House of Goodwill goodbye

I woke up the other morning to one of those texts that no one ever wants to receive.  It was from my neighbor (and friend) Teresa, telling me that her wife Pat had had a massive stroke and was in the hospital.  I got the news later that morning that Pat was gone.

For the last three days I’ve been wondering how to put this loss into words, and I still don’t feel I can even as I sit here typing this out.

It’s hard to believe that she’s really gone.  Pat had an incurable form of cancer for years, and it’s strange how even when you know that death is inevitable – and will even be sooner rather than later – somehow it still feels like a complete shock when it actually happens.

I loved Pat.  She had the best personality – she was funny and kind, always generous, and very, very real.  There were no pretenses with Pat.  You never had to wonder what Pat thought about anything.  And yet she never overwhelmed you with opinions or made you feel judged.

Pat and Teresa loved Halloween, and always decorated their house for all the neighbors' kids to enjoy.  They always had a big party the weekend before, and we could look forward to chili, apple cider and lots of candy.

My son and husband, with Teresa (left) and Pat at one of their impromptu "Hey, why don't you stay for dinner?" dinners

The Halloween house

I loved Pat for her love for animals – Pat and Teresa have had even more dogs and cats than we have.  (And that’s a lot.)  When you lose a beloved pet you always know at least 50% of the people around you will not be able to comprehend the loss at all.  Pat did.  And she was so supportive and kind when we adopted a teenage boy.

I often think that for those whose lives don’t follow the “normal” course of seemingly most everyone else’s – those whose paths don’t chart the “normal” milestones (happy childhood, marriage, children, happy retirement) – the more swerves off the path and the more losses accrued – those are often the people who show the most understanding and compassion to others.

And sometimes life just feels like a series of losses, with more endings than beginnings. 

For me, Pat is the fourth person I’ve lost in the last ten months in my phone’s contact list.  She is the second neighbor.

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about neighbors lately, as over the last several years we’ve lost many to moves and ill health.  We have always been blessed with wonderful neighbors, and it’s made me realize how much we took for granted – neighbor friends occupy a special place in one’s life.  You may not see one for a few days (or a few weeks) but you see her car, or see him out getting the mail and you stop and have one of those satisfying five minute conversations that remind you of how glad you are that they live nearby.

Neighbor friends are part of the background fabric that quietly surrounds us with a feeling of security and home.  Neighbor friends are the ones that have a key to your house; that will get your mail when you’re on vacation or feed your cat in an emergency.

I wasn’t able to see Pat much over the last couple of years.  Our young foster placement kept me tethered to the house much more – and COVID kept the world at home this year.  Pat had a compromised immune system, so even though she lived a few houses away, she wasn’t able to socialize much in the last few years.

I was running by Pat’s house a few months ago when I caught her outside.  She had lost her hair, but she looked good.  We talked about how her chemo wasn’t working anymore, and how the doctors weren’t sure what to do next.  She said she wasn’t feeling too bad.  We chatted about the neighborhood for a few minutes, and her cats.  I had no idea it was the last time I’d see her.

Black-eyed Susans in my front yard, a flower share from Teresa

As sad as I am to lose Pat, I am equally sad for Teresa.

She will be ok.  We always can choose to be, if we decide to.  But journeys of grief are lonely, and the only way out of them is to go through them.

I hope I can be a source of support, of friendship and love as she and Pat have always been to us.

Sometimes things happen that make the acts of daily living – like painting and blog posting – not seem to matter much.  It takes a while to regain equilibrium.

I have always loved this picture of Jesus.

It is the great hope of my life.

The sadness, the sickness, the insanity will all one day come to an end.

In time, He will make all things right.

When I think of goodwill, I think of friends like Pat.

She was greatly loved; she will be greatly missed.

Score!

Since I'm in the middle of a long day of cleaning and painting, this will be a quick post just to share a recent purchase.

