This weekend was such an epic two days of progress and disasters that I don’t know if I can quite find the words to describe it. If I was going to try, though, here are a few phrases that might work:

• Bleeding from the face
• The most disgusting thing I have ever borne witness to, probably
• Hammer, meet sink
• Uh, oops
• The best weekend yet

And that was just Sunday.

Sometimes I get stuck on a particular project– in this case, painting the Pink Parlor– and for whatever reason I can’t make progress on it, and it keeps me from making progress on anything else. Well, since I gave myself permission to work on whatever the hell I wanted last week (and it felt fabulous) I continued that theme through the weekend.

I’ll tell you a little bit more about Saturday and how my 85 year old grandma is way better at driving the riding mower than I am later this week. For now, let’s talk about this room…

That’s the upstairs full bath (but not the crazy Master Bath).

This upcoming weekend I’m having my mom and some friends stay over for a night or two, and at some point in the last 48 hours it occurred to me that this house does have three bathrooms and it might be nice for guests if more than one of them worked.

Like many things in this house, the upstairs bath is a weird amalgamation of expensive and old materials. The new granite counters on mismatched stock cabinetry, for example.

Or the nice Kohler toilet with a… well, a squishy palm-tree toilet seat.

My mom managed to clean a lot of the Hey-it-looks-like-someone-got-murded-in-here iron stains off the tub that you saw in the this video, but I still wouldn’t call this room “guest ready.”

It occurred to me that I could probably slap a coat of paint on the walls, switch out the broken faucets and gross shower trim, replace the toilet seat, and the bathroom wouldn’t be in bad shape.

Then  I opened the lid of the toilet (which I hadn’t opened or turned on since I moved in), and I fell over dead.

(Warning: Don’t scroll any lower while you’re eating.)

Yeah. That is fricking mold growing in the toilet, which apparently can happen if you leave antifreeze in there once it starts to get warm. So, don’t do that.

Right then and there I thought about just putting a whole new toilet in, but I decided to give a two gallon bottle of bleach and some Iron Out a try first.

And, okay, because that was so gross I’m going to just go ahead and skip to the magic part of this post to make up for it…

Same. Toilet.

Did you just fall over?

Here’s what I did:

1. Dumped bleach all over it and let it set for a while. (This almost immediately dissolved the mold.)
2. Swished my toilet wand around the bowl a few times.
3. Dumped Iron Out in the bowl and let it set for a few hours.
4. Changed the toilet seat.
5. Sanitized my entire body for coming within 3 feet of that thing.

The toilet looks brand new, and it required almost no scrubbing. And it may be the one thing that actually went as planned in this bathroom this weekend. While I was waiting for the bleach and the Iron Out to do their thing, I tried tackling some of the old fixtures.

For some reason, these grossed me out and since it will be a long while before that tub surround is replaced I decided a trim update was in order. Because the faucet was old and didn’t have a discernible brand name on it, I took the thing mostly apart and then found universal bath and shower trip pieces at Lowe’s that would fit.

Here’s kind of how it went down:

1. I took everything apart.
2. I tried to replace the dial, and realized I had the wrong parts.
3. I successfully replaced the drain and stopper.
4. I tried to replace the faucet but the parts didn’t work.
5. I tried to replace the shower head and broke the elbow off in the wall.
6. I went back to Lowe’s and got the correct dial parts (and some other things, like a few sinks)
7. I “modified” the faucet with the reciprocating saw.
8. I successfully installed the faucet and dial trim.
9. I did a little dance.
10. I then realized the shower elbow is still broken off in the wall and I have no idea how to fix it.
11. I stopped dancing.

This is a crappy picture because apparently I can’t see straight when I try to take pictures after midnight, but this is the new trim that looks awesome and probably works, although I haven’t tested that out yet.

There will be complete how-to’s of the trim switching later this week with better pictures, once I figure out what to do about the broken shower piece.

I started most of these projects in the early afternoon, and when I got as far as I could with the shower trim I decided to switch out the sink faucets so that at least something would be working in the bathroom. (Oh yes, that’s foreshadowing.)

Both of the faucets were leaking from the handles (the joys of winterization never cease) and the sinks were set up for the fancy wide-spread faucets which means I had to drop $90 each for the cheapest faucets I could find to fit the sinks. It occurred to me at the time that it might actually be cheaper to buy basic sinks that would accept the cheap $25 faucets (more foreshadowing), but I gave myself the little “hey, let’s not go crazy here and create more work than we need to” speech in the plumbing aisle at Lowe’s and grabbed my expensive faucets and headed home.

