The Most Productive Weekend

This was the most productive weekend ever. Thanks to the grace of the in-laws, we were able to shop, childlessly, for paint on Friday night. We bought paint and cabinet hardware ( we chose "A", and got a hell of a deal, too, from Lee Valley. Paid $4.50/handle, where at Home Depot they were about $10 each and at the place that is building the cabinets, they were $20 each, for exactly the same thing. We needed 45.).

Now, to the actual painting. There are time pressures, because the paint needs to be done before the cabinets are delivered, tomorrow.

So Saturday, we did parental things in the morning - Trevor took Jack skating and I took Aimee to gymnastics. I managed to find a friend of Aimee's who invited her to play in the afternoon, then I kind of engineered an invitation for Jack to another friend's house, a family who are very generous in their neighbourliness, and agreed to entertain him for the afternoon in exchange for dinner. So I dropped him off, after going out for groceries and birthday party supplies. Then, with the help of Trevor's dad, painter extraordinaire, we got the first coat of paint on. We went for takeout Chinese at the friends', and, after a few glasses of wine, put the second coat on. Then, this morning, the kids played nicely by themselves for a while, and then "helped" us put a third coat on. The camel colour went on nicely, and was pretty much done at this point, but the red was not covering as well. So this afternoon, while the same friend brought her boys over to play and check out the carnage, Trevor & I did a fourth coat. Then we all headed off to the Y for Jack's birthday party, which was lots of fun. Still, the red was not completely done, so we slapped on a fifth after the exhausted kiddies went to bed. It still needs another coat, but it's to the point where we will live with imperfection after six coats. Trevor has taken a vacation day tomorrow for cabinet delivery so he will get the last one on first thing in the morning and hopefully it will dry before they scratch the hell out of it with boxes and things.

So this weekend, we managed to buy paint, apply five coats, attend gymnastics and skate, run six miles (collectively, Trevor and I), clean both bathrooms, change all the sheets and do three loads of laundry, and host a birthday party for 8 5-year-olds (we also met Jack's girlfriend's parents, too). We rock. It's 9 o'clock and I am drinking a small scotch, and we are both heading for bed.

But our colours are wonderful. The kitchen looks darned good.

Here are the weekend's updates. North, WNW, WSW. Notice in the view under the window where the red goes fairly low... that's where the kids were "helping" to paint. It worked, though, they had fun for 10 or 15 minutes and stopped asking if they could help.

I certainly need to give credit to the people who have helped us survive this ordeal so far. We have had meals provided by my parents, Trevor's parents, our friends Ian and Kelly, my Gramma has given us two casseroles (the first was delicious, I'll let you know about the second), and we have resorted to restaurants only maybe three times so far, and I haven't even wanted to drink that much. We have had child care provided by all grandparents, Ian and Kelly, Dawson's parents, our next-door neighbours, and Holly's mom. We have also had organization and cleaning help from my mom, and major painting help from Ron, Trevor's dad. Not bad at all. I pledge here and now that we will never move away. All this support and a great kitchen, too.