Unreserved

Forgot to add:
The scene - the Saturday before Christmas. Claire is wailing after having been clobbered in the head with an ornament by her sister.
Anna: I'm not being very good.
Me: No, you aren't behaving.
Anna: Why?
Me: I don't know. It would be good if you'd behave.
Anna: Why?
Me: Why did you hit your sister in the head with a Santa Claus?
Anna: I didn't hit my sister in the head with a Santa Claus. I hit her in the head with a snowman.
Me: Oh, well that makes it okay then.

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I hope all seven of my readers had the merriest of Christmases. I know we here at Chez Unreserved did. As merry as can be expected considering Christmas is more like a marathon than a holiday. I mean this in the best possible way, but holy cow what a lot of extra work it is!
I hear people lamenting the loss of the mystical qualities the Christmases of their youth seemed to posses. I think it's sort of like Disney World. If you were a high school band nerd in the past 15 yrs or so, you may have had the opportunity to march in a parade there. The theme park management is very protective of the image portrayed inside the gates of the park. While waiting behind the scenes, we were strictly warned that anyone caught taking pictures of "backstage" would have their camera confiscated and the film destroyed. It's not that there was anything horrific back there (at least in the parts we were privy to), but it's disconcerting to see Dopey sans head.
In the same way, when actively involved in making Christmas happen in one's own household, it can require effort to sit back and watch the magic unfold without the constant "I need to grab a garbage bag for all this giftwrap which reminds me that the trash needs to go out tomorrow and that means I should scoop the cat box before morning speaking of the cat we're low on cat food must add that to the grocery list along with more size three diapers and another bunch of bananas...." monologue running through one's head.
Anyway, Christmas came and is in the process of wenting and our living room looks like it's been toy bombed and Anna has subsisted on nearly unadulterated cane sugar for the past several days. I'm off work for the week and doing my best to be as unproductive as possible. It makes me twitchy. The kitchen did not get finished in time for the holidays, of course. Now that I've lost my momentum, the thought of sanding drywall mud makes me cringe. We just got all the dust cleaned up! But if I do, there's a good chance the walls will be done enough to paint, and that should inspire the sprint to the finish line. Meh. Time to drink more eggnog and knit.

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I still have thinset under my nails. And in my slippers. And probably in my hair for all I know. I've finished laying the porcelain tiles in the kitchen. Hooray! What a job and half that was! Our kitchen is approximately 90 square feet, but it's 90 square feet of oddly laid out room. It's basically like three hallways converging. This means there was much cutting involved. I am grateful for the use of my father's tile saw. It's very noisy. I am grateful for the use of my husbands noise-blocking ear phones (leftover from a long ago visit to an aircraft carrier - your tax dollars at work). I am grateful that my husband kindly occupied the girls so that I could spend the weekend crawling around my kitchen dripping thinset everywhere.

I tried to complete a seemingly minor task today. I bought a replacement sink sprayer and tried to install it. In doing so, I somehow made the entire faucet quit working. The combination of Google and my rudimentary faucet repair skills tells me that we need a new diverter valve. In the meantime, we got the fauct working, albeit poorly.

So now what? Well, I'm not done finishing the new drywall that went up where the doorway framing used to be. The ceiling is nearly finished and ready to paint. We're second guessing our choice to paint the (top) walls red and are considering green. I got the beadboard panelling for the wainscot today and the less said about that misadventure the better. (no animals were harmed in the transportation of the beadboard) There's grout to put down, and cabinets to finish. We're crawling toward the finish line and my but I am tired of the kitchen.

I hear rumor that there some sort of holiday in a week or so....will have to look into that.

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There are some tiles on my kitchen floor. They are adhered there!
There are some Christmas lights on my house. They are lit!
There is some drywall in the space left by removing the kitchen doorway. It is flat!
There are some decorations up inside the house. They will be dusty when the drywall mud is sanded, but the world will continue turning on its axis.
There has been some knitting going on, but I'm pretty much convinced that it won't be done in time for its intended deadline. I'm brainstorming plan Bs for the meantime.
There are two little girls upstairs. They are sleeping!
I believe I will join them.

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Over the weekend DH repaired the rotted kitchen subflooring and I cut all the pieces of WonderBoard for the floor. I had planned on mortaring them to the floor Monday night, but was knocked on my butt by the latest headplague courtesy of small children who have no concept of germs except as collector's items.

The kitchen is more torn up than usual on account of having the majority of items off the floor. This includes the removal of the bifold door that leads to the basement. I unwisely propped this door in the doorway yesterday evening to stop the draft coming from downstairs. This was unwise because the cat pushed it back over into the stove and now there's a stovecorner sized hole in the door. Stupid luann. Stupid cat. (Don't tell Anna I said that) Stupid cat owner.

A closer calculation reveals that we're going to need more tiles. I sort of expected this. A search for more tiles like the ones I've procured (for free, so no big loss if they must be scrapped) is ongoing but thusfar fruitless. (which makes sense - if I had successfully found the same tile, why would I still be searching?) Plan B is to get all new tiles. I'm flexible.

I'm really itching to finish the kitchen's messier bits so we can decorate for Christmas inside. I figured at the very least we (DH) could get the outside lights up. Turns out our icicle lights have seen a few too many winters. I stopped to get more on one of my many Home Deposit trips only to find they were out of clear ones. This was a great excuse to buck the trend and go with "swag" lights. DH just went to put them up and informed me that one box is clear and the other two are multicolored.

I can't win. I'm sick. I'm tired. There's way too much to do and not enough time to do it. The annoying goody-two-shoes angel on my right shoulder tells me I should remember what the season is all about and not stress over the little things. She reminds me that Christmas will come whether the kitchen has new flooring and intact walls or not.
Smarmy bitch.

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