Renovations -- the not so much fun part

I'm stuck in the land of in between.  And I'm just not having fun.

Years ago, when we first bought our house, we bought the biggest house we could afford, and barely eked by.  We knew over the next several years our incomes would increase and we'd grow into the house.  And that, for the most part, came true.  We love our neighbors.  We love our location.  I just never truly fell in love with our house.

Most of my issues with my house came from the orange colored wood.  Orange trim.  Orange cabinets.  Orange, orange, orange everywhere.  My least favorite color, and I found myself surrounded in it.

But, as we'd found ourselves rather house-poor, when we did have a few spare extra dollars for home improvements, the money ended up being spent on such things as a new roof.  A new fence.  Sprinkler system.  Water heater.  Furnace.  Not, exactly, what I'd call the *wow* factor.

It wasn't until last year that I got up the gumption to take some house improvement funds and I started renovating the upstairs.  I sanded and painted all the trim white.  I painted the halls a pancake color to mellow out the orange trim that still exists downstairs.  Each of the kids' rooms has been fully redone, and both turned out beautifully.  Last year I completed the two upstairs bathrooms, the hall, and then our master bedroom.  So, other than needing new carpets (and some day new windows, sigh), the upstairs is complete.

I planned to begin the downstairs renovations this summer.  If we could afford it.  Having a couple of kiddos strains the olde pocketbook.  And we were hoping to start saving up for a few trips next spring and summer.  There is, after all, only so much money we can stockpile away.

So when the dishwasher leaked and led to the whole fiasco that is sucking the very life out of me in dealing with insurance agents, and claims, and battling it out with who's going to pay for what, and discovering crawl space issues, and needing new floors, and now new cabinets and new counters, I'm overwhelmed.

I thought remodeling would be a fun adventure.  I thought it would be like planning a wedding.  I'd have my remodeling "bridesmaids" to go with me to ooh and aah over floor samples.  They'd help me pick out carpet colors.  They'd accompany me and help me select the best tile and trim pieces.  They'd tell me how wonderful I'd look in my cherry cabinet covered kitchen.  I was the remodeling *BRIDE!*  I was going to be oohed and aahed over, and I was going to enjoy every moment of my planning, knowing just how very much money is being spent on this whole renovation project, and how fabulous the *BIG DAY* was going to be when all the renovations were complete.

I was not, however, expecting the experience to be like the one where my husband-to-be at the time went shopping with me for my wedding dress.  Back then, I thought that would be a great idea.  I wanted him to see the dress before hand, because I wanted to make sure he thought I looked great in it.  I didn't want to ruin our *BIG DAY* when I discovered he thought I looked hideous in a dress he hated.

So when I took him granite slab shopping last week, I thought we'd find some great patterns, and have trouble narrowing things down, and we'd agonize over our decisions, making sure that our $6000 countertops would, in fact, look spectacular against our Brazilian 5 inch plank hand scraped solid hardwood floors and our cherry cabinets with a mahogany finish.  Instead, it felt a bit more like his response to the wedding dress shopping.  That's when I heard him mutter under his breath such things like, "White dress, white dress, white dress, white dress with long sleeves, white dress."

Sigh.

I have stacks of hardwood floor samples piled on my dining room table.  I have nine inches of cabinet magazines on my kitchen counter.  I have carpet samples strewn about the living room floor.  And I'm no closer to any decisions than when I started.

And although Pinterest has assisted me in finding out the style of ideas that I'd like to accomplish, all I can see before me is that enormously long laundry list of things that I have to accomplish before the remodel can begin.  Repainting the ceilings in every room and hallway downstairs; sanding, staining and sealing the three pocket doors;  removing the two inner doors, sanding, staining and sealing them;  popping off all the orange wood trim to sand and paint before being reattached by the contractor;  moving all my office furniture into the garage;  moving all my furniture in my living room to the office;  painting my living room;  moving all the furniture from my office into the living room to paint the office; refinishing the cupboards in the laundry room;  and resealing the laundry room utility sink so that it can be, once again, white after that whole 'attempting to dye something fiasco.'  The list goes on and on and on.

I'm not even sure that's my entire to-do list, but it's a start.  And I have about 4 weeks to get it all done.  I'm simply overwhelmed.  

This just isn't as fun as I thought it would be.

So I guess, perhaps, I'll pretend I don't have to do any of that, stay in my jammies all day, make a batch of cookies, eat them all, and write blog entries.  Sounds like a good plan to me! :)

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