Things were not so busy a few weeks ago before we started our renovation planning. January and February were fairly quiet for me and I really needed that time for reflection after the sadness of December. In March things began to pick up as we started to plan our home school co-op days and get things into place. I missed the big conference that was held here this year instead of Saskatoon but we were fortunate enough to get to see the keynote speaker at a local church before he left the area. Dr. Jay Wile is so interesting to listen to and my son was thrilled to meet the author of his science texts! :)
This term at the co-op group I had planned to teach basic fingerspelling to the 9-11 age group. I figured that by the end of the 8 weeks we'd have to move into some actual signing in addition to the fingerspelling but they surprised me! Most of this ambitious group searched out some resources and began to learn on their own. As a result, I had to start teaching beyond the fingerspelling on the very first day! They will be a challenge for me, I'm sure, before this is done.
Because of the way my December went, I found a Griefshare group to join in February. The first group I was going to join had some wrong dates on their website so when I actually called about it before what was supposed to be the first night, I found out that they had already begun. The leaders knew of another group that was running locally so they gave me the number but also made sure that I knew I would be welcome to join them anyway, should that not work out for my schedule. I ended up joining the second group and it's been really good for me. It is quite a small group but it's just good to know that I'm not alone in my grief. It helps to focus a little on the journey others are on as well. Griefshare meetings are once a week for about 12 weeks. We just talked about emotions like anger and blame. It's really amazing the things you can be feeling as a part of your grief and not even realize it.
I have also had a couple study groups going on that I've been attending. One is at a local church (not ours) where my son is babysitting during a women's Bible study. I joined in to avoid all the driving back and forth and am having a good time getting to know the Bible and some other Christian women better. It's been a time of growth for me and a time of refreshment. They are a fantastic group of women who are very open and real. The other study is a small group study at my own church on the book of Joshua. It's been a pretty intense study so far and I'm learning a lot. I hope I'll be able to keep up with the homework from now till it's done. It can be quite time-consuming. This group just happens to be mostly senior women, along with our pastor and my husband. It's a fun group to be a part of. :)
I still sing occasionally on the worship team though there's more people involved now so it's less often than it used to be. That's really too bad because I really love when I get to be a part of that. I wish I had more opportunities to use that gift but perhaps something more will come up yet sometime.
Back to the topic of homeschooling, the school year has flown by and we are just a few weeks from wrapping things up for the year. Our goal has always been to plug away hard through the winter so we can have more free time in spring/summer. This year is no exception. My son is working hard and is just a week or two from completing his math, social studies and English. Science will likely take a couple weeks longer. My daughter is also just a few weeks from being finished only for her it's finished finished. She graduates this spring. I can't believe she's really going to be done. The past 18 years has gone by WAY too fast in a lot of ways...
Our homeschool group's Moms support has asked me to speak at our spring brunch this year so in addition to all that study homework I mentioned, I'm also preparing for that. I can't fathom how this is all going to come together but I'm sure it will. The same day, a friend is getting married so I'll speak in the morning and then in the afternoon and evening I'll celebrate with mixed feelings. The mixed feelings part is because she's moving away. Her fiance is from the States and she's moving there. I'm totally thrilled for her... but I will miss her presence here. Thankfully, her parents live here so it's not like we will never see each other again but it won't likely be all that often either.
So, life is busy... REALLY busy! But sometimes busy is good. Sometimes it keeps us from dwelling on things and going places we shouldn't go. I haven't had much time for the digital scrapbooking I started over the holidays but I will get back to that again... while I'm waiting for the different stages of installs for the kitchen. At least the snow is leaving and the weather is warming up. Spring is here in many ways! :)
Dee..
Sunday, March 23, 2008
kitchen renovations..
This is the season for renovations and we are finally starting ours in earnest. It's really quite a scary concept when I think about the extra bills to pay but it's more than overdue. I thought I'd put some of the plans here so friends can see a little of what we've chosen to go with. It will be a while before things really come together but the planning stages are very nearly done, leaving us wondering if we are a little nuts! LOLThe diagram to the left shows the layout from above. The top shows the west, the right is the north, etc. The door on the top is the front door and the place with the x is where our little dining table will go. We don't have a dining room in our house, just an eat-in kitchen, so it will be quite cozy. The two doorways on the right both go into the living room and the other little door in the bottom right is what we currently use as a pantry. It will likely become a broom closet and pantry overflow area for things like cereals, canned goods, or jars. The opening at the bottom is to the hallway and the side entrance.
