Stuck in Frump, Striving for Fab

Lately, whenever someone sneezes (which is often with all the dust in the air around here), Judah will say, "Bwess you!"

So the other day, he was out in the living area while I was back in the bedrooms, and he sneezed. Nobody was around to return the favor, and I hear him say in his sweet little toddler voice, "Bwess me!"

:: :: :: ::

A few Saturday's ago, our church had a work party to spruce things up a bit around our church campus.

During the course of the day while working on the church kitchen, I learned that there were some electrical things that were being tended to in our church building.

The following Sunday, nursery and toddler classes were canceled because something was wrong with the heater in their adjoining classroom. The kids were asked to stay with their parents in the warm sanctuary as it was an unseasonably cold day, and the classroom was chilly.

So we're sitting in the sanctuary, listening to the guest speaker while our Pastor was out of town, when suddenly the right bank of sanctuary lights blinks off.

My mind immediately shoots back to recent electrical problems in the building, and I wondered if there was something more wrong than previously thought.

During the split second I'm contemplating these things I notice some movement off to the right in my periphery.

My eyes widened.

There, stretching as far as he could reach over the back of the pew (in the back row in the sanctuary) was my toddler son, ready to try out a few more of the light switches, having enjoyed the stir that flipping the first switch caused.

Horrifed, I snatched him back, and firmly sat him on my lap, shrugging apologetically to the number of people that turned around to see what had happened, including my husband who was ushering at the side entrance.

Most people glanced back, and upon seeing who was responsible, turned around and, if the nods from family members were any indication, had no doubt whispered to them one word. "Judah."

You see, they're used to this from him.

He's quite possibly the most disruptive kid in our church's history.

When he was just a little tot, he would yell out, "AMEN!" at the end of prayers (and sometimes in the middle if it was particularly long-winded).

And then there were the offeratory envelopes that he once, for no apparent reason, tossed high into the air in the aisle, the papers fluttering to the floor like so much confetti in Times Square that first moment of the new year.

And more recently, the time he got away from Grandma (a few rows up) to come sit with us, except that when Jeff stood up to get him, he stopped and turned the other way, running up the right side of the sanctuary, around in front of the pulpit, and down the center aisle to the back door.

Our Pastor did something that time that I'd never seen him do before. Ever.

He stopped his sermon, took off his glasses and grinned. "You'll catch up to him eventually" he remarked to Jeff.

Just like those times, boy, was my face red!

I did see quite a few heaving shoulders, though. People trying very hard no to laugh outright in church (which as you know is not an easy thing to do, because everything just seems so much funnier when it happens in church, lol).

So after the 'shutting off the lights during the sermon' incident, Jeff was stopped by one of the old guys (who we thought might have found it disruptive) on his way out the door. "I LOVE that kid" he said, chuckling.

Adding to my chagrin, however, was when our Pastor returned from his trip a few days later, and the first thing he said to my husband when he saw him was, "So I heard Judah turned off the lights during the sermon."

Word sure does get around in small churches.

:: :: :: ::

Jericho is currently 21 and O for arm wrestling at his school.

He informed me that all his pull-ups are really starting to pay off.

I think it's gone to his head a bit, though. He's strutting around the house lately without a shirt on, saying, "Don't mess with me...I've got 'Guns'!", lol.

Just like his daddy, that one.

:: :: :: ::

Here is a photo looking down the hallway in our new home.

If you look closely, you'll notice a few key things about this work-in-progress:

• Door waiting to be re-hung (Yeah, we're pretty classy like that. Exposing all our closet innards for everyone to see when they come in the front door.)
  
• Fake plants and picture collage frame waiting to be hung where they belong (because as if finding time to do this with a toddler in the midst of the chaos isn't enough of a feat in itself, finding where the toddler was last playing with said hammer adds a whole new dimension to the task.)


• The 10# Beef Stew and Tomato Sauce can doorstops (What, doesn't everyone have doorstops like these?)


