What goes up, must come down

so you can paint. It just never stops. After I got the house all tucked in to suit me and crashed I was up twice with this stupid whatever it is. I have an aching swollen gland behind my ear and that ear is sore and inflamed. Ow. I hate that.

When I got home last night Best Girl had torn the bathroom apart, stuffed it's contents into the bedroom and begun washing the walls and ceiling. She was on a break sitting in the newly assembled living room on a new loveseat and reading with a dog curled up beside her. She said it was so quiet and peaceful that she didn't even turn on the tv or tunes.

I love it that the room is so comfortable for her, and sis and mom and me! Now I have to finish the rest of the down stairs so I can get after the upstairs. She stayed, packed up some dishes I am getting rid of and then took off for home after we hashed out a plan for today that made me so happy I just kept giving her money...LOL!

I hate shopping. I didn't have any fun on Saturday and dreaded the things I knew I still needed eating up hours of my time this weekend when I want to be working on the house. Wow! She LIKES to shop, especially when it's not her money!

The list - 3 of one kind and 2 of another kind of candle, 50 lbs of dog food, a hundred lbs of bird seed, six window panels, one more valance, get the last yard of material we did the chairs in, smokes for me, two curtain rods, some hardware, return the shade with the broken spring and dog chewies. It was three stores, minimum, and probably four. I so didn't want to do it. I gave her the estimated cash and twenty bucks for gas and time. She had it all done before ten today. I totally don't know how I would do this without her.

Not to mention the dog is doing so well with the extra attention that I am trying to figure out how to bribe her for two nights a week of just petting the animals. Today she will fill the bird feeders, the dog water, find the heater for the dogs and set it up in their shed, finish boxing the glass ware and then start painting the bathroom. WOW, again. All this and she is leaving by two thirty today to take her kid to his dad's. (I said to Mom, after I recited all this, "I want a kid like her! --- OH! She IS my kid! Chortle! How did I get so lucky in all my children!" )

When I get home I am fully motivated to iron all the new curtains, put a second coat on the bathroom and clean up the mess again so the house looks ok for if people stop by and see me. I can make dinner, feed the animals, watch the birds feeding while I eat and relax, too.

I have been no slouch, either. I got laundry done, including a load of bedding, which I hate doing, got the rest of the bathroom scrubbed down, grabbed a sandwich and milk, tidied the living room (it's so easy now! straighten the covers on everything, dump ash trays and wipe, run a rag on the end tables - POOF! done.) Why didn't I get more done?

Because I was going to put the five buttons each back in the chair backs we had done by myself. HA! Now I took those backs off. They had ten shank buttons tied in. The nice lady that fixed up the cushions sent these gadgets that look like a cloth covered giant tac on one side with a matching tac head with a hole in it on the other that snaps together. Shove the pointy end into the cushion, through the wicker and snap the cap on it. No big whoop, right?

I gathered my tools and laid a cushion over my knees, found the correct place and started to push the sharp part through - it won't go. REALLY won't go, like with a hammer won't go. OK, I get an awl and drive a hole. I have to take the cushion over to the table and lean in with all my weight to get that hole. I don't know what these are lined with inside but it should be impervious to tears. It was totally he-man straining to pierce it.

The little tac part won't go straight in. The pin pops off it's mount and lays any which way when you try to shove it through. I finally took the end of a big safety pin, the round part, put it over the pointy end I could feel behind the iron lining and pushed on the pin to get the material to give enough that the tac would go through.

I dicked with this for HOURS and finally got 3 done on each cushion but FORGET putting it through the wicker. I picked out four of the shank buttons that were in them and four of the new tac parts that also have small holes in the cap around the pin part. I found the sewing kit when I was looking for something else in the bedroom. Tonight I will use my beloved carpet and button thread and do the last two top buttons on each back and tie them through the wicker to keep the cushions in place on the chairs. What a furkin joke! A twenty minute job took two and a half hours. So that's why I didn't get as much done as I wanted. But the cushions look brand new!

Tonight we paint the bathroom. I called the plumber and the window guy. I get the one on Wednesday next week and the other on Thursday. If we can get the pantry and bedroom done I can have new vinyl next Friday or Monday and be down to putting things back where they go, framing and putting up pictures, the fun stuff, ya know? Two more weeks of chaos and I may have the down stairs whipped.

The upstairs has a door I can close so it won't make me so crazy while it's torn up. Ya team!