Upgrades, Repairs, and Other Joys of Home-Owning

Back in July, when we were so young and fresh-faced, Keene and I walked through what would become our home. We oohed and ahhed and peeked in rooms. We mentally redecorated the living room and pictured the children playing in the backyard. We immediately began the process of buying the house.

But you know what we should have done? We should have been pulling the previous owners' clothes out of the closet. We should have knocked all of their dishes out of the cupboards. We should have pushed their toolboxes off of the workbenches in the garage. Because you know what we found once the house was empty and ready for us to move in? A whole lot of particle board.

Bowed particle board in the closets. Sticky particle board in the pantry. Waterlogged particle board in the garage. There was more particle board in the house than in all of Home Depot.

So, I've had some people ask for pictures of our various upgrades and repairs. (Yes, really! This isn't a situation where I just want to talk about something, so I say, "People have been asking me ________." No, people really have been asking me. Seriously, I can prove it.) So here are our latest projects.

Pantry

This was the very first thing we blew money on fixed up. Now, this is actually a picture of our closet, but the shelves are similar to those in the pantry. Meaning, exposed particle board, haphazardly installed, and awfully inefficient where space is concerned.


Keene started by ripping out all of the shelves. Turns out, the walls behind the shelves were just as gross:


We repainted the walls and Keene installed wire racks instead:


And then he installed a broom/mop/child-holder on the back of the door:


Now, ten points if you can spot our next repair in this picture.


Think you've got it?

Yup, the door itself. Notice how it awesomely opens so that it effectively blocks you from the rest of the kitchen? We have found that that area is like a little Bermuda Triangle: In the span of four feet, you have a bathroom door, pantry door, two spice cabinets, the fridge, and the dishwasher all vying for the same opening space. At least once a week, somebody finds him or herself trapped in this mess of doors. While it may not solve the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle, replacing the pantry door (so it swings in the other direction) will be a quick and easy fix.

Before:

After:

Here is a dramatic reenactment:


Garbage Disposal

Moving along, we also installed a garbage disposal. I wish I had pictures of the before/after and installation process. But that would have been very boring, so I didn't do it. Instead, here's the after:



Spider Tree

There is a large fir tree in our front yard. It was so close to the house, it literally pressed on it. An inspector told us that it would eventually have to be chopped down, as it would wreck havoc on the house. We decided to just trim the branches which were touching the house--rather than chopping the whole thing right away.

So we started with this:


And we started chopping branches.


And then we discovered something horrific: old pine needles literally two feet deep below the branches. Which emitted strange, green fumes and set forth hundreds of wolf spiders when we tried raking them.

Blehuhuhchu. That's the sound I made. Over the course of a weekend, we alternated chopping branches with exorcising the pine needles using a snow shovel and garbage bags.


Once the trunk was naked from seven feet down, we called it quits.

Landfill cleanup

One thing we did notice during the initial walkthrough was this:


A large pile of junk, garbage, and rotting wood. "No worries," we thought. "That'll be gone before we move in! Yay!"

But guess what was waiting for us once we moved in.


Another weekend of hauling garbage to the curb and further testing our garbageman's boundaries.

Kayden's New Room

Finally, a fun project! Kayden got his loft bed about four years ago:



For those not in the know, a loft bed is basically a bunk bed, except instead of a bed on the bottom, it's just open space. Or you could think of it as a bed on stilts.

Anyhow, the loft bed was fun and novel when Kayden was a little boy of eight. But now he's a strapping young man of eleven and the loft bed has lost its appeal. Every night, climbing up and down a ladder has started to wear on him. Moreover, his new room has a lot less space than his room at the old apartment, so we were facing a serious organizational dilemma.

So I came up with a brilliant idea.

We took out the mattress from the loft and measured the area:


Then we had a piece of heavy plywood fitted (albeit very tightly fitted) to the area:


Keene bolted the plywood to the metal bars, using carriage screws, nuts, and these weird metal things:



Then we lay down a rug which appeared to be made from the fur of a Muppet.


Maia did the honors of smell-testing the new carpet:


Keene built a wall-hung bookshelf, which was promptly filled to bursting:


When times got hard and our motivation wanned, Kayden pushed us to keep going:


And gave his approval of his new reading- and play-nook:


Lastly, we moved Kayden's mattress (temporarily on the floor) to underneath the loft and his desk against the wall. I wish I had taken a before picture to show what a huge change this was and how much space it created for him. Next time, next time.

That kid is snarky

Aye aye aye. Kayden. It's really hard to get after him about being snarky when I'm too busy laughing behind my hand.

So, we were all in the car last night, on our way to take Kayden to his dad's house. Maia was eating (fast food, since we were en route).

Several times, I heard Kayden telling her to close her mouth while she eats (she is quite a loud eater). She continued to eat with her mouth open.

Finally, Keene said something like, "Well, Kayden, you have to give her a break if she occasionally opens her mouth to breathe or something..."

Without missing a beat, he said, "Isn't that what a nose is for?"

Toilets, Gizmo, Fly-Glue, and Auto-Tune: Why, This Must be a Mish-Mash!