• the lack of flooring (because when one project on our to-do list gets bumped off course, they all do)


• the lack of baseboard trim (again, a classic case of one task waiting on another

Though you can't see it in that photo, off to the right is the front door, where we have our make-do weather stripping (that's not our permanent flooring. It's just how it looks after the tile and the moisture barrier were removed)



Yep, as you can see, there are two dark blue hand towels under our door (until such a time as we remember to get that rubbery weatherstripping from Lowe's).

Then again, maybe you can't see it. No thanks to our dog (who sleeps on the front porch) .

Yes, Raisin seems to have taken those two towels being there as a personal challenge, and spends half the night tugging on them until they're out, snuffling her jowly snout along the bottom edge of the door, her paw scrapes and bumps on the door making noises in the night that cause the hair on the back of my neck to stand on end in bed...until I remember the source of the sounds, and the fact that our LACK OF FLOORING causes such sounds to echo and carry much farther than usual.

As Judah would say, "Naughty Way-way!" (Toddler-speak for "Raisin", which he shortened to "Ray-Ray".)

:: :: :: ::

Judah was delighted to learn that he and his little friend Rachel were permitted to do this inside the house.



:: :: :: ::

Our pallet's worth of Laminate flooring waiting installation behind the sofa.



Which, with all the junk that has already been conveniently 'set' on it after just two days tells me that perhaps this would be a good place for a storage unit instead of the planned sofa table. (And from a couple of postings ago, those are the infamous forest green sofas.)

:: :: :: ::

I found a spider on our back porch a couple of days ago that I'm pretty sure was a young tarantula.

Oh, the joys of living in the desert.

I'm sorry not to have posted pictures, but I'm afraid in my freaked-out, trying-to-prevent-my toddler-from-petting it state, I didn't think to take a picture, and by the time I got done with it, well, there wasn't much left to take a picture of.

All I wanted was to see that thing dead.

It's legs were solid black and it looked much thicker and sturdier than a black widow, but it's body was fuzzy and gray and larger and hairier than, say, a wolf spider.

Definitely the shape of a young tarantula.

It was at least the size of a silver dollar, and took me three good stomps to completely kill it.

And I can't begin to describe the crunchy-rubbery grossness. **shudders**

I can only hope it didn't come from a large family still living in our yard.

:: :: :: ::

So on the way home from our weekly Bible study the other night, Jericho and I were chatting about his day at school.

We used to have our daily commute to and from his school to talk and joke around, and I've missed being able to keep up on things with him like I used to, so it's nice to have this one night a week in the car both ways to have uninterrupted mom-son time.

In the middle of our conversation, which had jumped around from topic to topic, Jericho suddenly throws out the comment, "Yeah, so we had to write statement sentences today."

"Oh?"

"I wrote, "My mom is pretty awesome..."

(His sincerity was such that I got all mushy inside and thought, "Awwwww".)

"...but sometimes she can be vicious."

"Vicious?!" I asked, appalled at the 'statement' that must have made to his teacher.

Jericho was laughing, loving my reaction. "Yeah, like the other day when you were chasing me around the house with the fly swatter."

I cocked a brow his direction, firing off a couple of those vicious mom eye-darts at him.

Because he well knew that the only reason I was chasing him with a flyswatter to begin with was that when I firmly told him to wash off an apple for his brother right then, he turned to me, and with a hint of pre-teen sass hissed like a cat.

It was either laugh my head off (and lose any modicum of authority I had) or chase him with a flyswatter until he relents and knows I mean business. Smartypants.

So we took delivery of our appliances a week or so ago.

I totally love them. Stainless goes great with my new kitchen colors.

The only downside is that every. single. fingerprint shows up...both on the stainless portion, and the black plastic ice/water dispenser in the door of the fridge.

I must wipe that entire thing off two or three times a day, and probably will until I get Judah trained to stay out of the fridge for as long as we own stainless appliances.

No sooner did we get the fridge hooked up and stocked, than the fancy-schmancy new in-door ice dispenser decides to quit working.