Then I spent an hour wedged upside-down in a 22″ cabinet, sweating my ass off and making no progress on removing the old rusted faucets, and I was like, “You know what? I think I’m going to go ahead and have that crazy moment after all.” Except when I said that to myself it sounded less like intelligible words, and more like a half-crazed battle cry and the crack of a hammer on porcelain.

Yep. I did that.

Okay, actually, what happened was that I did decided to remove the sinks in a normal, sane way. I spent another 30 minutes trying to cut the caulk around the sink with a utility knife, and when I stuck a screwdriver under the lip of the sink to try and pry it up, and chunk of porcelain broke off and hit me in the face. And apparently being hit with broken porcelain is akin to being hit by a flying razor blade, because the next thing I know I’m bleeding from the face.

And that’s when I went a little Bruce Lee on the sink with a hammer.

Easiest faucet removal. Ever.

And, yes, I did lose my shit a little bit, but it was the best temper tantrum I’ve thrown in a while because the new sinks only cost me $40 each, and I was able to get basic $25 faucets to go in them. So not only did I get to whack something with a hammer–which admit it, is always fun–I also ended up saving $50 and a shitload of time spent wedged upside-down in a cabinet.

I may or may not have been running around the house at this point in the day, singing a song I made up about the sinks that mostly consisted of the phrase “I win” over and over again.

What? A girl’s got to get her kicks in where she can.

To sum up, this project pretty much went how I would expect… which is to say, not at all how I saw it going in my head. That’s what seven years of DIY experience has taught me: You don’t get better at figuring out how it will go, you just get better at accepting it when things don’t go as planned.

I hardly ever dive into something like this without at least one extra trip to Lowe’s, and it was so much less frustrating than wrestling with those faucets for the next three days. I feel really awesome about the progress and expect to have working sinks, that pristine toilet, and painted walls in the next day or two. The shower is still iffy, but either way it’s not the end of the world.

This, my friends, is exactly what great DIY feels like!

Here’s a conversation I’ve been having with myself for the last two weeks:

Project ADD Me: Oh! I have a great idea for a painting I’d like to do for the Parlor!

Rational Me: What? The Parlor that still has pink walls and floors that haven’t been refinished and no furniture? I don’t think hanging a painting in there is our first priority at the moment.

Project ADD Me: Okay, true. But it would be a quick painting.

Rational Me: If you want to paint something, pick up a paintbrush and get to work on the wainscoting. Or, you know, the entire exterior of this house.

Project ADD Me: Yes, but I’ll never forget to paint the wainscoting, but I might forget the idea for this painting.

Rational Me: Write it down.

Project ADD Me: Slave driver.

Rational Me: Calling yourself names isn’t going to change my mind.

Project ADD Me: Whoa, whoa, whoa. You are not the boss of me. Who says I can’t paint a painting if I want to? It’s not like I’m living in a garage and have to build a house before winter.

Rational Me: The couch is still covered in plastic wrap, the shower is leaking on to the boiler, the weeds have taken over the side garden, there are approximately 12 pallets of concrete block and brick taking up space where the donkeys are supposed to live… do I need to go on?

Project ADD Me: Seriously, what is the point of being an adult if you don’t get to eat ice cream for breakfast and paint a fricking painting when you want to.

Rational Me:  Mmm… Ice cream…

And then while the rational part of my brain was distracted by a pint of Ben & Jerry’s, I did this:

To save myself time and clean-up I bought some cheap acrylics. And to save myself money I reused one of my old unfinished canvases that was lying around in a spare bedroom.

Goodbye, wine bottles…

I’m going to be a temperamental artist for a minute and only show you a sneak peek of the painting, since it’s not done.

And let me clarify… I’m temperamental to a fault, but the three art electives I took in college don’t make me an artist. I’m just not any more afraid to pick up a brush and paint a house than I am to pick up a hammer and build one. Because the worst thing that happens is it looks like crap and then you paint over it or tear it down and start over. (Okay maybe the worst thing that happens is you build a crappy house and it falls on top of you in your sleep, but you get my point.)

Giving myself permission to just create something for the fun of it was one of the best decisions I’ve made since… well, since the last time I did it. I forget sometimes that before I was a girl who banged on houses, I was a girl who made stuff. The truth is that I like doing both. I like to be able to replace a faucet or tile my own shower, but sometimes I just need to spend some time taking an idea and making it into something real.

Plus, once the painting is done it may motivate me to finish painting those Parlor walls so I have a place to hang it. So, win-win.