I really love decals. I wish I had the money and permanent space to buy a bunch. This is my current favorite at the Etsy shop, Flush Please:


I love these ones too, but unfortunately, it seems the seller has since closed her (I don't know why I assume everyone on Etsy is a girl) shop:



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While visiting my sister once, she remarked that Kayden looked like Gizmo from the movie, Gremlins. "He looks like a little Gizmo doll with his big brown eyes!" Kayden pretended to be offended (and still does, since I occasional call out, "Mogwai!" when he's around), but I think secretly he likes it. Because, let's face it: Gizmo is pretty damn cute.



Except for those shudderingly creepy fingernails.
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Keene found an article at Tasteless Photography about urban explorers who rappelled down into a bell-mouth spillway. Meep! As it turns out, it is as scary as I imagined. Check out the link for even more pictures.



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Looking for something to pass the time at work?

Tone Matrix
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Awhile back, Keene and I had this conversation as he walked through the front door:

Kelli: Something happened with Maia.

Keene: (joking) Did she poop in her pants?

Kelli: No.

Keene: Did she go crazy and attack Kayden?

Kelli: No, it's worse.

Keene: (starts walking towards Maia's room, getting worried) Is she okay?

Kelli: No. She's...she's listening to autotuned pop music. On the radio.

Keene: (pauses) How did she find it?

Kelli: (despairing) I don't know!

Keene: Did you say anything to her yet?

Kelli: No, I thought you should talk to her yourself. I was about to text you to break it to you gently, but then you came home. I...I didn't want you to find out this way.
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Speaking of auto-tune, here are a couple older videos which deserve to be refreshed in your mind. The first is one of the OGs of my girl-crushes: the red-headed, Irish dancing chick.



This one is just supa-impressive. I don't think I could spell a whole word on my stumpy fingers, let alone remember which word was written where.



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And finally, another blast-from-the-past conversation (which Keene probably doesn't even remember anymore).

I showed him this link: Work Well Together


Keene: Have you ever tried it before.

Kelli: Only with kids...but they didn't fly.

Keene: (jokingly) You worked in daycare?

Kelli: No, tour guide for the Grand Canyon.

Keene: You have a disturbing sense of humor.

Doc Holliday and the Two-Headed Fish: A Visit to Glenwood Springs

On Saturday, we packed our gear into the car and headed towards Glenwood Springs, a mountain town three hours away, where we would camp for the night with Kayden's fellow Cub Scouts.



One of the greatest things about Colorado is that the journey is just as beautiful as the destination.




We arrived in Glenwood Springs just before 11:00 a.m., with me on the verge of death since the air conditioner in Keene's car doesn't work.

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Our first stop was to the...


Where we met up with the other families for a guided tour.

A ranger explained the process of gathering fish eggs, putting them in baskets with shock absorbers, where they cook into real fish. (I may have not been fully paying attention.)


First they look like tapioca:


Then they turn into enormous, bug-eyed sperm:


Then they sometimes accidentally turn into a two-headed fish:


But usually not:




...and finally, they end up as my two-headed dinner:


After the tour, we got to go outside and feed the big fish.

This:


+ this:


= this:




Next stop was Two Rivers Park for lunch and rock-skipping at the Colorado River:


I didn't see the second river of "Two Rivers," so I Googled it and discovered there is supposedly (I say this with suspicion) another river nearby that we missed called Roaring Fork River. I wish I could have seen that. Is it like an army of roaring forks, or just one big fork?

At this park, there is a memorial to commemorate fourteen firefighters who died while fighting fire on Storm King Mountain in 1994.


...And a chipmunk that eats potato chips.


After lunch, we headed to Glenwood Springs Cemetery.

(Look! A lizard!)


(Ooh! Rocks!)

We hiked to the top (good thing this cemetery is now defunct...I can't imagine a funeral procession successfully climbing this path), we found the grave of John Henry Holliday, better known as Doc Holliday, the cowboy/dentist pal of Wyatt Earp. Just after moving to Glenwood Springs, Holliday croaked of his long-standing tuberculosis.


To honor his gambling nature, someone left playing cards. Supposedly, when he realized he would soon die, in his bed and not in a saloon, he spoke his last words: "I'll be damned. This is funny."


When I saw this gravestone, I didn't know who it was, but with a name like Kid Curry, I figured he/she had to be special. And he was! Sort of. You know Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid? Well, he wasn't that kid. But he was in their gang. From VisitGlenwood.com, "Harvey Logan, alias 'Kid Curry' was also buried in Linwood after committing suicide following a train robbery in 1904 near Parachute."


I like this plot because it takes the guesswork out of where to step. I really don't like the idea of stepping over dead bodies.



"Funk is my middle name."




After traipsing around the fairly well-maintained and occasional ornate headstones, we headed farther up the mountain to the Potter's Field. I'm fascinated by the idea of a final resting place for all of the "unwanted" or uncared for people of the world.




While Doc Holliday's gravestone is in the main portion of the cemetery, he was actually buried in an unmarked grave in Potter's Field.



Finally (finally!), we went to the campsite, where we set up the tent and explored the area.





Keene watched hummingbirds:



While Kayden got stung on the neck. Yowch. That is no way to have a good time.


After dinner, volleyball, and general merriment, it was time to sleep on the cold, hard, bug-infested ground.


Bright and early, we packed it back up and headed home to Denver.

But not before stopping for our Starbucks fix. You can take the Starbucks out of the camper (or wait long enough and it will take itself out), but you can't take the camper out of Starbucks.


I often say Kayden is exactly like me. This is one of those times. Here we are: same tired eyes, same irritated expression directed at Keene who kept snapping our picture before we had even fully awakened.