Last Friday, on craigslist, I found this incredibly beautiful marble-topped dresser for $200:

Now, I will admit that maybe this wasn't the deal of the century.  If I had gotten it for $25, maybe I could say that.  But at $200, it was easily at least 50 - 75% off what it would have cost new.

And let me point out what I love about it - this thing is solid!  Its all real wood, it's really big and spacious, and it has one of my favorite things in the world - a marble top.  I love marble-topped furniture because not only is it beautiful, but it's so practical.  It can take a hot cup of coffee, a frosty glass or a water spill and it's probably going to be just fine, unlike a wood-topped table.

As far as I'm concerned it's perfect - for my own house as well as a rental.

Funny thing: my husband and son couldn't wait for me to smell it.  I have no idea what the people we bought it from had been storing in it, but it smells amazing.  I wish I could have been there to ask and learn their secret.  This is usually the opposite of what people expect to find when they buy something used, no?

Anyway, the whole point of this blog is to demonstrate that beauty can be achieved and life can be enjoyed for much less than what many people think.

I have been reminded that I need to show some budgeting accountability, and I know that the day of reckoning is coming.  To be honest, I feel quite sure I've surpassed my $5000 limit by now.  However, I know if I've surpassed it, it won't be by a lot.

A new record?

This week I'm trying to set a new record.  I'm trying to completely finish painting a bedroom in one week.  I realize this sounds ridiculous (even to me), but in all my years of painting, I've never had to paint molding like this.  It just takes forever.

I'm used to knocking out rooms in 1-2 days.  It took me 3 weeks (3 weeks!!) to finish the master bedroom.  (There were a few special circumstances though, if you'll recall from previous entries.)

In order to keep myself motivated, when I finally finished the master bedroom, I picked the smallest bedroom next.  It also has the least molding.  I figured if I could completely finish in a week, the triumph would be invigorating.

Here is what I'm starting from:

My husband's been using this bedroom as a temporary office while we are here.

After one day of work: I deglossed the molding throughout the room, and got one coat of paint on both door frames and the window frame.

Honestly, painting this one's kind of killing me.  For one thing, the paint on the wall is in PRISTINE condition.  There are no nail holes, and only one nail, and it's in a location where I will probably be hanging something anyway.

And the other thing - I'm changing the paint color here from green to green.

I know this sounds pointless.  And I've almost talked myself out of painting the walls several times.

But recently my mom asked me what colors I like.  And I answered her honestly - I like every color!  But I don't like every shade of every color.  For some reason, I just don't like this room.  I just don't.  It's not a bad color, I just don't feel happy when I walk in and see it.

It's hard to tell from the pic, but the wall color is a green with a yellowish tint, kind of like the inside of a less-ripe avocado.  Also, all the walls in this house were painted in paint with a flat tint, which somehow manages to make a dark house appear even darker.

The paint with a little bit of a glossy tint should reflect more light, and hopefully, brighten things up a bit.  It made a huge difference in the master bedroom.

Ok, enough posting.  Time to open the paint can!

What 2 itunes operas and 1/2 an audiobook worth of painting get you (ie. a painting progress report)

I keep talking about painting football fields worth of molding.  But I haven't been posting as often because it takes a while to achieve any results to show.

The reason?  I have learned that painting dark 1970's molding takes a total of 3 days.  Why?  Because it takes about 6 coats of white paint to cover it completely - with no dark showing through - and the molding will only accept 2 coats of paint a day.  Any more than that, and the brush just ends up taking off paint, instead of adding more layers.  So even if I were capable of painting it faster, there's only so much I can do in a day.

That said, painting molding takes lots of precision, which makes it really time consuming for that reason as well.  I don't like using painter's tape; I'm pretty accurate, and I prefer to just wipe paint off the wall or floor if I accidentally brush some on.

On Monday, I finally finished the molding and spindles in the master bathroom.

Here is a pic from before:

Still so dark!

Here is a pic from after:

Finally, done with the spindle painting!