The main design element is, of course, the cabinetry. We've chosen a sugar maple in a shaker style. The image actually shows it quite well. The appliances are LG and not exactly as shown. The fridge is bottom freezer but with a French door top with water in the left door. The
dishwasher is what they call semi-integrated. We initially looked at a design that had buttons in the top of the door but the one we went with actually has them on the front anyway. It has a stainless tub and can do half loads if needed. That might come in handy when the kids are no longer at home. The range is a ceran top with four burners and a warming one in addition. There are no knobs. Everything is done with push buttons. The oven is convection. We didn't really want to go with an over-the-range microwave but in the end it was the best way to go space-wise. Because it's on an outside wall, the fan will vent directly outside. Notice the pot drawers on the right of the range? I have always wanted those. Fabritec, the company from Quebec that is making our cabinets, has some really great standard features like full extension drawers so we were impressed by that. We will also have a glass door in the corner above the sink with accent lighting. I can hardly wait to see it installed and be putting our belongings away in there. It will be a huge improvement over what we currently have!
The countertop is going to be corian and will hopefully keep things light in colour and feel. Our kitchen doesn't have a lot of light with only one small west-facing window so we have to be careful not to choose dark colours and make it look smaller than it already seems. I have always loved the stone look and Bob likes the qualities found with corian. We think it will look better and last longer than a laminate one. I love the blue flecks in it which you can see with this close-up. They won't be quite so visible in the real thing, I imagine.
Faucets presented a bit of a challenge for us. We needed a single lever faucet and wanted something that was higher so that things like stock pots wouldn't be difficult to fill. I also wanted a spray nozzle but preferably one that is not right on the spout. Some of the ones I've seen appear to get loose after a while and so we thought a side spray would work better. It's a brushed nickel finish and looks quite nice alongside the cabinetry and the corian we've chosen. It was tough to find a faucet that we both liked but the simplicity of this Monticello set should compliment the simple style of our shaker cabinets while lending a glimmer of a modern look.
The lighting isn't totally decided on. We need to have bright lights because of there only being one small window in the room. That is also the reason we're going to have task lighting under the cabinets as well as in the glass door above the sink. We're also considering putting sconce lighting on the wall by where the table will be. I love light and if there's one thing I don't like about our house it is the minimal windows.
The last element is the flooring. We contemplated going with laminate but in the end we decided against it. We may have decided differently if we were able to install it ourselves but since we can't, and the install cost would pretty much double the price of the flooring, we decided to go with the sheet vinyl design to the left. The warm tones in it should go really well with the warm wood of the cabinetry and the cooler tones in it should work really well with the grayish look of the corian counter tops and the blue we are planning for wall colour, tying it all together. It was quite fun to go from department to department in the store carrying samples to see what they looked like beside other elements we were looking at. Some of the samples are actually quite awkward to carry around! LOL It was encouraging though, to see how well some things went together and, when something didn't seem to match well, to find something that seemed to match better.The time frame is in place for the cabinets. They should arrive somewhere around May 20th and then, once we are sure there is nothing damaged and that all the pieces are there, we notify the installer and he will give us a date for the install. It looks like about 4 weeks from the date we call them at this point. Before the install can happen we need to pack up and empty the room, remove the old cabinets, remove wallpaper, and have the flooring installers put in a new sub-floor. I think we're going to have a very BUSY spring! I hope I'll be able to post some photos during the process but will definitely have before and after photos to share later in summer.
Dee..
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Here I go again. I am negligent in blogging. I am still having a hard time with the death issues from last spring and just can't seem to bring myself to post much. I've been very busy through this school year (not really an excuse) but I've just felt unendingly sad this year. If you've ever felt that way, you will know that it's incredibly difficult to convince yourself that you have anything at all worthwhile to contribute to the lives of others.
December was especially difficult because that is the month that held my step-father's birthday. On that day I had an evening commitment I struggled to get through. Then it seemed to be fairly quickly on the heels of the birthday was Christmas. December was one of Dad's favourite times of year. Having him gone this year... and the reality of that... the issue of mortality shoved in my face... made this Christmas an extremely difficult season. I hope that it will get easier each year.
It's not even that there haven't been some good things happening here and there. There have been. The biggest of those is that we managed to get our financial situation into a position that we can start to think about the renovations that have been needed since we bought our house almost 7 years ago now. It's exciting! It's also exhausting to even think about. We need new flooring and paint through the entire main floor. We need a new bathroom so that the facilities will accommodate my husband's disability and allow him a little more freedom and independence. (It's been a long 7 years for him.) We need a kitchen. The one we have is falling apart so badly. We've lost almost all our cupboard doors, the flooring is gouged and stained horribly, and the layout just does NOT work at all. Finally, we spend a lot of time in our basement as that is where there is the most space for the whole family and we really need to brighten it up a bit... after we brace the floor joists. It's an overwhelming thought of the money this will cost and what it will do to our debt load. There are so many decisions that need to be made. How do we get what we need and quality materials so we aren't having to do this again in another 10-20 years. I know that the best thing to do is take it one thing at a time but it's really difficult to do when there's so MUCH that needs doing. We've never done this before and it's a little scary to even get started. However, that said, we have started making some basic decisions on layout and started looking at options for materials.