It made a straining sound in the motorworks when the button was depressed.

Our family seems to have bad luck with ice-dispensers this way.

However, this time, due to the fact that we had nothing yet stocked in the freezer, we knew there was no chance of it being pizza or corn.

Wouldn't you just know we'd opted against the full warranty?

On a side note, this planned obsolescence thing on the part of appliance manufacturers is going a bit far! With companies trying to appear 'green', why has nobody begun pointing fingers at appliance makers that used to build appliances that lasted for 30+ years relatively trouble-free, but now last only 5 years or so (if that), ending up in the landfills much sooner and requiring more resources than ever? What difference does it make if we're 'saving the ozone' with better refrigeration technology if we're filling up the landfills 6 times faster than we should be? How is that green, I ask?

Ahem. **stepping down off soapbox**

Meanwhile, wanting to take advantage of our limited warranty if need be, our resident detective Jeff decided to take a closer look at things.

Wondering if ice had somehow jammed the works, he took out the ice tray and tested the corkscrew mechanism that moves the ice to the dispenser chute.

Everything was in perfect order.

He slid the tray back in, closed the door and tried again.

The straining motor sound continued.

He then opened the door and poked down through auto-close seal on the chute (to keep the cold air in the freezer after the ice is dispensed)... and promptly discovered the problem.



Yes, apparently apples shoved up inside the dispenser chute can completely disable an ice dispenser. Who knew?

The forensic evidence at the scene of the crime clearly pointed to one particular member of our family.



Unbelievably, fingerprints on the stainless finish are good for something, lol.

We asked Judah if he had put his apple there.

He grinned cheekily in admittance.



To him, that round dispenser hole was a perfectly logical place to stick an apple.

The one he'd taken only a couple of toddler-sized bites out of and wanted to hide from mom and dad.

Is it just me, or does something about this little tale seem vaguely familiar?

Something about eating an apple then trying to hide evidence of their sin...Oh, yes. Adam and Eve!

I know she probably won't like it, but I totally love this snapshot of my mom (and sister, which was obviously taken at my sister's wedding a couple of summers ago).

I only hope I look as good as my mom does when I get as old as she is.

Er, I mean, when I reach her age.

Ugh! This just isn't coming out right.

What I meant was that I hope I age as gracefully as she has when I am old enough to be a grandma... turn 29. Again.

Oh, wait. I've been doing that for several years already.

Anyway, you know what I mean, mom.

Love you...and Happy Birthday!

P.S. If you don't like the photo then you'll just need to come visit us so that we can get some more to work with. (;

A little peek at my work-in-progress kitchen.

Today I'm going to discuss a few things not often discussed here at Stuck in Frump.

Things like home decor, girls-night-out, testosterone, Zombies and the color green.

No, you have not stumbled upon a strange episode of Sesame Street.

And yes, I'm sure you are wondering what a self-professed Frumpmama would be writing about such things for, and how they could possibly ever even remotely relate to each other.

I suppose I should start by informing you that while it may not seem like it to you, my bloggy peeps, deep in the heart of this Frumpmama is an interior decorator waiting to burst forth.

To be set free. Loosed!

To decorate with abandon as I have longed to do for years and years.

I do not kid you.

I was an art major in college. At one time, I planned on becoming a graphic designer, creating world-famous logos.

Then we became parents, and all that changed.

My focus shifted to the more important matters of custom birth announcements, scrapbooking...and the creme De la creme: interior decorating.

Settling on the all-important theme for our baby's nursery (which in Jericho's case was the brightly colored Paddington Bear in case you were wondering...because no son of Jeff's was going to have a nursery in pastels of any color, thankyouverymuch) was of utmost importance.

Sadly, despite all my best efforts, my home's decor has suffered terribly, becoming the biggest casualty of my condition.

For the past 15 years, I've suffered from a condition known as RID.

Otherwise known as Repressed Inner-Decorator.

