It's been quite a stressful week, in a low-key kind of way. I don't deal well with chaos; nor, apparently, do I deal well with empty rooms, day after day. This is what we almost got used to:
While the dining room was crowded with furniture. I was surprised at how stressed I became, more so each day as the building work continued inside and out. Not that the builders caused any trouble at all: they did an excellent job, and cleaned up after themselves every day. We were very impressed, and asked them to do some other things around the house too.
The kittens had to be shut away when plastering and painting were happening in the living room, and as soon as they were let into the room, they wanted to investigate everything:
Alex blogged about the building work too.
On Friday morning the last of the inside work was done and we were able to move things back to their normal places. We're still waiting for one new sofa and one re-covered one, but at least the room no longer echoes badly, and I feel so much more relaxed with the rug, curtains and so on in place again:
Just in case things were getting too peaceful, Richard decided to look for some paintings to put in what was Tim's room. Our 'spare' paintings (mostly from one or other of our grandmothers) were in a closet in my study, which had become a general dumping ground for old pieces of cloth (from curtains, mainly), not-quite-finished needlework projects, soft toy stuffing, random ornaments, old boxes...
Everything ended up on my floor and I commented that the closet would be much easier to organise with a couple of extra shelves. And then I realised there were two shelves in high cupboards which I couldn't easily reach, even standing on a chair. So we got those out, and Richard trimmed them to size, and we bought some little shelf-hanging thingies... and I re-organised the closet completely. That was quite a job but it looks so much better now.
As for my December daily tasks, they've been a whole lot more random than I had hoped. Still, in seven days (including today) I have acquired a poinsettia, made mincemeat, made Christmas puddings, written our family newsletter, designed and ordered calendars, and done almost all the online Christmas shopping for family both here and in the UK. I've also uploaded and ordered photos from June through to the end of December. That's not specifically for Christmas but it makes a seventh task!
I still want to do some other food preparation, and have to write and post cards this week as well as the final bits of gift shopping; we also need to do a lot of food shopping and order our turkey. At some point I'll marzipan and ice the cake. And we'll put up the tree and other (minimal) decorations. But still, given that I've had to work around a fairly chaotic house, I'm glad to have achieved as much as I have.
While the dining room was crowded with furniture. I was surprised at how stressed I became, more so each day as the building work continued inside and out. Not that the builders caused any trouble at all: they did an excellent job, and cleaned up after themselves every day. We were very impressed, and asked them to do some other things around the house too.
The kittens had to be shut away when plastering and painting were happening in the living room, and as soon as they were let into the room, they wanted to investigate everything:
Alex blogged about the building work too.
On Friday morning the last of the inside work was done and we were able to move things back to their normal places. We're still waiting for one new sofa and one re-covered one, but at least the room no longer echoes badly, and I feel so much more relaxed with the rug, curtains and so on in place again:
Just in case things were getting too peaceful, Richard decided to look for some paintings to put in what was Tim's room. Our 'spare' paintings (mostly from one or other of our grandmothers) were in a closet in my study, which had become a general dumping ground for old pieces of cloth (from curtains, mainly), not-quite-finished needlework projects, soft toy stuffing, random ornaments, old boxes...
Everything ended up on my floor and I commented that the closet would be much easier to organise with a couple of extra shelves. And then I realised there were two shelves in high cupboards which I couldn't easily reach, even standing on a chair. So we got those out, and Richard trimmed them to size, and we bought some little shelf-hanging thingies... and I re-organised the closet completely. That was quite a job but it looks so much better now.
As for my December daily tasks, they've been a whole lot more random than I had hoped. Still, in seven days (including today) I have acquired a poinsettia, made mincemeat, made Christmas puddings, written our family newsletter, designed and ordered calendars, and done almost all the online Christmas shopping for family both here and in the UK. I've also uploaded and ordered photos from June through to the end of December. That's not specifically for Christmas but it makes a seventh task!
I still want to do some other food preparation, and have to write and post cards this week as well as the final bits of gift shopping; we also need to do a lot of food shopping and order our turkey. At some point I'll marzipan and ice the cake. And we'll put up the tree and other (minimal) decorations. But still, given that I've had to work around a fairly chaotic house, I'm glad to have achieved as much as I have.
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