Now, many people would say that this is a perfect opportunity for a homeschool family. I struggle with the balance between schooling and life issues sometimes. I realize that life IS education and while I don't dispute that, there are certain amounts of book learning that are beneficial to have in case university is in your child's future. There are some things they need to be able to do if they are going to continue with post-secondary book learning. They NEED tools and skills in that area to build on. They can't just go in cold. So, back to the struggle to find balance through this time and how to capitalize on the experience.
The struggle I've had with the events of the past year is getting to a point where it needs to be dealt with more concretely so that I can really find fulfillment again. I am starting next week with a Griefshare group for 13 weeks. I hope it will help me to sort out those issues that have robbed me of joy the past months. I want to be able to move on and LIVE.
This is just a few of the things that have been occupying my mind and energies in recent months. I hope to try to blog more but, honestly, it will come as it comes for now.
Dee..
December was especially difficult because that is the month that held my step-father's birthday. On that day I had an evening commitment I struggled to get through. Then it seemed to be fairly quickly on the heels of the birthday was Christmas. December was one of Dad's favourite times of year. Having him gone this year... and the reality of that... the issue of mortality shoved in my face... made this Christmas an extremely difficult season. I hope that it will get easier each year.
It's not even that there haven't been some good things happening here and there. There have been. The biggest of those is that we managed to get our financial situation into a position that we can start to think about the renovations that have been needed since we bought our house almost 7 years ago now. It's exciting! It's also exhausting to even think about. We need new flooring and paint through the entire main floor. We need a new bathroom so that the facilities will accommodate my husband's disability and allow him a little more freedom and independence. (It's been a long 7 years for him.) We need a kitchen. The one we have is falling apart so badly. We've lost almost all our cupboard doors, the flooring is gouged and stained horribly, and the layout just does NOT work at all. Finally, we spend a lot of time in our basement as that is where there is the most space for the whole family and we really need to brighten it up a bit... after we brace the floor joists. It's an overwhelming thought of the money this will cost and what it will do to our debt load. There are so many decisions that need to be made. How do we get what we need and quality materials so we aren't having to do this again in another 10-20 years. I know that the best thing to do is take it one thing at a time but it's really difficult to do when there's so MUCH that needs doing. We've never done this before and it's a little scary to even get started. However, that said, we have started making some basic decisions on layout and started looking at options for materials.
Now, many people would say that this is a perfect opportunity for a homeschool family. I struggle with the balance between schooling and life issues sometimes. I realize that life IS education and while I don't dispute that, there are certain amounts of book learning that are beneficial to have in case university is in your child's future. There are some things they need to be able to do if they are going to continue with post-secondary book learning. They NEED tools and skills in that area to build on. They can't just go in cold. So, back to the struggle to find balance through this time and how to capitalize on the experience.
The struggle I've had with the events of the past year is getting to a point where it needs to be dealt with more concretely so that I can really find fulfillment again. I am starting next week with a Griefshare group for 13 weeks. I hope it will help me to sort out those issues that have robbed me of joy the past months. I want to be able to move on and LIVE.
This is just a few of the things that have been occupying my mind and energies in recent months. I hope to try to blog more but, honestly, it will come as it comes for now.
Dee..
Sunday, December 9, 2007
2007.. a tough year..
This year was a rough one for me. It's been a series of struggle and distress as I lost two family members within 6 weeks of each other and had several minor health crises. I say minor because I know that many people deal with much worse health-wise but I've had very little in the way of health issues myself. I guess you'd say this year has been a real wake-up call.
In May my brother's oldest son was killed after an auto accident. He survived an accident and when he went up on the highway (perhaps in a state of shock) he was killed by an oncoming semi who didn't see him trying to flag him down. This happened days before my mom's birthday and as it turned out, the memorial was held on her 60th birthday. It was the first time in years that she had all her family together in one place but what a sad reason for us to all be together. My brother and his wife have one other son but I can't imagine the pain they've been enduring over the past while as they have had to endure all "the firsts". The first summer without him, the first birthday with him gone, the first fall when he would have started university, the first Thanksgiving, their first home, the first Christmas, the first New Year, and so on. Sometimes life is just HARD.