I blame this condition largely on the fact that we've rented for so long and have had to suffer with 'rental' white (and in one case, a very sad shade of 1970's 'Navajo White' which was not white at all, but a very drab tan) and some wood-look paneling, which worked together to suck all the brightness from the living room of our home...in spite of even the bright halogen torchere (sp.?) lamps we had in those days.

It was a very trying time for me, but I persevered.

Under the constraints of those drab rental walls, I usually managed to decorate our home in a pleasing manner, employing artwork of my own design (though always longing for the day when I could finally slather the walls with color and could place things on the walls and hang select objects from the ceilings wherever I wanted to).

Recently, as I've begun to reassess my home decor choices from years past (and plan out completely different colors for our new home), I've noticed something remarkable.

Somehow in recent years and quite without my notice, our home decor has evolved into an abode that virtually screams 'boys live here'. Though that could be due in part to all the Matchbox cars littering the floors.

In spite of all my efforts to steer clear of sports related themes, never giving in to the desire (however brief) to decorate in "Lodge" theme, the color scheme of our home still gravitated towards masculinity, leaving not a vestige of femininity in the home.

How could this travesty have occurred with a girly-girl (albeit frumpmama) in the house, you ask?

I blame it all on the color green.

Forest green, specifically.

Now I love the color forest green. Always have, and probably always will. Probably because I used to wear a lot of it.

The long, forest green wool winter coat I used to wear over my work clothes during Minnesota winters was what I happened to be wearing when my husband first took notice of me.

My love of forest green, however, became all-consuming, and led to a serious decor dilemma, and one that I tell you about because it must be nipped in the bud right away so one doesn't fall prey to it.

You see, I loved the color SO much, that the very first furniture that we ever bought new was a two-sofa set from This End Up...honey pine finish with upholstery of forest green.

We still have these sofas today, all. these. years. later.

Aside from a couple of stubborn grease spots still remaining from the "Molly McButter" incident of Jericho's toddlerhood, they still look pretty decent.

Yes, thanks to ScotchGuard and the high-quality foam and upholstery fabrics they were made of, the pieces are virtually indestructible. And still comfortable. Just sadly in need of a better color.

Cutesy "Country" style furnishings were in when we bought those sofas.

Navy and burgundy were also used (along with forest green) in profusion around our home.

For years and years. And years.

Because I did not realize the gravity of the situation early enough to correct it, most of my living room decor choices over the years have (out of necessity) had to match those forest green sofas. One can't ignore those elephants in the room.

And as a result of that, my family became accustomed to this abundance of masculine colors permeating our home decor.

In fact, I believe the men in my life have come to correlate hearth and "home" with these colors, and have firmly resisted change. Jeff has turned up his nose at all of my forays into incorporating "Shabby Chic" or "Victorian" or "Romantic" look in our home, because, well, we raise boys here.

Anything pink, lacy or including the term 'doily' is pretty much out of the question.

Which limits me considerably.

I'm just not into the sleek modern or minimalist looks.

Even as a FrumpMama, non-fashionista type, I still desire to have a beautiful, functional and cozy home with decor that includes those special feminine touches that truly make a house a home.


I suppose I could deal with the whole 'masculine' decor issue well enough if I hadn't become inundated by another wave of testosterone around here lately.

Yes, as if decor colors weighing heavily on the side of testosterone weren't enough...every which way I turn in this house I've been subjected to ongoing testosterone-filled discussions about sports, superheroes (who can 'take' whom), race cars, weaponry, Thomas the Train, the TV series Smallville, anything and everything Star Wars, and more recently, Zombies.

"Zombies?" you ask.

Yes, Zombies. As in Dawn of the Dead zombies.

In recent months, my husband and oldest son have become rather obsessed with Zombies.

Ever since they first heard about the book World War Z.

They even have a contingency plan.

Wherever we go as a family, be it an amusement park or a museum, the grocery store or Lowe's...at some point during that trip it is a given that the topic will arise, wherein they will discuss the merits or failings of such a place being a 'fortress' to defend themselves were "Zombies" to ever attack.

