There will be no more progress reports. Not because I'm now able to happily report that the renovations are complete (I wish!) but because things are now happening in dribs and drabs and there seems to be little or no progress from one week to the next.
This is the frustrating part. So close ... and yet so far away. There are really only a handful of things to be completed: install the range hood over the stove; finish the wiring; tile the splashback; paint the doors (although it now appears that the painters have packed up and left for good and that we're going to have to paint the doors); put up the light shades (Son#1 is ready to do this as soon as everything else is complete); and move in.
I'm ready to move in. More than ready. I had high hopes that it would happen last weekend ... and then when that didn't happen I had planned on this weekend ... now I'm beginning to believe that I'm doomed to looking at an almost-complete kitchen for the rest of my life and serving up salad and cold chicken to my family every night.
Running several appliances off the one power point has led to those appliances either becoming temperamental or dying altogether. Son#2 commented that he thought we used our electric kettle in the living room because it was convenient. But no, we use our electric kettle in the living room because if we use it in our make-shift kitchen we cannot use any other appliance at the same time which can, especially when preparing dinner, lend itself to unwelcome delays. Plus there was a time when it would only work in the living room (don't ask me why). And convenient it's certainly not since we have to keep tripping back to the front room for tea and coffee and milk and cups.
I'm just a teeny little bit frustrated (can you tell?). I want to get into my kitchen and be the first to scratch the bench top (too late for that I'm afraid) or spill tea leaves down my cupboard or forget to turn off the tap over the sink and get to see if the overflow really does work. I want to cook something other than chicken in the slower cooker and be able to use my new wok (I've never had a wok before). I want to sit in my living room and look out through the new French doors and out of the corner of my eye see furniture in the dining room rather than a huge expanse of polished floor boards (very nice floor boards too but they'd look even better with some furniture on them). I want to try out that new stove and the hobs and not get a fright when the little gas cooker that DH is using catches on fire (I only saw it happen the one time but apparently it happened several times when he was helping me with dinner last night but he persevered because he knows how much I hate raw potatoes). I want to transfer clothes from the dirty clothes basket into the machine and push the appropriate buttons and then forget about it rather than having to drag the clothes out to the shed and then run around to the other end of the house to turn the tap on and then continually check to see where the cycle is up to which will often tell me wrong anyway (another temperamental appliance perhaps?). I want to be able to offer my family and guests something other than bought biscuits all the time even if having home baking - or any baking - readily on hand has only ever been a dream and never realised (why does it disappear as soon as it's out of the oven?).
I want things to get back to normal. But I guess I haven't anyone to blame but myself. I wanted everyone out of my house - builders, painters, tradespeople - and now they've gone. I just wanted them to finish it first!
This is the frustrating part. So close ... and yet so far away. There are really only a handful of things to be completed: install the range hood over the stove; finish the wiring; tile the splashback; paint the doors (although it now appears that the painters have packed up and left for good and that we're going to have to paint the doors); put up the light shades (Son#1 is ready to do this as soon as everything else is complete); and move in.
I'm ready to move in. More than ready. I had high hopes that it would happen last weekend ... and then when that didn't happen I had planned on this weekend ... now I'm beginning to believe that I'm doomed to looking at an almost-complete kitchen for the rest of my life and serving up salad and cold chicken to my family every night.
Running several appliances off the one power point has led to those appliances either becoming temperamental or dying altogether. Son#2 commented that he thought we used our electric kettle in the living room because it was convenient. But no, we use our electric kettle in the living room because if we use it in our make-shift kitchen we cannot use any other appliance at the same time which can, especially when preparing dinner, lend itself to unwelcome delays. Plus there was a time when it would only work in the living room (don't ask me why). And convenient it's certainly not since we have to keep tripping back to the front room for tea and coffee and milk and cups.
I'm just a teeny little bit frustrated (can you tell?). I want to get into my kitchen and be the first to scratch the bench top (too late for that I'm afraid) or spill tea leaves down my cupboard or forget to turn off the tap over the sink and get to see if the overflow really does work. I want to cook something other than chicken in the slower cooker and be able to use my new wok (I've never had a wok before). I want to sit in my living room and look out through the new French doors and out of the corner of my eye see furniture in the dining room rather than a huge expanse of polished floor boards (very nice floor boards too but they'd look even better with some furniture on them). I want to try out that new stove and the hobs and not get a fright when the little gas cooker that DH is using catches on fire (I only saw it happen the one time but apparently it happened several times when he was helping me with dinner last night but he persevered because he knows how much I hate raw potatoes). I want to transfer clothes from the dirty clothes basket into the machine and push the appropriate buttons and then forget about it rather than having to drag the clothes out to the shed and then run around to the other end of the house to turn the tap on and then continually check to see where the cycle is up to which will often tell me wrong anyway (another temperamental appliance perhaps?). I want to be able to offer my family and guests something other than bought biscuits all the time even if having home baking - or any baking - readily on hand has only ever been a dream and never realised (why does it disappear as soon as it's out of the oven?).
I want things to get back to normal. But I guess I haven't anyone to blame but myself. I wanted everyone out of my house - builders, painters, tradespeople - and now they've gone. I just wanted them to finish it first!
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