Just under 6 weeks later, very close to where my nephew died, my step-dad was killed in an auto accident. Another fellow ran a stop sign and hit Dad's SUV while he was on his return to the office before lunch. He wasn't wearing a seatbelt (he was a large man) and was thrown from the vehicle, dying at the scene. We saw the aftermath on the news a couple days after it happened. What a twisted mess of metal! Being that he and my mom were divorced a few years ago, I hadn't seen him a lot recently and it was a huge shock to me to lose him when he was only in his mid-50's. I always hoped that in time we would become closer and now that is not to be.
At the same time, I battled a virus for a time that played with my balance due to inner ear stuff in addition to the usual sinus and chest issues associated with this kind of thing. While most of the symptoms cleared up quite normally, the balance took a long time to return to normal. I've also had some blood pressure problems creep up on me that I've been having to deal with this year that were complicated by taking decongestants for the cold symptoms I've had this fall.
My family is in a time of transition this fall. Our daughter is on the threshold of adulthood, having just turned 18 in the past few weeks. She's still working on her homeschooled Grade 12 year as she's also been working full-time and more since June. It's been an experience to have her moving into the adult world when it hardly seems like more than a few short years since we brought her home from the hospital that very first time. It's amazing how fast time goes by when there are periods when it feels like they will never grow up. And now we know that it won't be long and her brother will be going through similar things.
Anyway, it's felt like an incredibly LONG year to me and yet, it's flown by with unimaginable speed at the very same time. So... all this to explain my absence to anyone who might have been watching for posts here. It's been quite the year.
Dee..
In May my brother's oldest son was killed after an auto accident. He survived an accident and when he went up on the highway (perhaps in a state of shock) he was killed by an oncoming semi who didn't see him trying to flag him down. This happened days before my mom's birthday and as it turned out, the memorial was held on her 60th birthday. It was the first time in years that she had all her family together in one place but what a sad reason for us to all be together. My brother and his wife have one other son but I can't imagine the pain they've been enduring over the past while as they have had to endure all "the firsts". The first summer without him, the first birthday with him gone, the first fall when he would have started university, the first Thanksgiving, their first home, the first Christmas, the first New Year, and so on. Sometimes life is just HARD.
Just under 6 weeks later, very close to where my nephew died, my step-dad was killed in an auto accident. Another fellow ran a stop sign and hit Dad's SUV while he was on his return to the office before lunch. He wasn't wearing a seatbelt (he was a large man) and was thrown from the vehicle, dying at the scene. We saw the aftermath on the news a couple days after it happened. What a twisted mess of metal! Being that he and my mom were divorced a few years ago, I hadn't seen him a lot recently and it was a huge shock to me to lose him when he was only in his mid-50's. I always hoped that in time we would become closer and now that is not to be.
At the same time, I battled a virus for a time that played with my balance due to inner ear stuff in addition to the usual sinus and chest issues associated with this kind of thing. While most of the symptoms cleared up quite normally, the balance took a long time to return to normal. I've also had some blood pressure problems creep up on me that I've been having to deal with this year that were complicated by taking decongestants for the cold symptoms I've had this fall.
My family is in a time of transition this fall. Our daughter is on the threshold of adulthood, having just turned 18 in the past few weeks. She's still working on her homeschooled Grade 12 year as she's also been working full-time and more since June. It's been an experience to have her moving into the adult world when it hardly seems like more than a few short years since we brought her home from the hospital that very first time. It's amazing how fast time goes by when there are periods when it feels like they will never grow up. And now we know that it won't be long and her brother will be going through similar things.
Anyway, it's felt like an incredibly LONG year to me and yet, it's flown by with unimaginable speed at the very same time. So... all this to explain my absence to anyone who might have been watching for posts here. It's been quite the year.
Dee..
Wednesday, January 3, 2007
Happy New Year... it's now officially 2007
Happy New Year to anyone who has found their way to my blog. I hope that 2007 will be very good to you and yours. :)
We had a nice evening with some friends on New Year's Eve after a very nice Christmas week. Laid back was the phrase of the week and it was lovely! Unfortunately, it's nearly time to get back into the swing of things and get back to routine. I'm not sure we're really ready for it! LOL I'm in the process of updating my address books and entering them all into the computer. What a task that is! Hopefully I can finish tomorrow or Thursday and get to planning some school lessons for the kids.
Again, HAPPY NEW YEAR, everyone!!!!
Dee..
We had a nice evening with some friends on New Year's Eve after a very nice Christmas week. Laid back was the phrase of the week and it was lovely! Unfortunately, it's nearly time to get back into the swing of things and get back to routine. I'm not sure we're really ready for it! LOL I'm in the process of updating my address books and entering them all into the computer. What a task that is! Hopefully I can finish tomorrow or Thursday and get to planning some school lessons for the kids.
Again, HAPPY NEW YEAR, everyone!!!!
Dee..
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