My message for everyone this weekend is this: Yes, we all probably have 172 item to-do lists, and things that should get done first… and sometimes it’s really hard to give yourself permission to let all of that go and take on a project (or a book, or a nap) just for fun. So here’s me, giving you permission. We’re all allowed to live a little, to breath for a minute, and to do something that makes us happy just because it makes us happy.

And you didn’t even have to bribe me with ice cream for that.

Since it is taking hours upon hours to paint all of the wainscoting in the Not-Pink Parlor and I needed to be able to check a couple of things off my list in order to feel right about the universe, I decided to take some time this week in between rounds of painting, calking, and swearing about getting joint compound in my eye to tackle some smaller projects around the Liberty House.

First up on the list was installing new door hardware on the back door, garage, and barn so that all the locks can be opened with the same key. This is the back door of the house:

This mismatched set of hardware is a holdover from something less-than-legal I may or may not have done before I officially owned this house. If you read this novel of a post about my home-buying experience then you know that after I wrote a big old check as a deposit and signed the purchase agreement, I was basically “on the hook” for the purchase price of the house, whether or not someone broke into the house and stole all the appliances and copper pipe before I closed on it. Normally something like that would make me a little queasy but probably wouldn’t cause me to break out in hives, however at that time the house had a similar keyless deadbolt and anyone who had access to the MLS system could see the code and get in. Add that to the fact that on a second walk-through of the house–after I’d signed the paperwork–I found someone’s flashlight and work gloves in the kitchen (that hadn’t been there two days before) and you basically have a recipe for a semi-permanent twitch in my left eye and at least five new gray hairs.

The way I see it a girl has two options in a situation like this: 1.) hope for the best, or 2.) surreptitiously unlock a ground floor window then break into the house later that evening and change the locks, ensuring that no would-be copper thieves can get their grubby little hands on the plumbing in your future kitchen.

And you guys know me, I’m definitely a sit-around-and-hope-for-the-best-while-not-taking-action kind of girl. Plus I would never do anything illegal. So. Yeah. About that door hardware…

The door is still ugly and needs to be replaced, but in the meantime at least the deadbolt and handle match. (For a complete how-to on changing door hardware, check out this post.)

And since I’m on the subject I have to say that I absolutely love the keyless entry deadbolt. No, it isn’t the prettiest thing ever, but for someone who once locked herself out of the house in her pajamas in the middle of winter, function definitely trumps form where door hardware is concerned. I also prefer the lever handles to knobs because they are way easier to open with a toe when hauling eight bags of groceries in to the house at once instead of walking the twenty steps out to the car again for a second trip.

One of the doors to the garage also got a new knob…

That’s another door that needs to be replaced eventually. And then there’s the barn…

It’s kind of fun to open the “big” doors every time I want to go in there…

But perhaps not as efficient as this:

It feels good to have consistent locks on everything and to have freed up a little more space in the mudroom where I’ve been storing that hardware and 75% of the rest of my belongings for the last month.

I also finally got my hands dirty with a little cleaning project I’ve been telling myself I needed to tackle for the last couple of weeks…

I thought, oh, it’s just a couple of logs and a little ash. No big deal. Okay, first of all, that was an entire paper grocery bag full of ash.

I don’t know much about the cremation of bodies, but I do know the ash from one human fits into like a quart sized container. So basically I shoveled twelve bodies out of my fireplace last night.

It took slightly longer than expected. The good news is that the entire house no longer smells like you shoved your face into a campfire, so that’s nice.

And, one more thing to add to my list of small wins… even with all of stuff that needs to be done to the Liberty House, I’m really making an effort to maintain better work/life/house balance than I did while working on the Memorial House. One of my good friends convinced me to run 3 races with her this summer as a way to keep us motivated to stay active.

We tackled the first one last weekend and I did not a.) puke, or b.) die, so I’d consider it a successful run. And yet another thing to check off my list for this summer.

There are a lot of times when I start a big project on my own and then at some point–usually when I find myself wedged between a large piece of lumber and my garage, flailing around helplessly and hoping a neighbor will come to my rescue– I decide that things might go a little more smoothly if I have a little help. In those instances, the first person I call?

The woman with the hatchet.

I’m pretty sure (judging by the fact that she dressed me in pink saddle shoes when I was a kid) that my mother thought birthing a daughter would mean things like shopping and pedicures and not building pergolas. She also probably never suspected she’d get to dress up miniature donkeys on a regular basis..

So I’m going to say it all balanced out for her in the long run.