Because, as you all know, there is a very real and imminent danger of Zombies attacking, and we should be fortified and heavily armed 'just in case'.

It's at times like these that a mom just wants to throw her hands in the air and cry out, "Why did I not have any daughters, Lord?"

Rarely do I get the opportunity to use, much less bestow upon a daughter my vast array of girly knowledge...things like French-braiding hair, sewing, applying makeup, teaching a girl to crochet or quilt or cook or decorate cakes, the fine arts of making deviled eggs, cooking Thanksgiving turkeys or decorating elaborate Christmas cookies...(not to mention someone to bequeath my expansive 5th grade sticker and doll collections to one day).

At times like these, I sometimes mourn all those girlhood plans I'd made to one day throw wonderful girl birthday parties and make beautiful cakes for my daughters...because, well, those plans went out the window when I had sons.

Because in our forest green manly house, boys cakes with icing roses would never fly.

Instead, I was forced to come up with things like Pirate cakes and parties.

But that's a blog for another day.

Not that I'm complaining, mind you. I love doing fun stuff for my boys.

It's just that all these girly talents within me have gone largely untapped.

I've even begun to think in boy.

Instead of pointing out pretty hairstyles or beautiful flower gardens to a daughter, or maybe marveling over a new color of lipstick or nail polish or a beautiful new dress together...I find myself pointing out lizards and bugs along the sidewalk. Or listening to long discussions on Star Wars or the latest episodes of Smallville, or long diatribes on superheroes and kung fu movies.

And if that weren't bad enough, I have even found myself occasionally slipping my two-cents into the family Zombie discussions.

**hangs head in shame**

As you can see, due to all these factors, it was apparent that I was long overdue for a girls night out.

Because a girl (especially the mother of two sons) needs an outlet every now and again, you know?

Time to get in touch with her inner-chick.

Thankfully, my good friend Chrissy and her sister-in-law Lisa rescued me from my distress.

They whisked myself and three other women away for a Christian women's arena event called Women of Faith.

We even booked a fancy hotel suite.

It was a refreshing, estrogen-filled weekend getaway. A slumber party of sorts.

And you truly haven't lived until you've heard Anita Renfroe, Patsy Clairmont, Luci Swindoll, Sheila Walsh, Nicole Johnson, Sandi Patty, Nicole C. Mullen, Steve Arterburn, Natalie Grant, Luci Swindoll, Mary Graham and others talk or perform live on stage all in one weekend.

And you really haven't lived until (courtesy the deal-finding skillz of Lisa's husband) you've scored arena floor seats about 7 rows behind "the porch", where all these ladies all sit while the others are on stage.

And you really, really haven't lived until Sandi Patty walks down the aisle past you after singing one of your old Sandi Patty favorites and speaking on stage, and you smile at her, and as she's passing by she warmly pats you on the shoulder.



Sandi was one of my favorite Christian singers as a girl.

That sistuh can saaang!

Hers was one of my very first cassette tapes ever, purchased by my mother the Christmas I received my very first Ghetto Blaster.

And Sandi Patty patted my shoulder.

That was huge, peeps.

Being that the only other celebrity I've ever seen up close was Don King the boxing promoter...for me, this was like running into royalty.

I'm pretty sure I still have fairy dust on my shoulder. Sandy, Michael W. and Amy were my childhood heroes.

And now, she and I are like this: **crosses fingers**

We're practically best buds, lol.

Yes, all things combined, it was a touching and wonderfully refreshing chick-weekend!

Still here. Still *cough, cough* covered in construction dust. Still striving for fab.

I have been a horrible blogger, I know, going for days without any contact while we were in the throes of DIY projects and covered in construction dust, but when I signed on to my reader yesterday after having been virtually out-of-commish for a little over a week, I found over 500 postings to slog through. It may take me a while to get all caught up.

As for the home renovation lessons we've been learning? Here are a few more...

