Fast and Furious

Since the recent discovery that Jack and I had not planed enough wood to cover the dining room floor, the work has been fast and furious.  In the last few weeks, I’ve ripped up the living room floor, puttied, sanded and painted the living room, removed the nails and scraped the wood from the living room flooring and have a pretty good head start on planing them, cleaned up half of the front porch so I could rip up the carpet and finished the re-laying the dining room, all while managing to run a household and curtailing my head from dramatically exploding.  Sometimes, that requires a dose of Aspirin.

I’m happy to make some progress on the house, even if it is difficult to see at times.  Jack comes home and almost always says something to the effect of, “Wow, you got a lot done today”–unfortunately, it’s to no avail.  By dinnertime, I’m usually grumbling how I haven’t even checked off half of my list.  Being too ambitious is an incurable sickness, it seems.

The ultimate goal is to have the carpet laid, the baseboard and trim replaced and the dining room floor polished as smooth as a baby’s bottom before the month’s through.  The deadline is the arrival of cold weather when glue doesn’t cure, polyurethane doesn’t dry and my fingers are too numb to do the work properly.  In short, I’ll be cut off from doing much work outdoors.  I suppose I should admit the real pressure is an impending visit from my parents.  Usually, I hold off on major projects until they can come and help but for some reason, I’m really going for the Wow! factor.  It’s been a while since they’ve stopped by and I want something to show for my efforts.  I’m also excited for carpet because Claire ends up looking like an infant chimney sweep every time she scuttles across the living room.  Darn grimy subfloor.

I indulge in vivid reveries while I work, imagining the day when I can entertain guests in my house without catching any mortified expressions or snide remarks.  I suppose that boils down to really just wanting to satisfy my ego.

Once in a while, it’s probably okay to feed that sense of pride in my accomplishments.  It takes me one step closer to my dream, giving me another reason to smile and reward myself with a bowl of ice cream.