Shuffling from room to room
First of all I'll just say that the unofficial decision is that we're staying here, of course pending the appearance of the contract from Seb's company. They aren't exactly known for keeping promises of this sort without lots of teeth pulling so it's more of a "I'll believe it when I see it," sort of staying. If there's no contract by the end of this week we have decided to go to Lyon. We both hope they come through. We finally came to the conclusion that we love our home too much to bail out on it and we'd really prefer to stay here. Besides we have the fireplace coming and the roofing contractor lined up for February. So much to look forward to.
Speaking of the roofing contractor, we finally found someone to do it for a reasonable price...ummm lets just say he doesn't exactly advertise in the local phonebook if you know what I mean. I know that's a risk but you should have seen the alternatives..CHA-ching! We really had no choice. Let's just hope he lives up to his reputation.
The roof is in decent shape, the problem is there's NOTHING under it. It was never tarped or insulated. Think alpine winter and lakeside winds. Brrrrr. The tiles are in pretty good shape but covered in moss. Besides, add to that the fact that we're installing three or four Velux windows in the roof and doing a new chimney. We decided it was better to just start fresh with a whole new roof.
The fireplace is being installed in a few weeks! I was very excited about that until Seb crushed me by reminding me that the roof has to be finished before we can do the chimney, and crank up fireplace.
It's always something! Grrrrrr a gutteral growl of malcontent... excuse me. The good thing is that we get to pick out our floor, or that well we already did. We decided on walnut, medium sized planks. You can see in the samples here how it might look with the marble on our fireplace. We chose the the walnut because it was less expensive than the oak and more elegant than the pine we'd originally chose. With the now posh fireplace we had to change our entire vision of the living room. Funny how one small piece can change everything, isn't it. We we're so ready to have that rustic pine floor but it looked terrible with the marble.
Here's a picture of the fireplace as seen in the store. Isn't it gorgeous? The foyer is polished marble and provides lots of places to sit. Since it was a floor model at the end of the season we got it at half price. It's a Jotul, which apparently is a really high performance Norwegian brand. We're really excited to have a Christmas in front of the fire, ... uh, next year that is....if we're uh, here you know.
The difficult part of all of this is that we can no longer sleep in the living room, but now must sleep in the DINING ROOM. Since our dining room became our living room when we moved our bed into the living room, ...following me?, we will be sleeping in the living/dining room on an air mattress FOR ONE MONTH. We have to completely empty out our living room so that we can lay the floor so that means packing away all books, videos, lamps and stereo equipment. We already have the bare minimum in the living room anyway because almost everything we own is packed away in the unheated, drafty basement. This is all getting very tiring. I'm very attached to my bed I'll have you know and swapping it out for a month for a camp bed has me with a sour case of the holiday blues. I'm a woman who'll spend more on sheets and towels than on meaningless vacations. I'm a 300 thread count kinda gal. Losing my bed is DIFFICULT. I'm trying to be a trooper but this is getting near impossible. Add to this the fact that the shower is usually frozen each morning and you'll understand how tempting Lyon really was.
Speaking of the roofing contractor, we finally found someone to do it for a reasonable price...ummm lets just say he doesn't exactly advertise in the local phonebook if you know what I mean. I know that's a risk but you should have seen the alternatives..CHA-ching! We really had no choice. Let's just hope he lives up to his reputation.
The roof is in decent shape, the problem is there's NOTHING under it. It was never tarped or insulated. Think alpine winter and lakeside winds. Brrrrr. The tiles are in pretty good shape but covered in moss. Besides, add to that the fact that we're installing three or four Velux windows in the roof and doing a new chimney. We decided it was better to just start fresh with a whole new roof.
The fireplace is being installed in a few weeks! I was very excited about that until Seb crushed me by reminding me that the roof has to be finished before we can do the chimney, and crank up fireplace.
It's always something! Grrrrrr a gutteral growl of malcontent... excuse me. The good thing is that we get to pick out our floor, or that well we already did. We decided on walnut, medium sized planks. You can see in the samples here how it might look with the marble on our fireplace. We chose the the walnut because it was less expensive than the oak and more elegant than the pine we'd originally chose. With the now posh fireplace we had to change our entire vision of the living room. Funny how one small piece can change everything, isn't it. We we're so ready to have that rustic pine floor but it looked terrible with the marble.
Here's a picture of the fireplace as seen in the store. Isn't it gorgeous? The foyer is polished marble and provides lots of places to sit. Since it was a floor model at the end of the season we got it at half price. It's a Jotul, which apparently is a really high performance Norwegian brand. We're really excited to have a Christmas in front of the fire, ... uh, next year that is....if we're uh, here you know.
The difficult part of all of this is that we can no longer sleep in the living room, but now must sleep in the DINING ROOM. Since our dining room became our living room when we moved our bed into the living room, ...following me?, we will be sleeping in the living/dining room on an air mattress FOR ONE MONTH. We have to completely empty out our living room so that we can lay the floor so that means packing away all books, videos, lamps and stereo equipment. We already have the bare minimum in the living room anyway because almost everything we own is packed away in the unheated, drafty basement. This is all getting very tiring. I'm very attached to my bed I'll have you know and swapping it out for a month for a camp bed has me with a sour case of the holiday blues. I'm a woman who'll spend more on sheets and towels than on meaningless vacations. I'm a 300 thread count kinda gal. Losing my bed is DIFFICULT. I'm trying to be a trooper but this is getting near impossible. Add to this the fact that the shower is usually frozen each morning and you'll understand how tempting Lyon really was.
posted by christine at 12:51 AM
3 Comments:
I sympathise with you. I am having heating "issues" myself. After numerous floods, I think I finally have most of the radiators hooked up, soldered, and not leaking (knock wood). There are still 5 radiators that are not connected, but I will get to them when finish the floors in the unfinished rooms. By the way, reading all thse blogs has inspired me to start my own, www.homeimprovementninja.blogspot.com.
I missed this post earlier this week. Sounds like a mixed bag. Very exciting about the fireplace and good news on the roofing contractor. I'll cross my fingers for you.
I know it's hard roughing it. I haven't been without a bed, but we had no water in our kitchen (I have mentioned before I'm sure) for over a year and I had to wash dishes all winter in a cold dark basement. Sometimes I wasn't always a good sport about it either!
I always appreciate your frankness and honesty.
This year is the first year we are having a x-mas tree and having a small group over for x-mas too. All I can say is that I will enjoy it SO MUCH. I really really enjoy my house because I haven't always. All I can say is that if you are meant to stay there and you do stay- you have that to look forward to. But if you don't stay there ultimately, you'll make a home wherever you go.
and finally...nothing like 300 count sheets! :)
Thanks Jocelyn. I know there's a light at the end of the tunnel. It's a pretty long tunnel though, that's the part no one really tells you.
I think the hardest thing so far out of the many hardships we've endured has been when we relocated our kitchen sink! I really feel for what you went through. That was horrible doing dishes in the shower. I thought I'd just about give up at that point.
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