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Quasi Spring Cleaning

Something in the wind must be changing, or maybe the extended daylight is having an effect on me. I feel the compelling need to clean. It’s weird, but it MUST BE DONE.
I bought a small vacuum cleaner on sale at Target on Sunday. Why would I need a cheap one when I have a very nice expensive one? Because my nice expensive one weighs a ton and is NOT friendly for stair cleaning. Up until several hours ago my upper stairs were coated in fluffy gray cat hair. No more! I left work a teeny bit early so I could go home and vacuum. 17 months after we moved in I finally cleaned the stairs and it felt awesome. I didn’t just stop there, though. I vacuumed air vents, ceiling corners, and areas of the floor where mounds of fluffy gray hair had long been accumulating.

Disaster Looming...

Mere weeks before we moved into our house in 2006 a storm ripped through Madison causing a major branch of the silver maple to split and nose dive into the neighbors’ yard. This was somewhat worrisome. Was the tree sick? Would it die? Would it collapse on the house? Most importantly: how much was it going to cost us?

It seemed to be OK, but it was starting to touch the roof. I had heard that branches touching the roof creates an easy highway for animals and insects to invade your house. This was not a desirable scenario. We called in a tree specialist to look at the tree and give us an estimate of how much it would cost to prune it.

Dreaming of Gardening...

Saturday I went to the WPT Garden Show. I attended seminars on organic gardening, composting and vermiculture. I even dragged myself out of bed at 7:30am on a Saturday (unheard of in recent history) to get to the 9am seminar. I’m not completely sold in keeping bins of worms in my basement, even if the guy was really enthusiastic about worms. I’d just be happy to have a hot, happy, active compost bin by the end of the summer.

I spent nearly 6 hours at the garden show talking to people, learning new gardening things, and drooling over gorgeous outdoor decorating ideas. Sure, I’d love a stone patio with a built-in outdoor oven/grill — if only I had a bigger, wider backyard and plenty of excess money.

How to save a big chunk o' change

It wouldn’t be news say that interest rates have been fluctuating. We managed to get in on that crazy action and hit the elusive sweet spot: a good appraisal in a crappy market AND a kick-ass interest rate.

Today we signed our mortgage papers on a refinance that will theoretically put us out of primary mortgage debt by the time Adam graduates from high school.

It also marks the first time I’ve ever realistically planned this far in the future. It is a little unsettling to realize that in 2023 I’ll be…(I had to do some math) I’ll be old. oy vey!

I can’t even see the grown-up in the pre-schooler, but in 15 years he’ll be there. As my mortgage shrinks, my son will grow and grow and grow, potentially up to 6’4 (so say the growth chart calculators).

Home sick, but with internets

I’m home sick today. Feeling like crap was not part of the agenda for the week.

The good news is that our our internets are back after two days. I was starting to have withdrawal. I had to resort to a yellow, paper, book-like thing to find the number for a local business yesterday. Barbaric!

Damned Dam, Damn!

Saturday night I came in from shoveling snow and was standing at the kitchen sink looking when I noticed water, water, everywhere.

My first thought was that Adam had used the sprayer and had soaked the ledge. I wiped up a lot of water from the window sill and felt a drip. I noticed that there was also water on the middle ledge on the window. There was a lot of water there too. I wiped that up and felt another drip. I looked up and didn’t see a wet spot or hole in the ceiling. Finally I saw the source of the water — the molding above the window was leaking water like a sieve. I touched it, the wood was still solid, but the plaster behind it was squishy.

It's Time for the Latest Edition of...

Owning an Older House Wheel of Chance. Today we’re going to play “OhMyGod, What’s that Smell?!” and the related game of “How Much Will it Cost Me to Fix It?”

I love lots of things about my house: the location, the floor plan, the arched entry ways, our big bedroom, lots of storage space, big (enough) kitchen…
There are things I don’t like though and they all seem to revolve around odors.
After we moved in I was able to identify quite a few and eliminate them — like the Fry Daddy up in a cabinet in the kitchen with old oil, or the grease filter under the microwave (sticky And stinky!) The basement carpet loves to smell mildewy in the summer, but the dehumidifier takes care of that problem.
Today, however, was completely unexpected.

Hot Midnight Wiring Action

Around 12:30 we were getting ready for bed and I went to flip the light switch.
This should be a simple action that requires no thought and minimal use of finger muscles. It did not. I had to push very hard to make it turn off, and then harder still to turn it back on and call Mike’s attention to our broken light switch.
He turned it on and off and agreed that our switch was broken. Then we went to bed.
We discussed the broken light switch in the dark. It loomed there in the dark. FIRE HAZARD mere feet from our heads. We confirmed we had a fire extinguisher in the room, but were unsure of the presence of a smoke alarm upstairs. I pointed out we had one unopened paddle switch in the room.

Backyard Bandits

Tonight we were lounging on the porch when we noticed we had some visitors over by the sandbox. A mama raccoon and 5(!) babies had waddled up onto our patio. They were remarkably unconcerned by the people indoors yelling at them. Two of the babies crawled on top of the sandbox cover and the rest just explored the patio and looked for water in the downspout. Then, as quickly as they’d come, they were gone again.

We retrieved Clio from outside before she decided to defend her territory against a (likely) territorial mama raccoon and become raccoon food. Then I took out the maglight flashlight to patrol the neighborhood in search of their home. My neighbors probably think I’m insane. I found no raccoon den, but I did observe a lot of late-night crazy cat behavior.

In Other News from the Homestead

The patio is finished! Of course, we have no furniture for it.. :(
Woohoo!
The porch is almost finished.
This whole past week were were painting. We spent 2 evenings putting primer on the wood and drywall, the next night I went to the Wisconsin Women in Government Banquet to hear Elizabeth Edwards speak while Mike and his parents painted the ceiling and trim. (Thank you!)
Today we put 2 coats on the walls and we’re done!
Tomorrow carpeting and re-furnishing the porch and we’re ready for Memorial Day!
Woowoo!