(Hopefully for a lifetime.)

The closet and bathroom door have not been put back on yet. They are still dark brown and will need to be painted.  I want to do a color but haven't decided which yet.

The bathroom and shower have the most beautiful green tile on the floor, walls and ceiling.

I absolutely love it.

Aside from the doors, all I have left to paint in the master bedroom is this bathroom vanity.  I was debating between a deep green or a cheerful orange.  

When I'm done painting my current room next week, this vanity is next.

The most boring week in the world?

So, as I've mentioned, I’ve been doing a lot of painting lately.  I’ve spent a couple of weeks painting a bedroom and living room, thanks to miles of dark molding that needed multiple coats of white paint to cover it all.  Because I’m also taking care of foster children before and after my paint shifts, I’m slowed down by that as well.  (My son takes the midday shift with them.)

Since I’ve spent a couple of weeks on two rooms, and I’m looking at a couple of months more of painting, I’ve found myself needing to actively focus my thought life more than ever.

Yes, it’s tedious.  And if I focus on the long view of this project, I can start to feel overwhelmed.  So I have to break the big goal into smaller ones, and work to focus on one smaller goal at a time.

I also have to find and appreciate all the great things about having a long and monotonous job: mainly, I can listen to all kinds of interesting things while I’m working.

I found this great free app called Hoopla, that is loaded with audiobooks.  I highly recommend it!

So far, I’ve listened to True at First Light by Ernest Hemingway, Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond and My Antonia by Willa Cather.  I’m currently in the middle of Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert.

They’ve all been interesting, but My Antonia so far has been my favorite.  It’s about a young orphaned boy from Virginia, who moves to Nebraska to live with his grandparents around the turn of the century.  The story tells his reflections of his friendship with an immigrant girl named Antonia, whose family has recently arrived from Bohemia.  It is the story of pioneer families, of rural farm life on the plains, of adapting to a new country and of lifelong friendship bonds. 

One of the greatest gifts my parents gave me was an appreciation for the world of ideas, and a love of reading, which translates directly to a love of learning.  I believe that learning = growth = joy.  If you’ve learned something new, you haven’t wasted your day.

I love to read and listen to beautiful writers.  I get to do this every day while I’m painting.  Aren't I fortunate?

So instead of focusing on miles of molding, I focus on what I get to learn.  I listened to operas last week.  I listened to great literature.  I expanded my boundaries of knowledge.  Up next: a couple of books in Spanish.

Was it the most boring week in the world?  No way!

What keeps me going

When your days are spent endlessly painting dark molding white, life can seem to become a tad bit dull.  You find yourself looking for any excuse to start working late, to stop early, to take breaks, to do ANYTHING other than paint dark molding white.

It doesn't seem to help that I'm an incredible optimist regarding how quickly I can paint.

And this is when you truly realize that all the cliches about life not being made up of the grand experiences really are true.  Life has a tendency to lean toward monotony - and learning to appreciate all the little moments of beauty throughout each day are where true contentment is found.

Why am I working on a lake house in the first place?

Because I love to turn my head at any given moment and see water.  I love to see the herons and geese (note my personal growth with that observation) meandering by the shoreline.  I love to watch the woodpeckers (just two hours from the home/house, but we have different birds at home) and deer wandering through the yard.

And here I have new plants and flowers to enjoy.

Since my painting avoidance has not resulted in writing more blog posts - probably partly because I don't have much visible progress to show at the moment - I will just share now a few of the little joys that keep me going; the reminders of why all the work is worth it.

Oh, hello!

This heron stood like a statue for an hour on the dock.

It's been a joy (kind of a gross, messy joy) to watch these house finches create a family.

Simply precious.

There are several different types of hummingbirds that feed at my feeder found at Goodwill.

See?  There is ALWAYS a way to bring any rambling topic back around to goodwill.

Always!!

My stargazers in bloom in thrift store vases.  (Look!  I just did it again!)