My mom is without fail my staunchest supporter. She’s the first person to volunteer to help me move, to help me set hundred-pound pieces of flagstone for a patio,  to spend her summer break painting my house, and to immediately and continuously pray for me when I have a crazy moment and decide to buy a 150 year old farmhouse while sitting at a bar on a random Monday night.

So when she said she wanted to come up and relax at the Liberty House for Mother’s Day, I had a great plan. It included mimosas:

My new favorite breakfast– open faced egg-on-a-muffin (recipe here):

And a dressed up fruit salad (plain greek yogurt, honey, cinnamon, cardamom… awesome over any type of fruit):

Of course when we were done with breakfast, what did she want to do for her relaxing day at the Liberty House?

That’s right. Drink mimosas and weed my garden. (Hey, who am I to argue?)

I’ve been putting in a good hour or two per day just trying to get my acres of jungle under control with the mower, weed whacker, weed spray, bug spray, and various clippers, snippers, shovels, and saws. It’s fair to say I’m not winning that battle, but I haven’t given up yet.

So here’s to my mom, the wheelbarrow full of weeds we picked this weekend, and all of the other projects that wouldn’t have gotten done without her!

I know that all of you think I took one look at that bigass list I wrote, fell out of my chair, and have by lying on the kitchen floor contemplating the purpose of linoleum and how the hell I’m going to get all that work done ever since. In fact, my mother finally called me last night and said basically “Listen daughter, I know I go into crazy mother mode, but you haven’t posted anything on your website or facebook for like a week. The only reason I knew you were alive is because you repinned something on Pinterest nine hours ago!”

Yes. Pinterest is not only a good place to keep track of inspirational images, but is also a good indicator of whether or not I’m still breathing apparently. Thank you to this image for keeping my mother from panicking:

The truth is I’m not overwhelmed by my list, but I’m just in one of those adjustment periods where I’m figuring out how to balance the time takes to maintain this house and property on my own, along with two hours in the car heading to and from work every day, and then trying to make headway on my projects, picture taking, and writing about everything.

Sometimes I have awesome days where I feel like superwoman, and sometimes I struggle with things like remembering to put pants on before I try to fix the boiler.

But, hey, if there’s one thing I always say about DIY: It’s not easy. It’s dirty, frustrating, difficult, inspiring, awesome, and fun. Sometimes you bleed, sometimes you laugh, sometimes (a lot of times, if you’re me) you swear, and sometimes you stare blankly at your computer screen for an hour before going to bed because you can’t articulate why it’s taking you three effing weeks to paint one room in your house. That’s just the way it goes. After years of this kind of chaos, I’ve learned that you’ve got to coast through the lulls without being too hard on yourself. Which I know is good for my mental health and all, but not nearly so entertaining for those of you reading this website, right?

So instead of waxing philosophically about my inability to properly dress myself any longer, I thought I’d take you for a little trip down memory lane and look at some of the things I was doing during the month of May over the last seven years.

May 2011

This time last year my focus was entirely on the Memorial House bathrooms.

I built this vanity:

Put my mom to work installing some radiant floor heat:

And lost my shit over some tile:

May 2010

Two years ago, I was closing on the sale of my first house and the Memorial adventure was just beginning.

The first month of the great DIY House Addition Adventure wrapped up, but the real work was just getting started:

Added to which, I traveled from Texas to Michigan with two donkeys in the back of a pickup:

May 2009

2009 was the Spring of two houses. I was dividing my time between my getting my first house ready for it’s future owners, and starting to make my mark on the Memorial house.

For example, I built some raised cedar beds for the garden at Memorial (note to 2012 self, make some more of those):

And back on Garrison road, I was finishing up some miscellaneous kitchen projects:

 May 2008

Four years ago most of the “big” projects were done on my first house, and I was keeping myself busy with miscellaneous projects.

Like crookedbrooms in pink-on-pink and leopard print. (It’s been at least two years since I’ve made any broom handles, but I wouldn’t say I’ve given it up for good):

And I proved yet again how “cleaning” never works out the way I plan:

May 2007

There was just one big project completed in May of 2007, but you can’t argue with results. The badass pergola:

May 2006

It’s hard to believe, but it was six years ago when I first said, you know, I have a crazy idea… and then grabbed a sledge hammer and started turning it into a reality despite quite a few people who told me it wouldn’t work. It took me a year to complete that pergola and stone patio, and here’s where it all started:

May 2005

In 2005 I’d been a homeowner for a little less than a year, and had started making my mark on my first house with projects like this basement makeover. Yeah, it’s not exactly jaw-dropping, but I was a newbie.

