Use Your Words: How to test your marriage. part 305

Hey-O friends!

Today’s post is a writing challenge created by Karen @ Baking in A Tornado.  8 participating bloggers picked 4 – 6 words for someone else to use in a post. All words must be used at least once. All posts will be different as each writer has received their own original set of words. No blogger knows who received their words or in what direction the writer will take them. Until today.   

My words are: sustainable ~ various ~ coping mechanism ~ slanted ~ raccoon ~ circus

They were submitted by the very creative Jenniy @

https://climaxedtheblog.blogspot.com               

                     

Oh, friends. If you've read this blog for a long time you know that I like to change things up a bit in my home every now-and-then. If it's something simple like painting or moving furniture, I do it myself. If it's more difficult (ala plumbing, electrical or heavy-lifting,) I ask the man for his assistance. This time, I wanted to update our main bathroom. The room is a bit awkward, as it also houses our laundry.  So, I brought it up to the man.

He's silent for a minute (this is him recalling every circus-like remodel we've ever done) and then clenches his jaw together while talking to me which lets me know he'd rather have his teeth pulled than deal with another update. We both want our house to be sustainable for years, but neither of us has the energy anymore. "What will it entail?", he asks.

My List:

1. Paint

2. A new sink top

3. Maybe do something with the dingy floor? (not sure) 

Three things. That's it. At most: 1 trip to Lowes.

Time frame: 1 long weekend

(insert all of the experts and the good Lord above laughing in unison.)

We enlisted our son to help take out all of the room's hardware so we could remove the doors.

We had to move the washer/dryer so I could paint.

Easy enough.

What really happened to my ridiculously naive list: 

Clearing out the bathroom/ when we had hope.

1. Remove the sink top and notice the stained wall and soft bottom of the sink cabinet.

2. Remove the top part of the CABINET and realize the hot water pipes have leaked down the wall and into the floorboards.

3. Remove the corroded pipes and realize they haven't been checked since...the year the man was born? Good heavens people, after I saw the connecters, I doubted everything I've ever known that was good in the world.

The actual hot water connection. There's not enough CLR in the land to help this pipe out.

4. Cry. Assess the damage and hit Lowes.

5.  Lowes for paint, primer, pipes, connectors, and a TOTAL SINK. Remember that our existing toilet has a surface crack in the bowl, so we proactively buy a new one. Who has two thumbs and gets excited for a flipping sale on toilets? This girl.

6. Ask the man to remind me to write about the LAST toilet we installed...

7. During the hook up of new pipes, we assess that the people who laid the existing tile did NOT, in fact, tile under the sink. And the floorboards under the sink are slanted. The floor would need to be replaced.

8. Lowes trip # 2 -  Pickup wallboards, new plywood, a faucet for the NEW SINK, and tiling materials; which should be easy right? (insert more tears). Add to the list mortarboard, grout, tiles, de hazer, mud, (oh yeah, they don't have enough of the tile we chose), and a scraper blade to "pop-up" the existing tiles.

9. Replace sink pipes and decided to start chipping up the tiles, since nothing can happen until we have a floor. Use the scraper. And a hammer. And a sledgehammer. 'Seems the people that lived here previously were either reigning tile champions, or have successfully buried bodies in cement, because that stuff would. not. move.

10. Home Depot this time, to rent a hammer drill. I can't express the frustration we possessed trying to tear up that floor. The tiles merely chipped and all of the mortarboards turned to dust. I'm sure I mentioned that we removed the doors right? Enter everything in my home covered in dirt.

11.  Take a day off to contemplate buying a new home. Perhaps one with an outhouse.

12. Home Depot trip #2 to exchange for a LARGER hammer drill that eventually does a satisfactory job.

all hope and happiness is gone

13. We are five days in and the man and I don't know how we ever loved each other. He huffs and puffs when i move and I can't stand the sight of his dusty-a$$ed jeans. Frustration leads to bickering and nothing makes it better until he mentions ice cream. That's right. Frozen dairy reunites us once again. Mint-chocolate-chip-tasting is totally a coping mechanism, right?

14. Day 6: we have to temporarily move the laundry back to the hook-ups because, oh, I don't know... I have spoiled my boys into not making their underclothes last? Hey, there ARE ways.

still hopeless, but smelling April-fresh.

15. Yeah. STEP FIFTEEN! Would you like to see the finished project? Um, so would we. We are at a standstill while the man does his real job and my grandson wants to go shopping. I'd much rather buy fruity pebbles, stuffed raccoons, and various Legos at Target, than trip over one more sample of porcelain tile.

Wish us luck/Pray for our marriage/Pray for our souls.

Have a wonderful weekend, friends, free from DIY projects or HGTV.

-Michele

Don't forget to check out the other amazing bloggers and see what they've come up with!               

They were submitted by:

 Baking In A Tornado

 Wandering Web Designer

 Spatulas On Parade

 On The Border 

 Sarah Nolan

 Part-time Working Hockey Mom

 Climaxed                                             

Funny Friday October 2019: Hot Sauce!