My husband brought me these from home so I'd get to see them.

(I think that should qualify as TWO goodwill links, don't you?)

Lilies are my favorite flower this year.

One lily tree bloom.  My lily tree was over 5' this year and FULL of flowers!

Just this one blossom scented the entire kitchen.

The House of Goodwill field trip

It was my son’s 20^th birthday.  

The question: what’s a fun way to celebrate a birthday together when the participants are between the ages of 2 and 51?  Oh, and it’s COVID-19 time, so some possibilities are limited?

Since swimming, boating, grilling and all other lake-type activities are normal, daily experiences at The House of Goodwill, we wanted to do something different.  (The third best kind of “problem?”)

When I was telling a friend we bought the house, and where it was located, she told me about a safari zoo near the house she said we HAD to visit.  Since our foster kids visit family on the weekends, I thought I’d try to save it for a time when they’d be with us, since it sounded like one of those rare things that people of every age would enjoy.

So we discovered the answer to how to celebrate his birthday: it’s called The Tennessee Safari Park, and wow, what a PERFECT summer/birthday COVID-friendly day out!

The Tennessee Safari Park is a drive-through zoo in Alamo, Tennessee, where you buy buckets of food, then the animals come up to your car window to feed from your bucket.

You get to feed giraffes, llamas, ostriches and deer, amongst other animals.  You also drive past animals you can’t feed – they may bite – but you still get to see up close, like zebras and bison and boars.

It’s a good long drive, and when you’re finished there’s also a small walk-through zoo with monkeys, kangaroos and lemurs.  There’s a place to pet goats, a walk-through parakeet enclosure (where the birds will sit on your fingers or shoulders, if you want them to) and a playground area for little kids.  Peacocks roam around the grounds freely.

Although I’ve visited lots of zoos, I’ve never experienced so many animals that closely before, or had opportunities to feed so many.  It was so much fun.

Funny side note: We took this trip in our 2004 Toyota Sequoia, the “newer” of our two vehicles.  

(Only sixteen years old!)  Though it doesn’t have the kinds of issues that my car does, it just recently developed one weird quirk: when the car is parked with the engine running – or just driving slowly – the air conditioning quits working.  Driving through town, or on the highway, you’d never know there was a problem.

But driving though a safari park, where we were continuously stopping, or driving very slowly, in 95 degree heat – we had no AC.  Come to think of it, it wasn’t really that funny.

And it definitely wasn’t a “good problem.”  But we had fun anyway!

When you plan your stay at The House of Goodwill, you should definitely visit the Safari Park!  Just make sure to travel in a car with functional air conditioning…

The second best kind of problem

It’s nice when life starts handing out great problems, for a change.

Do you know what the second best kind of problem is?  (After the obvious best kind – “How do I spend all this extra money I don’t need?”)

The second best is one I just keep encountering: what do you do when you find really beautiful things at such a low price that they are perfectly in budget to go in a rental property, but so beautiful you don’t want to put them there?

I mean, I keep finding great stuff cheap.  But a lot of it is so great I just don’t want to put it in a rental.

Here’s my latest example:

Few things are as beautiful to me as colored glass in sunlight.  This compote is so pretty I just hate putting it in a rental!  I mean, the price is right – it’s not the end of the world if a $4 item gets broken, no?  But it’s so much prettier than its $4 price tag!

It’s always a blessing to have the good “problems.”

Goodwill got me good (again)

Oh, Goodwill.  Haven’t we been through this already?

First the diaper pail with the used diaper, then the coffee pot full of grounds…is this really what I deserve?

I think we need to see a counselor.

I was back with my other significant other, Goodwill, the other day, enjoying what seemed to be a fun shopping date.  (We even had the blessing of my husband to be together.  No sneaking around.)  He was really coming through for me too – I found this great carpet cleaner for $14.99.  (Even though The House of Goodwill has all hard flooring, there will be lots of rugs.  And carpet cleaners are indispensable if you have children or pets + rugs and carpets.)