So what I can stay for sure is that May is historically a good project month for me, and those projects have just gotten bigger and bigger over the years. No reason to break tradition this year, I suppose, so I better get started on that list.

While I’m only making incremental progress (read: just barely keeping things from falling apart) on the Liberty House, I dream of a day when I’ll be checking things off my list left and right. Since I’ve had almost no success in keeping the house organized, I thought I might have better luck organizing my brain.

One hundred and sixty items later… yep. Still crazy. This list is easily the next two (and probably the next three or four) years of my life. So basically I’m in project heaven. I also haven’t quite gotten over the exhaustion from 1.) not sleeping for six weeks while buying this place, and 2.) moving all of my belongings twice in 6 months.

So I’m taking a nice long weekend away to see some old friends and will probably pace myself with some more easy (but time consuming) patching and painting in the parlor next week. Then I’m diving headfirst into this list with things like new appliances and countless hours of quality time spent with a drum sander. It’s going to be awesome.

General Electric

1. Fix all non-working outlets (kitchen/laundry room specifically)
2. Figure out outbuilding electric
3. Redo diagram at main

General Plumbing

1. Fix slow drain/water backup done!
2. 2.   Fix low pressure to kitchen sink done!
3. Get rid of black residue in water (bleach pipes)
4. Cap open line at old barn
5. Get exterior spigots working

General HVAC

1. 1.   Get boiler working done!

Exterior- High Priority

1. Replace roof done!
2. Cover holes in brick exterior on second floor
3. Replace missing gutter/downspouts
4. Install rain barrels
5. Fix soffit
6. Power wash and scrape wood siding
7. Remove all flower boxes
8. Replace rotted wood siding at back entry
9. Repaint wood siding
10. Repair/ Rebuild back deck
11. Repaint front/back deck
12. Get rid of chipmunks
13. Get rid of Ricky the Racoon

Exterior – Eventually

1. Replace back door
2. Fix front door
3. Plane bottom of french doors in kitchen
4. Add pergola and built-in grill to existing patio
5. Add lower level and fireplace to existing patio
6. Build swing/bed for front porch

Yard/Property – High Priority

1. Remove debris pile
2. Clean out donkey shed
3. Replace roof on donkey shed
4. Put up donkey fence
5. Check/fix electric at donkey barn
6. Put up clothes line

Yard/Property – Eventually

1. Landscape around house
2. Plant vegetable garden
3. Plant grapes/vineyard
4. Build chicken coop/garden shed
5. Create walkway to bonfire pit and tent area
6. Build pergola off of garage
7. Fence in propane tank off of garage
8. Build hermitage
9. Repaint mailbox

Kitchen – High Priority

1. Replace dishwasher, fridge, stove
2. Replace recessed light bulbs
3. Storage for garbage/recycling

Kitchen – Eventually

1. Paint wood walls
2. Stain or paint ceiling
3. Install trim around windows
4. Add beams
5. Paint recessed light trim
6. Install new lights
7. Replace counters/backsplash
8. Replace floor
9. Paint/Reconfigure/Replace kitchen cabinets
10. Buy stools for peninsula
11. Install woodburner in nook

Kitchen – Maybe

1. Remove archway
2. Widen doorway to hall/bathroom

Parlor – High Priority

1. Fix holes in ceiling – in progress
2. Paint ceiling
3. Clean out fireplace
4. Refinish floor

Parlor- Eventually

1. Paint room – in progress
2. Replace glass on broken widow
3. Fix mullions on broken window
4. Replace glass block
5. Install new light fixture
6. Buy rug
7. Buy couch, chairs
8. Buy TV
9. Build random-drawer entertainment center
10. Build mirror
11. “This little house of mine” painting for above fireplace
12. Replace outlet/switch covers

Parlor – Maybe

1. Remove archway

Entry – High Priority

1. Refinish floor
2. Refinish/paint stairs
3. Remove wallpaper
4. Patch drywall holes from skylights

Entry – Eventually

1. Remove wainscoting
2. Replace bottom part of window trim
3. Install horizontal wood paneling
4. Paint french doors to study (Red or black)
5. Remove door to closet under stairs, add built-ins
6. Figure out what to do with beam
7. Replace light fixutres.