Funny Friday, October 2019

Today’s post is this month’s Funny Friday, a regular feature published on the last Friday of every month. Funny Friday is a collaborative project. Each month one of the participants submits a picture, then we all write 5 captions or thoughts inspired by that month’s picture. Links to the other bloggers’ posts are below, click on them and see what they’ve come up with. I hope we bring a smile to your face as you start your weekend.

Here’s today’s picture. It was submitted by Karen of Baking In A Tornado.

1. Fashion Alert!!! "Hot Pants" are coming back, Spring 2020

2. I've been called a "smart a$$" before, but never a "spicy a$$." Is that a thing?

3. "If you're not wearing your Sriracha pants on Wednesdays, you can't sit with us."

4. Will my "Frank's Hot Sauce" sweater clash with these pants?

5. You think these are cute? Wait till you see my Soy Sauce slippers! (Kikkoman, of course!)

Click on the links below and let some other bloggers make you smile!

Baking In A Tornado

                    Spatulas on Parade  

Use Your Words October 2019 : I hate tomatoes.

Hey-O friends!
Today’s post is a writing challenge created by Karen @ Baking in A Tornado.  6 participating bloggers picked 4 – 6 words for someone else to use in a post. All words must be used at least once. All posts will be different as each writer has received their own original set of words. No blogger knows who received their words or in what direction the writer will take them. Until today.   

My words are from the very sweet Tamara @ Part-Time Working Hockey Mom  Thanks, Tamara! Those were challenging words, but I loved them!

My words: advocate ~ innate ~ fortify ~ entity ~ toys ~ shrieking

Pattern Story #11 I hate tomatoes.

I'm not talking about the tomatoes that fortify your body with lycopene and potassium (although I'm not crazy about those either.) I'm talking about the little cushions one uses in sewing to hold pins. (View A in the pattern photo below.)

Pattern Property of McCall Pattern Company 2016

When I was in sixth grade, our class participated in various skills units, like wood-shop, cooking, and sewing. There probably were others, but the sewing class definitely sticks in my mind, because I was TERRIBLE at it. I'm not kidding. For our first project, we were taught how to make our very own pin cushion in the shape of yes, a tomato. 

The teacher, Mrs. Hill, carefully showed us each step in creating the project, then held up her own blue ribbon-worthy, perfectly round tomato pin cushion. There may have been oohs and ahhs, I can't recall everything. Finally, we were off to make our own. I thought I followed every direction. I cut, stuffed, and wrapped the fabric and string just like the teacher did in her directions. Looking around the class, I saw other students holding up their red entities with pride. Me? I held up a mess of stuffed, stretched fabric and thread cut into too many pieces. I slowly walked up to Mrs. Hill and watched as she put her hands to her cheeks and shook her head in disgust dismay. 

By now, my classmates were finished shrieking in delight at their creations. They had succeeded with their ripe, perfect, probably-soon-to-be-thrown-in-the-trash-after-class projects and were ready to move on. I was cursing my innate inability to reproduce a fabric, sawdust-filled piece of fake fruit from perfectly given directions.  I must admit, my tomato resembled a red egg. Or, as Mrs. Hill put it, my pin cushion looked "like a flat, pet rock". Thanks for that, "Teach."

Mrs. Hill may not have been her correct name, It's been almost 40 years since I sat in that class. But today, I can close my eyes and see her disappointment in that squishy mess. In the days that followed, while the other children were off on their next projects (probably sewing life-like toys or 17th century costumes; I don't know,) Mrs. Hill, whose job was to be an advocate of both home-made goods and children, (thank goodness!) spent a chunk of her time helping me turn my "pet rock" into a somewhat familiar-looking red orb. Where is it now? I have no idea. Funny what you choose to remember. (and forget.)

I'd like to tell you that as a seamstress or as a teacher who gives directions to little ones that I've overcome the disdain I hold for those tomatoes, but I'd be lying. I've never made one since. My pins are kept in bowls where I can easily grab them. The cushions I've accumulated over the years have been tag-a-longs from eBay sewing-kits, antique stores, or Joann's.  The middle one in the photo above belonged to my husband's grandmother. (Okay, I actually love THAT one.)

So you might ask me, "Why/When/How in the world did you even start to sew after such a disastrous experience? You know the kind, Michele. The experiences where you can still remember small details 40 years later? The kind when you recall a particular failure, you feel the shame of it late at night?"

My only answer is that I learned to master it like anything else in my life. 
Out of spite.
:)

My REAL sewing buddy/pet rock, Tom. Tom-ato. Never forget.

Have a "fruitful" weekend friends,

Michele

Check out the other cool kids playing "Use Your Words" this month!

       Baking In a Tornado

       Wandering Web Designer

       Spatulas on Parade

       On the Border

       Climaxed     

       Part-Time Working Hockey Mom