There was some other great stuff too – candles and a big mixing bowl for the kitchen.

Anyway, as I was dragging my “new” carpet cleaner out to my car, I distinctly heard a sloshing sound.

I checked and yes, it was what you think – NO ONE HAD EMPTIED THE DIRTY WATER CONTAINER.

Carpet cleaner!  Yay!!!

Carpet cleaner, no!!!

True story.

I don’t even have the heart to ask - really??  I just walked over to a tree in the parking lot and emptied it out.

*sigh*

Maybe some day, Goodwill.  Maybe some day.

And a little more progress...

After my five-day bedroom painting fiasco, before I could set the bed up, I needed to paint the floor molding.

I have never before attempted to paint over dark molding, which is EVERYWHERE in this house.  I was concerned that without sanding it first, the new paint wouldn't stick, and would easily be scratched.

After googling the problem, I found a product called "liquid sandpaper" that you paint on the surface of your project (for woodwork that needs painting where sanding it with paper is impractical or impossible).  After applying, you let it dry about 15 minutes and then start your painting. 

I tested the liquid sandpaper in two different areas.  After a week, on one of the molding strips I painted the paint was completely resistant to my attempts to scratch it, on the other, it scratched off easily.  On the area where it scratched off easily, I don't think I let the liquid sandpaper dry completely.  At least I hope this is what happened.  Otherwise, I have no idea why it didn't work there when it worked on the other molding strip.

My worst nightmare is spending hours and hours of my life painting molding, only to have it scratch off the first time it gets kicked accidentally.

Since I had (and have) no Plan B, I went ahead and painted the rest of the floor molding in the bedroom.  So far, so good.  It looks so much better, so much brighter!  But I don't have the heart to test it by trying to scratch it up.  Now that it's on, I'm going to leave it and hope for the best.

This will easily be the hardest part of painting the house.  And by hard, what I really mean is - very, very tedious and monotonous.  After cleaning the molding, and putting on a layer of the liquid sandpaper, it took four coats of white paint to completely cover the dark molding.  And painting molding is not like paint rolling a wall - you have to be very precise, so each coat takes much longer to put on.

And rimming every floor and ceiling of every room of this house is dark molding.  Not to mention the dark bedroom wall spindles, as well as every dark stained door in the house and all of the bathroom and kitchen cabinets.  (And there are two kitchens!)

I definitely have my work cut out for me.  This is the part where I wish my dogs could babysit the foster kids during the day, so my son could help me paint, but someone told me that was a bad idea.  Oh well.

Anyway, once the floor molding got painted, my son and I set the bed up, and even though there's still more molding to paint, it's starting to feel like a real room.

Here is what the bedroom looked like before:

Here is how it looks now:

Doesn't Shiloh look like she approves?

This is the king size bed  frame my son and I found on the side of the road with a "free" sign attached.  The mattresses and box springs were also free - they came from the 2nd mother lode giveaway house.  We bought an $80 gel foam mattress topper from Wal-Mart that is REALLY comfortable.  Love the bed!

Here you can see the faint lilac color that the walls are painted - I really liked how the color turned out!  It definitely lightened up the room but gives just a hint of color.  

I've still got to paint the window frame, the spindles, the cabinet, the doors (there are two - one is to the closet) and both of the door frames.  *sigh*

Thank you, God, for a great house to paint!

I'm still looking for nightstands and an armoire...the shopping part's the fun part!

crisis averted: tv installation successful

The first two weeks we were at this house, we were tv-free.  And when we went to Wal-Mart to buy one, we discovered to our great dismay that due to COVID, almost every tv in the store had been sold.

Apparently there was an unfortunate convergence of high demand and an inability by the manufacturers to receive certain necessary tv-building components from China.

Remember the (not) great tv debate I had with my husband?  The one where he insisted on Samsungs only for the house?