Study – High Priority

1. Refinish floor done!

Study – Eventually

1. Remove wallpaper
2. Tear out closets, replace with built-ins
3. Paint walls/trim
4. Replace light fixtures
5. Figure out what to do with beam

Office (4th Bedroom) – High Priority

1. Remove closet
2. Reframe/drywall closet
3. Install luan, hardwood
4. Stain/poly hardwood
5. Paint
6. Install new light fixture

Downstairs Bath- High Priority

1. Replace shower trim done!
2. Replace shower head
3. Remove baseboard
4. Install wood paneling, paint
5. Build/Install built-ins
6. Move outlet by mirror
7. Replace mirror
8. Replace light fixture
9. New shower curtain
10. Get rug

Downstairs Bath- Eventually

1. Replace floor
2. Replace shower surround with tile

Laundry Room – Eventually

1. Remove bi-folds
2. Move doorway to left, replace with barn door
3. Replace sink
4. Add counter over washer/dryer
5. Remove cabs/ counter on south wall
6. Add cabinets to North wall
7. Paint
8. Replace floor
9. Add hanging totes for separating clothes

Hallway – Eventually

1. Paint
2. Paint basement door
3. Replace floor
4. Add new light fixture

Mudroom- High Priority

1. Better organization for coats, shoes tools
2. Paint

Mudroom – Eventually

1. Replace floor
2. Build benches and lockers for storage

Basement- High Priority

1. Replace broken (or all) basement windows

Basement – Eventually

1. Remove bags of dirt/dead bodies
2. Clean off storage shelves on stairway
3. Figure out random pump in storage room
4. Put storage shelves in storage room

Master Bedroom- High Priority

1. Paint trim, walls, ceiling, doors
2. Replace closet doors
3. Replace closet shelves
4. Remove “gas” from fireplace
5. Build hearth

Master Bedroom – Eventually

1. Remove carpet
2. Install hardwood

Master Bath – High Priority

1. Patch ceiling
2. Replace missing section of window

Master Bath- Eventually

1. Demo everything
2. Move wall for toilet
3. Install door
4. Replace everything (toilet, tub, vanity, floor, fixtures)

Bedroom #2 – Eventually

1. Remove carpet
2. Install hardwood
3. Remove built-in desk
4. Paint
5. Update light fixtures
6. Furnish

Bedroom #3 – High Priority

1. Replaced cracked glass in window

Bedroom # 3 – Eventually

1. Remove carpet
2. Install hardwood
3. Paint
4. Update light fixtures
5. Furnish

Upstairs Hallway – High Priority

1. Patch drywall

Upstairs Hallway – Eventually

1. Remove carpet
2. Install hardwood
3. Remove transom in hallway to master bedroom
4. Do something with linen closet in hallway

Upstairs Bath- High Priority

1. Replace toilet
2. Replace sink faucets
3. Fix peeling paint on walls/ ceiling
4. Paint walls
5. Paint cabinet
6. Get mirrors

Upstairs Bath- Eventually

1. Replace tub surround
2. Remove and re-tile floor
3. Build new doors for vanity

I’m trying really hard right now to write this posts without using excessive exclamation points. It’s a struggle because one of my coworkers recently sent me what I’m pretty sure is the coolest app ever invented!!!

Sorry, I couldn’t help myself. But this is actually pretty sweet, and nobody paid me, emailed me, strung me up by my toes and made me listen to pop music, or otherwise tortured or coerced me into to saying this.

The app is called Magic Plan, and it’s appropriately named, because as anyone who has ever spent 15 hours with a tape measure and some graph paper trying to get an accurate floor plan of their house will tell you, to be able to accomplish this is 15 minutes is pretty freaking magical…

That’s the first floor of the Liberty House, by the way. And I created this floor plan on my phone (which is also downloadable as a PDF, JPEG, DXF, or available on the web) by standing in the center of each room and taking pictures of it.

For real, people.

I don’t know how the magic of it works (I mean I have some thoeries that don’t involve magic pixies) but frankly I don’t care. You just stand in the middle of a room and virtually “mark” the corners, then assemble the rooms for an entire floor…

If things are a little “off” the app understands and adjusts doorways to fit, etc. And you can go into any room after the fact and quickly adjust the sizes if something isn’t right, plus add windows, closets, stairs, etc.

You can also snap a picture of each room for reference.

Would I build a house from these plans? Well, this is me, so yes, but obviously it’s not totally foolproof. As you can see above I need to do a little adjusting for some thick walls and ductwork. But just to have as a reference on my phone for figuring out things like if I have room for a piece of furniture, or how much flooring I need, this is invaluable. Because before Magic Plan, this is how I kept track of  room measurements on my phone…

Right? That’s not a joke. That’s seriously what I’ve been using as a reference for the last two months. So you can see where the compulsion to end every sentence with a lot of excitement is coming from!!!!!!