16. Even if your list of DIY projects appears to be small and manageable, you will get 10 days into the list (the projected finish time), see no end in sight, and will wonder if you've bitten off more than you can chew. And you will weep and wail and gnash your teeth. (Not really, but it sounds so dramatic, doesn't it? And I'm nothing right now if not dramatic.)

17. Your family will lament the fact that the new home just doesn't feel like home yet. And you will wonder if the boxes of glass-framed family pictures and things ended up getting buried beneath boxes of stuff in the garage, hoplessly broken to smithereens. But you can't check on this because there is so much else that must take priority.

18. The house, though you spend hours each day trying to maintain a modicum of your usual high standard of cleanliness and homemaking will still look as though a bomb went off. (Oy, the dust! We're all sneezing and coughing and none of it is due to colds.)

19. It is possible for even a compulsive blogger/family chronicler/hobby photographer like myself to lose track of her camera bag (*gasp*) and her laptop (*gasp and sputter*) in the move.
20. Calling the trash company twice about your not-yet-delivered garbage cans will yield little by way of results, but you can bet they will still try to charge you for "service".

21. Bags of trash will pile up in the bed of the pick-up in your driveway for lack of any other place to put it until such a time as the recepticles finally arrive. All that is needed now are for a few broken down cars to litter the yard, and to allow the weeds to grow knee-high, and we'll really look the part of the desert rat.

22. Never leave a cup of paint thinner with a paint brush in it outside on the patio, where a toddler could push paint cans over to step up and get it. Because he will find it, spill it all over his pants, and though the pants are removed at the first discovery of chemical smell, the son's legs will not smell like paint thinner, and you will wrongly assume that it merely got on his pants. Later, however, inspection of your toddler son's "owie" will reveal a bright red rash on the top of his foot that will evidence his lengthy contact with the chemical. You will thank the Lord that your husband had the foresight to clean the bath tubs in the new home (while you were unpacking) in preparation for the families first night there, and will promptly put your child to soak, then soap it up and soak him again, and it will will (thankfully) return to normal color by late that evening. And you will be eternally grateful that said paint thinner-in-a-cup was an unappealing color of murky taupe so at least he didn't drink it. Like your (then) toddler nephew did a few years earlier when he happened upon a cup of milky-white paint thinner-in-a-cup in the new home they were moving into and took a swig while his mom raced across the floor in slow-mo, with leaden feet (like in nightmares) because he'd recently had heart surgery, and aspirating it into his lungs was a frighteningly real possibility with potentially grave consequences (though thankfully he never had any lingering problems as a result, either).

23. Compulsive perpetual listmakers like myself will go crazy during the move, both from having the well-devised lists and plans for our renovation getting tossed out the window, and from not being able to find a single piece of paper in the house (not even a scrap of scratch paper) on which to write new lists. Which results in lots of writing on the palm of my hand to stay on track for the day.

24. Ripping up the carpeting that had been in the house will prove to be a wonderful idea, because the funny smell the house seemed to have lingering inside will go away (along with the carpeting)...and will be worth every extra penny you are forced to spend on new carpeting (which thankfully ends up being far less than usual, thanks to your husband's firm refusal to go over-budget, and the carpet place's desperation for a sale in a very slow market).

25. Oldest son's bedroom will turn out drastically a tad brighter than the paint chip you'd picked out to match the 'water' on the maps you would be hanging up in his room, rendering his room a garish aqua (instead of the desired lighter shade of turquoise), because contrary to popular conjecture...paint does not dry 'lighter', and those paint chips are colored with transparent inks, not opaque paint. However, being 'turning-life's-lemons-to-lemondade' type of parents you will enthusiastically applaud his color choice (and he will, thankfully, be delighted with the results), which is a good thing, because his project-weary parents aren't likely to be changing the color any time soon.