Well, that one resolved on its own.

The only tv in stock at the time was a 50" TCL smart tv.  And there was only one.

That was the size we wanted for the upstairs living room, so we bought it, even though it was a brand we were unfamiliar with.  As it turns out, we really liked the tv, so on a future visit to the store, when a few more tvs were in stock, we bought a 65" TCL for the downstairs basement living area.

After another several-day debate about where to place the tvs - the natural spot in both rooms seemed to be above the fireplaces, but we had mixed feelings about covering the beautiful stonework - we finally decided it made the most sense to hang them there, and just have one focal point in each room.

But we really, really didn't want to drill a hole into the stone.

So how to mount them then?

This is where I give a lot of props to the husband, who I had no idea was so handy when I married him.

Upstairs, he drilled a hole through a ceiling beam and attached the tv to a ceiling mount he hung in the attic.  Downstairs, he drilled a hole through the drop ceiling tile and attached a ceiling mount to a beam a foot higher up.  With both tvs he ran the power cords through the mount tubes up into the ceiling, then out a different hole to plug in in another room.  Therefore, no cords are visible at all.

It took him over a week to figure out how to do this, and it was the kind of job you only get to do once, because if you messed it up with a hole in the wrong place, it would have been nearly impossible to fix (especially upstairs, where he drilled the hole in the ceiling beam) - no pressure!

The upstairs tv, with a ceiling mount passing through an overhead beam.

I hated covering up the beautiful stone, but at least we didn't put holes in it.

The "basement" tv - hung by my husband with his #1 helper, our son Tavo.  Now he's got his video game cave set up there.

The hanging tv mount wasn't long enough to connect directly to the wooden beam in the ceiling, so my husband built this wooden connection to put between the metal mount and the beam.

Look at this, no wires!  The tv cord goes up the mount pipe, through the ceiling and down through a hole in the wall of the garage (on the other side of the fireplace) where it plugs in.

Tvs hung; sigh of relief exhaled.  Finally, back to life as normal Americans.

Finally, a little progress!

July 4th weekend was great!  Kayking, swimming, eating, relaxing - and we even managed to get some projects completed around the house.

This week I'll share some photos of our progress.

Today, here is the living room, before and after painting it.  We still haven't moved in the furniture, added the rugs or the wall decor.  But step 1 is complete.  This is probably the whitest wall I have ever painted; I'm still not a fan of white walls, but the color is doing its job at least: the room looks so much lighter and brighter than before.  Less like a cave and more like a lake house.

Goodbye, gray.  Hello light!

Happy 4th of July weekend!

Here is one thing I know for sure about a lake house: if you own one on July 4th weekend, you are there.  (And so are all of your friends!)

The best part of this July 4th weekend?  We finally found kayaks!

For at least a month we searched every store at home, every store in this area, and religiously checked craigslist and resellers trying to find ANYONE with a kayak to sell.  It's interesting the things that COVID has made scarce, but this year, with everyone staying home, anything boat-related at all has been a challenge to procure.

And then on Wednesday, when my husband was making a Wal-Mart run, he just happened to hit the jackpot - a truck had just pulled into the store with 65 kayaks!  After fruitlessly searching EVERYWHERE for over a month, this was a major score.

Pine Lake is 500 acres, and it's the perfect kayaking lake.  There are little coves around every corner, a lot of undeveloped lakeside land, and little sandbar islands where you can stop.

On Friday night, we got to take the kayaks out for the first time, leaving at sunset and paddling back to the house in the moonlight.  It was quiet and beautiful.

I swear, the colors in this photo were not photoshopped!  

They sky was an incredible shade of purple.

On July 4th, I watched my first ever boat parade from the kayak - so fun!  Everyone was grilling, swimming, boating, and relaxing on their docks.

This airbnb will be a BYOB (bring your own boat) - powerboat, that is.  The kayaks will come with the house.

I can't wait to go out again!