There are video tutorials built into the app (which runs on iPhones and iPads with a camera), but here’s a little sample of how it works.

Seriously, I haven’t been this pumped about my phone since I dropped it from a first-floor ceiling joist all the way down to the basement floor without it breaking. AND, the app and downloading a watermarked JPEG or PDF is completely free. For a non-watermarked version or other file types it’s only $2.49 per plan, which again, totally worth it. S0, all I’m saying is, probably you need this. I sure did.

First of all, totally unrelated to the topic of this post but as a follow-up to my last one, guess who successfully mowed all two acres of her lawn today without cutting off a toe? Yes. Yes, I did. And I am so sorry that the first 20 minutes of that adventure wasn’t captured on camera for posterity– particularly the part where I came thisclose to running the mower through the closed garage door.

It has been a long time since I laughed that hard at my own ineptitude, but I will say this… mowing the lawn may actually be the one household chore that I love to do, and it was a nice way to decompress after what ended up being a particularly crazy couple of days.

You may have gotten the impression over the last couple of weeks that I wasn’t completely moved out of the Farm House rental. My lease is actually up at the end of May, and while the landlord agreed to let me out of the contract early if they found another renter, up until Friday it looked like I would still be on the hook for another month of rent and maintaining the grounds and utilities at two properties. (Which is not stressful or financially taxing at all, right?)

Then Friday at 9:30 AM I found three frantic messages on my voice mail. Apparently they found a renter who had signed a lease and wanted to move in rightthissecond, which, on one hand, Yes! On the other hand, I still had about four carloads of junk in that house. You know, all that big awkward stuff that was both difficult to move and that I had nowhere to store at Liberty.

For example:

That, for the record, is one mini-fridge, one microwave, one full-sized Christmas tree (boxed), one bar stool, one dining room chair, one ironing board, and four boxes of miscellaneous junk.

Now 330 days out of the year I go to work in some variation of jeans-and-a-tshirt, which would be totally fine if I had to unexpectedly take an afternoon off work to move large and unwieldy objects by myself, but oh no, not Friday. On Friday I was wearing a dress. So, add to the list of things I never thought I would do, but did: “load minifridge into back of SUV wearing cute red flats and making very unladylike grunting noises.” Check.

It took four loads and eight hours, but by the end of the day Friday I was able to close the door on this house for good.

It was never “home”, but I’m grateful for this little place because if I hadn’t taken a leap of faith and moved here five months ago, I never would have found The Liberty House. (Okay, that thing with the sink I would rather forget about, but everything else I’m grateful for.)

I also figured out what the World’s Largest Mudroom is good for…

Yup. That’s only three carloads of stuff because the fourth one is still in my car. And, you know, usually I’m all about breaking out the fancy camera out so that you can have a really sharp image of all of the crap I’ve managed to accumulated over the last decade (and have moved twice in the last six months) but I have a sneaking suspicion that the camera is located at the bottom of that pile of junk right now so the iPhone pics will have to suffice.

Now the ironic thing is that it really only took eight hours to move all of this because I had a half hour drive between houses each time I took a load, and when I mentioned this to my Grandpa over what has become our weekly Sunday breakfast, he looked at me quizzically and said, “Honey, why didn’t you use the trailer?”

Oh, right. Look what I forgot was conveniently sitting in my barn:

So clearly I’ve moved beyond a point of rational problem solving in my life these days, because that would have been a hell of a lot easier.

So, there is just one thing on my to-do list for the house this week: Regain control of my sanity and the mudroom. And the kitchen. And the front entry. Okay, so like four things, actually. One day I’ll be able to get back to building stuff and making big messes, but apparently this is too much chaos, even for me.

You know that phrase generally used after eating three pounds of pumpkin ravioli with a handful of buttered rolls and then washing it down with half of an apple pie about your eyes being bigger than your stomach? Clearly I would never do that with carbs and dessert–ahem–but I think the phrase “her eyes were bigger than her lawnmower” might be appropriate here.

That’s picture was taken from the back of my property looking back up towards the house. As you can see, the back field is a little, uh, wild. I have somewhere between six and ten acres of property to maintain (long story) and about two of that is nicely mowed lawn around the house and barns.

