One (Renovation) Step At A Time

Progress on the home renovations onion has been slow, but it has been made.  Consider that so far this year, we have:

• Renovated the laundry room,
• Negotiated the financing to tackle redoing the master bath and the kitchen, and
• Arranged for new closet systems to be installed

To that list we can now add, re-carpeted the entire upstairs: last week we completed that effort with the installation of new carpet throughout the upper floor, and even in the study--the only carpets not done were the entire basement level, which can certainly wait another decade as far as I'm concerned.  

But now that the carpets are done upstairs, we can proceed with the installation of the new closet system, which will be done on August 15.  That will mean some more demo and repainting work beforehand, but things that I should certainly be able to knock out beforehand.

We are, after all, making progress on our plans for the year.  And I am also proud of the fact that (as best we can tell) Fergie has not yet "christened" the new carpets, although she certainly does enjoy snuffling in them for all the wonderful new smells.  And it is a wonderful change to have springy carpeting underfoot, as opposed to what we had had for at least the last nine years (and who knows how long before that).

Over our Vermont week I hope we can come to consensus on the contractor for the master bath, which we've agreed will be the first project.  Then perhaps we can begin setting that up, and make that happen within this year.

Isabella, 2011 - 2013

Tonight we lost one of our two pet gerbils, Isabella, who had been Sarah's.  We got them at the end of March 2011, hardly as newborns, and knowing that the average gerbil lives to be two to three years old, it's not surprising that we're now facing the loss of our first one.  But that doesn't make it any easier on Sarah tonight.

Isabella was the "fun one," the social one, the one who would run over to the cage bars first to sniff us and see if we brought any pumpkin seeds.  She also, quite frankly, became the plump one, despite being the one more likely to be found on the wheel than her sister Gerb.  We tried to spread the treats around, but somehow Bella seemed to be able to wrangle more than enough food.

Bella was the one who, on being put into her plastic gerbil ball, would run and run and run all over the floor while the kids changed their cages; Gerb would be more content to just wait patiently.  She would try to climb out of the box, or the cage, or wherever, and when we opened the cage door to let them come out and explore, Bella was always the first one to venture out.  She was the first gerbil to trust me enough to come out into my hands and let me pick her up and carry her around.

Sarah loved her gerbil, and is taking it quite hard, blaming herself for not caring for them enough.  With a new dog in the house, it's understandable that the old gerbils would have gotten less attention over the past few months, but they were never truly abandoned.

We found a box that had been the presentation box for a fountain pen, and made a bed of aspen chips for her, and nestled her in there, covering her head with some extra chips.  David dug a nice deep hole out back, next to the azaleas, in the same area as where we buried Fishy Fish some four or five years ago, and laid her to rest.  Jacob Franklin, who was visiting, made an impromptu cross from a twig, and so tonight Isabella sleeps a much longer rest, while Sarah will hardly sleep at all.  Rest in peace, little gerbil, and thanks for the memories.

Canine Theology

This past Sunday, I had the opportunity to bring the message to the 8:30 service at our church, Sydenstricker UMC.  Somebody thought it would be a good idea to record it.  Silly.  Anyway, I talked about what our new dog has been teaching me about faith.  Give a listen, see what you think.

Fergie: The Q1 Report

It's been three months since the firm expanded and acquired new human capital...er, canine...and in the interests of keeping shareholders appraised of the status of the firm's latest strategic expansion, the following are offered on Fergie's first three months with us.

Consistent with expectations, Fergie is becoming more and more a team player, integrating into operations fairly seamlessly.  While she had some missteps, especially in the first few weeks, fortunately the rest of the firm did not misstep into her missteps frequently at all.  In fact, over the past month there have been vanishingly few incidents, as she is becoming more confident and capable of managing the independence expected of someone in her position, especially during the six hours each weekday that she's alone.  Evenings, she is most often found in conference with other members of the firm, usually in the family room watching TV; nights are on a rotation among three of the firm's four principals (the fourth tends to keep his door closed).

Fergie has displayed an intellectual capacity we had not fully expected, on several levels.  At a more cunning level, she has demonstrated the ability to pry open cupboards and pantry doors left insufficiently closed, as well as the intellectual curiosity to want to explore all that lies behind those formerly closed portals.  Sometimes the results are amusing, other times more annoying.  However, at a higher level her intellectual curiosity manifests itself in her love of books.  Several occasions she has selected a book from one of our bookshelves and simply devoured it.  While her desire for self-improvement is appreciated, the resulting "book reviews" she creates are not.

One area of growth remains manners around others not of the firm, where she is capable of displaying almost animal-like aggression on occasion, necessitating a quick, impromptu performance review session.  This seems most pronounced among other canines she may encounter, and the occasional moth, for some unknown reason.  However, her essential mien remains one of welcome, as long as the proper amount of scritches are applied strategically.

Into the second quarter, we continue to anticipate further growth and development, while maintaining her healthy 46-pound bottom line.  Simultaneously, we expect further refinement in performance as conditions continue to improve and integration becomes more and more complete.

The Home Renovations Onion

It's now four months since the Home and Renovations Show we attended to begin the process of possibly redoing our kitchen and master bathroom, and three months since we had contractors out to give us initial estimates.

And nothing's begun.

Making progress on this has been like peeling back an onion: nothing is as simple as it seemed at first blush.  For instance, one of our first commitments was to redo the closets with a new closet system for us and for Sarah.  We've signed the contract to get that done.  However, it dawned on us that the new closet furniture will be installed, and pretty immovably, on top of the carpets...the carpets that have been there for at least the nine years since we moved in, and God knows how long before that.  Replacing the one in our closet is easy; it's a stand-alone patch of carpet, since the tile floor of the bathroom begins just outside it.  However, Sarah's closet carpet flows into her room...which flows into the upstairs hall...which flows into the guest room (oy, there's one that really needs replacing), David's room, our room...which means a much larger project than at first blush.  (The carpet guy is coming out tonight to take a look.)

Picking a contractor took awhile; I think we've come to a point of decision on whom we want to use, but we also want to lock in the financing first before we make a multi-tens-of-thousands commitment and find we can't back it up.  So we back up to start looking for a home equity line of credit (HELOC).

A simple query on Lending Tree turned into an interesting snapshot of credit markets post-2008.  Only one lender was willing to talk with us, and quoted us rates that seemed higher than I had expected; apparently these days lenders just aren't willing to take a subordinate position to homeowners, even those of us with credit scores around 800.  They suggested a cash-out refinance, but then when we started exploring that (with a fresh Lending Tree query), everyone said we were asking for too much cash out for the credit markets to bear these days.

Fortunately, one lender made the comment that a credit union has different, looser rules, and so we're now in the process of getting final approval for a HELOC through our credit union.  But the multiple rounds of that have precluded us from making final decisions on a contractor, let alone the scope of work and details of the project.

I do remain optimistic that our plan for the year--that There's Gonna Be Some Changes--will still come about, even in this realm.  It just may be into the fall before the renovations are done.  And it will take all my willpower not to suggest to the designers to put up wallpaper with onions on it, to remind me constantly about the level of effort required to get there.