Box piles are thinning and all but two puzzling pieces of furniture have found a home. What a difference a few days makes.
Last night, my husband and I danced a do-si-do with these two furniture orphans between us. After a full turn around the living room — first with one, then the other — we failed to find a suitable spot for either. Maybe it was the lateness of the hour or perhaps simple exhaustion; I only know I went to bed with hope that Sis could solve what I could not.
My sister Christi is gifted at home decorating, perhaps a carryover from displaying merchandise for sell in the gift shop she ran for years. If she wished, Sis could moonlight as an interior redesigner — those special home decorators who simply move around what homeowners already possess to make it look better than before. Christi redesigned my Mesta Park living room before it went on the market and the results were amazing — her design plan offered a lovely first impression to everyone who came through the front door.
Though the boxes and furniture placement are minor inconveniences when compared to our loss of an operable kitchen. Since our home sold faster than anticipated, my kitchen remodel is still in process. Unless one counts a shiny new refrigerator, we moved into a home where the kitchen space is bare: No cabinets; no stove or oven. Not even a kitchen sink. Just bare walls, filled with gaping holes, electrical wires protruding from the wall.
The appliances scheduled for delivery today didn’t make it. I’m told the cabinets will arrive around the Fourth of July. The rest is really up in the air as counter-top builders and tile contractors don’t like to put themselves in a corner. They simply tell me they’ll do their best to give us a 2-to-3 week turnaround. I’ve translated this as, best case, an operable kitchen by end of July.
Meanwhile, we’re either dining out or “camping in,’ keeping meals and dining utensils simple. We each have one coffee cup for use. We share a few plastic glasses and a few pieces of silverware that we clean in a small bathroom sink. with a nearby bottle of dishwashing soap. We eat off of paper plates. I’m surprised at how little we actually need to get by on. We prepare meals on the grill or eat sandwiches or salads we can assemble without cooking — like my favorite chicken salad I made Monday, which began with a chicken roasted by a local grocer.
As I think about it, maybe redesigning a living room is a lot like making a nice sandwich spread — as long as I can leave the cooking to others.
an everyday life 
What a beautiful home, Janell! Really appreciate this: “I’m surprised at how little we actually need to get by on.” So true, and only through experiencing it does one take this to heart. Enjoy your new home and all the best with the new kitchen!
Arti,
Thanks for the blessing.
It is beginning to feel homey in spite of the absence of a working kitchen.. Delivery of our freshly washed rugs on Monday helped immensely — our three dogs were simply beside themselves with joy to see these ‘old friends” which got me to thinking that surely — from their lower-to-the-floor perspective — rugs were most important of all, as somehow, they told Maddie, Max and Cosmo they were home. Not just visitors.
Lessons are everywhere aren’t they? Listening and learning their wisdom, of course, is the hard part. And for me, the lessons I most need to hear remind me that we’re all just visiting — passing though this big, beautiful world — arriving with nothing and leaving the same way.
I think this home will be a good place to grow old. Toward heaven.
Janell
Jane, third time to try and comment – I understand all you are experiencing.
With many years of moving, creating and downscaling – I think what I have is perfect for this time. A long journey for me – from 6000 sq and family to 1200 sq cottage in the woods with a 600 sq guest area. I could not be happier but then take one day at a time. Wonder is this it. Only God knows….
Ernestine,
I echo your sentiments — I think where I’m planted is perfect for my season of life.
As I think about it, the seeds of desire to live in a one-story were planted last summer, when I helped my sister transform my parent’s home into one that better suited her lifestyle. I began to look at newspaper ads a little then — but I first became aware of this house not though an ad, but when driving by the “For Sale” sign in the yard. This lovely stone house is just a few blocks from my daughter Kara’s house. I was in her neighborhood a lot then because I was painting the nursery for my soon-to-be born granddaughter.
I know I wrote about this place then — I should go back and re-visit my thoughts. But as with any big, scary step in my life, I hesitated. It’s so hard to make the big moves — no pun intended. And it was January before my husband and I came to view the house. And I walked in the door and thought, “I could live here.”
And now I do. Doors opened and others closed in just the right sequence and at just the right time. And in looking back on it, it seems all I had to do was get the nerve to take a few steps and let go of what I had.
Ernestine — thanks for sharing your thoughts; your words invited me to mine a little more of my own.
Janell