Here’s where I have to pause in our regularly scheduled programming and tell you guys my dirty little secret… I have never really mowed a lawn before. Yeah. I mean, don’t get me wrong, my first house had a yard just larger than a postage stamp and I ran my manual reel mower over it like 3 times a year, and at Memorial I made a good show of week whacking occasionally, but  “mowing” wasn’t on my list of chores… that’s why I had donkeys, after all. So I’ve never once had to fire up a gas powered mower (rider or otherwise) and spend a significant amount of time maintaining a lawn.

It’s possible I didn’t take all of that into account when I saw the Liberty House and the rolling fields that surround her, but just after I moved in things started greening up and I realized that sooner rather than later, something would have to be done.

So I did what any fully-grown fiercely-independent licensed contractor would do in this situation… I called my grandpa.

It was supposed to be strictly a consultative call. You know, should I buy a new mower or a used one? Does it make sense to hire someone? Do I need a bush hog for the back field or should I do a controlled burn?

As you might imagine, I don’t make these calls often, and perhaps my grandpa sensed a note of panic in my voice because the next the next thing you know I’m surrounded by a whirlwind of grass clippings and dish soap– he and my grandmother came up on a Saturday morning and managed to mow the lawn, do the dishes, unpack most of my kitchen, and in general make more progress on the maintenance of the Liberty House in two hours than I had in two weeks. Let me just take this moment to say how beyond lucky I am, particularly in the grandparent department.

Then, as if just getting the two acres of lawn under control wasn’t enough, I drove up to Liberty House after a couple of long days on the road for work last week, and saw this…

Yes, the very same tractor that was once wedged into the back of my postage-stamp sized lawn for this project.

Even more exciting than reminiscing about that buzz cut I used to have six years ago…

Here’s a little before and after for you:

I might have been a little disappointed that I didn’t get to drive the tractor myself, but I’ve got it stashed in my barn for another week or so and there are still a few acres to the north that I’m going to try to tackle on my own this weekend. That’s right… I’m planning to take my mowing experience level from manual reel mower to tractor in a day. Hey, go big or go play with your barbies, right? I’m also hoping to make a little progress on the rubble pile while I’ve got the big toys to play with.

As far as maintaining the field, the neighbor tipped me off that the previous owner tended to just knock the field down once a year instead of keeping it mowed, which sounds like a good plan to me, at least this year. However I’d love to find a second-hand rototiller somewhere and till up a patch of land out there for a big old garden… I’ve still got a few weeks until planting season, so it’s not outside of the realm of possibility.

Long term, some of the area to the North will be fenced off for donkeys (though I’d need a dozen of them to keep this much acreage clear), I’d like to have that big garden, and a couple of rows of grapes and/or fruit trees somewhere out there. It would be awesome to be able to maintain a wildflower meadow with the rest of the area, but apparently that’s not as easy as it looks.

I figure I’ve got years to plan out how to best use all this land, and in the meantime I just have to make sure it doesn’t turn into a small jungle.

All I have to say is, amen for grandparents and tractors, neither of which I could survive without.

You know how sometimes you go to blogs or turn on the TV and you see a gorgeous and completely finished before and after? Yeah. That’s not what this is. This is the chaos in the middle…

Where the old, and apparently purple, trim is still showing through the white paint:

Where the ceiling isn’t cut in (or even completely patched):

Where I haven’t even started priming the trim on those thousand foot tall windows:

It’s not a lot of progress but you won’t hear me complaining about the slow but steady exorcism of pink from this house.

I predict that there will be at least a few more days where I show up to work with caulk in my hair before this job is done, but hey, that’s normal. After a couple of false starts with paint color I went with Benjamin Moore’s November Rain on the walls and just your standard white paint on the trim. Well, at the moment it’s ultra-white paint but I think I’m going to tone it down a bit for the final coat.

There are also 15 holes in the ceiling of this room (improper radiator winterization rears it’s ugly head) that are in various states of being patched. Something that would normally be smart to do before you start painting the walls, but I gave myself leave to do things out-of-order on this room, because you know what? Sometimes it just feels good to paint something.

In other rather-unimpressive-but-still-feels good progress, I finally managed to locate both the envelops and the stamps and decided to celebrate that milestone in the unpacking and bill-paying process by doing a little dance and then dragging my old farmhouse table into the kitchen to set up a temporary work space.

At first I was all, “Really? There are fifteen rooms in the house and the only one you live in is the kitchen?” But I just can’t tear myself away from this view…

And really… why should I have to?

Now that I’ve got a sink that drains, a boiler that (cross-my-fingers) isn’t locking out every five minutes, and two solid weeks to get my feet back under me, I’m hoping that progress will start to look more impressive.