A Decade on the To-Do List is Cool ... Right?

We’ve found, recently, that our kids are moderately self-sufficient at times. Which means that we can actually tackle some of the house projects that have been on our list for an embarrassingly long time. That’s not to say that situations like Girls, for real. I’m holding up a very heavy microwave and your dad is securing it to the wall. Will someone please go wipe your brother’s butt? don’t happen (hypothetical, of course). But they are less constant and often solvable through bribes or sheer exasperation.

Over the summer, we chipped away at our lingering entry way project. We painted the door from the entry to the garage – and then the one from the garage to the backyard. We painted the frame of the door so that it matched the trim better. And then, one lovely weekend in September, Mike put new ceramic tile in the entry to replace the old, not-in-good-shape-and-partly-already-ripped-up-from-when-we-replaced-the-banister laminate tile.

There was a bit of drama during tile installation when one tile was 1/8 inch smaller than the others and it messed with Mike’s perfect grout lines. And then he and Quinn decided that three of the tiles were a slightly different pattern than the rest (which no one but Mike and Quinn will ever notice). After a few days of debating whether the whole thing was jack-hammered up to be started again, we left things as they were. Because it really does look great. And once that was done, we created an awesome picture wall going down into the basement of some of our favorite moments at the lake.

It is a project that you appreciate from the fact that you don’t really notice it. Instead of walking through the landing area and sighing at how much we didn’t like it, we just waltz through now. It is still too small for a family of five plus giant dog. But it’s a “pretty” small. It was a project that has been on our list for years and we were both happy to finally have it checked off.

Then, with the recent additions of my instant pot (which takes up a lot of counter) and my new Nespresso machine – plus the fact that I’m baking more with Quinn and would like my big KitchenAid to actually be accessible, we finally ripped out the cabinet and hood above our range to install a new (shorter) cabinet and an over-the-range microwave. Thus, the microwave on the counter is gone. Hallelujah! A short 11 years is all it took for us to get that done.

Now I just need to rearrange the contents of the kitchen cabinets and decide what gets to stay on the counter. Organization and decluttering – this is where the magic happens! Oh, and some super glue removal from the door of the new cabinet. Because you can’t do a house project without a little drama …