3.05.2008

Finish What You Start

There are ups and downs to living in the house while there is still substantial work to be done. On the plus side, we no longer have to plan our weekends around 40-mile trips to a house without furniture or any means of cooking food (and typically in a snow/ice storm). On the down side, however, I keep finding myself with, say, an hour of free time to tackle a project on a whim that takes three hours to complete. This haphazard approach to home remodeling has left us with the following:
  • A new wooden, bi-fold door my brother and I cut to fit the kitchen pantry, yet remains unpainted and uninstalled.
  • Power ran to the non-functioning (and previously powerless) doorbell, which still doesn't work for some unknown reason.
  • All the materials purchased and assembled to install a new light in the coat closet, but the install itself is on hold because I don't have any tool right now that will cut the lathe board.
  • And my favorite: a door on the upstairs bathroom that doesn't fit the doorway because I took the old door off to fit onto the previously door-less laundry room, and I didn't thoroughly measure the "new" bathroom door before hanging it in the bathroom, and now it is about 1/4" too wide.
I've definitely lost my focus, and it's showing in my recent remodeling efforts. Remember just a few weeks ago, when I was espousing our One Room A Month Plan? I wish I could consistently bring that type of focus to the table, but right now I feel like I'm just hopping around from task to task as the mood strikes me. And the maddening part is that I don't even care! I like living in the house, and I think that's causing me to overlook all the little imperfections that should be driving me crazy, but are not. But things can't go on like this forever. Some of these projects need to be finished before starting others. In fact, right now Kendra is priming that pantry door, so maybe we can start checking off some of these items off the "to-do" list. I even hear there are rumors of a trip to Lowe's and Home Depot this weekend . . .

2 comments:

Suze said...

jumping from task to task...I hear multi-tasking...that's how I roll too. Sure there are multiple projects to do, but if doing little parts of each one eventually gets ALL of them done, the point is...they get done. You guys have done SO much work on that house, you deserve a break from "Big" projects.

Jennifer said...

Sounds like my house!