Jul. 11: Movin’ on up

Busy weekends make me oh-so-tired and oh-so-proud of my productivity at the same time. I got up an hour ago; is it too early for a nap?

Our weekend started early because Victor was home on Friday. We spent most of the day moving furniture up and down the stairs. It was un-fun. The good news is that we have a for-really-and-for-true office again—for the first time in many years—and the kids have the Wii hooked up on the big TV in the family room. Win-win.

We hadn’t planned on starting the move this soon because I wanted to paint the room first. It’s still a dark royal blue from when it was Jack’s pirate bedroom. And while it’s not the color I would choose were I starting this office from scratch, I’ve decided I can live with it because I don’t have the energy for painting right now. I have decided, though, that when I do get around to painting, the office will be a delightful shade of green.

The most difficult part of all our work was moving the armoire from the playroom to the family room. This armoire is solid pine, built by my dad, and in typical Dad fashion, has every kind of support and brace and backup support and backup brace he could possibly have put in. This means that it weighs no less than 127,000 pounds. We took out all the shelves and removed the doors and STILL had a tough time wrangling it down the stairs. As we began to push it, Vic said, “If I say ‘run!’ make sure you RUN.”

Can you imagine? I go through all this cancer crap, but in the end, my obituary says “She died trying to save an armoire.” Because let me tell ya, if that thing fell on someone it would DEFINITELY kill them.

I’m glad to say no people or things were harmed in the moving of the armoire. Whew.

The other challenge was getting my bookcase/desk up the stairs. Thank goodness the desk can be detached from the shelves because they are both huge:

 

See? Huge. Sixteen sections huge. (Mine’s a lighter wood, but I’m pretty sure it’s just as heavy as this one looks.)

At least the bookcase has places to grip (unlike the armoire)—it was actually more awkward than heavy. After a lot of clever maneuvers, it’s in its new place and looks very nice. We added our comfy puff rocker and ottoman to the room, along with a few small pieces of furniture, and voy-ol-ay, new office!

Will it change my life for the better, this new room that’s all mine? I like to think so. But we all know the truth: within a couple weeks my desk will be overflowing with mail, the dogs will have taken over the rocker and ottoman, and the misc furniture will be stacked high with things that belong on my desk but no longer fit. It’s more than a little bit sad that my life is so predictable, hm?

The other big weekend event was that yesterday Jack came home from my mom’s. I was so glad to see my boy! I didn’t think I’d missed him all that much (bad mom alert!), but I guess I had. I kissed him and kissed him and kissed him until he finally wiggled away from me in what I can only describe as revulsion. He looked a lot like this:

The first thing he did was run upstairs to see his new bed, and he was VERY happy with the change. He then ran down to the family room and turned on the Wii so he could play the game Katie bought while he was gone. That’s what he’s been doing ever since.

Katie’s at Mom’s now. It’s so nice when the kids are someplace where I have no worries about their safety or homesickness. They love hangin’ with Grandma Mary and Gilly. (Thanks, Mom!)

It’s cooler today than it’s been most the week, so I’ll probably do a little weed-pulling in the front yard. Otherwise I plan to do a lot of lying very still with my eyes closed in a dark, quiet bedroom. Yes. Good.