26. It is possible to teach old dogs new tricks! I have learned (among other things) the fine art of switching out door-knobs and installing dead-bolts and door hinges, and Jeff has learned how to install new electrical light fixtures (thanks, Steve!) without incident. And our normally 'bark only when necessary' dog Raisin has learned to bark at every. single. person. that passes by our house each day.

27. Even decor-conscious folks like myself will deign to live (temporarily) with plastic garbage bags and/or newspapers taped over the front windows until I'm able to get around to hanging up curtains, because just about anything is better than that 'living in a fishbowl' feeling of not having the windows covered.

28. Your first night in the new house will not be entirely restful, as a whole new set of sounds will wake you throughout the night, requiring investigation as to the cause if you are to get any sleep at all. Including what sounded like someone breaking into the garage, but turns out to be your scaredy-cat dog pounding and scratching on the metal front door and snuffling along the bottom edge (which echoes funny through the house due to different accoustics than you were used to) to inform you that she does not like life in the front yard one. single. bit.

29. The laminate flooring that you ordered 10 days earlier (and paid for in advance) and was told should be delivered via a store-to-store transfer in just a couple of days will not actually get ordered, resulting in both rescheduling the installer and enduring another 10 days or so of dusty living on bare concrete floors. Ugh. However, we will recognize the blessing-in-disguise when we end up with a 20% discount for their mistake and our inconvenience.

30. Though the house is still in a tumultous state, having the kids settled in their beds in their new rooms after bedtime prayers, and the "Goodnight Johnboy" bedtime routine returning will bring a sense of normalcy to things once again. Who knew that parents needed those routines just as much as the kids?

I'm still here. **cough, cough** We've been buried under all the dust involved with the 'face lift' of our new home.

Here are a few of the lessons I've learned during this renovation:

1. Do take the time to cover more than just the newly installed light fixtures with plastic before sanding cabinetry and taking up the tile flooring, because such tasks will leave a superfine layer of dust across the interior of your home that will rival the amount of ash that your grandma had all over her yard in Tacoma, Washington after Mt. St. Helen's blew back when you were a girl.

2. Take the time to be sure you've turned on only the lights in the fixtures NOT still covered in plastic in your new home...before you are nearly driven from the home by the smell of smell of melting plastic on hot bulbs.

3. If what you thought was "merely" a heavy film of grease on the kitchen walls around the stove does not come off the walls after inordinate amounts of scrubbing with sudsy Dawn, TSP and a stiff scrub brush...it is most likely a film of nicotine. From six-pack-a-day smoker.

4. Bugs of all kinds can survive in 2-years-vacant homes, and five dead cockroaches found in the newly cleaned out and bug-bombed fogged garage will cause horror-flick quality nightmares that will pervade your normally sweet sleep, and cast a pall over the wonderful experience of owning your beautiful new home. As in those kind of repeating nightmares that come back night after night taunting you with their realism, causing you to fret even in your sleep that you will accidentally 'infest' your sister-in-law's home where you are staying during the renovation and that she and her family will recoil in horror, thinking you and your family to be horribly disgusting and filthy because of it.

5. Just when you think you have the perfect time frame all mapped out for completing the 'flip', something seemingly insignificant will pop up that will bump all the remaining tasks off schedule and require calling around to reschedule help in the days ahead. This will happen a minimum of five times.

6. You will be happy to accept help of any kind, even from people who don't bother to read your notations on your painstakingly organized moving boxes (such as "FRAGILE" and "HEAVY") especially if it means being able to get to bed before midnight, because your back and feet will be screaming, lamenting the use of muscles you never knew you had.

7. Feeding your volunteer work crews from day to day will provide you with moments of hilarity you never thought possible before...like the day you ordered 14 tacos, 10 burgers and 10 orders of fries at a drive-thru (for a group of teens from church that were coming over to help), and the kid taking your order gasps, "T-TEN?! Ten small fries?" (with a "Say WHAT?!" kind of verbal double-take), and you must, with red face, admit that yes, we are in fact ordering 10 orders of fries. And you will feel that all the workers in the restaurant will be peering out the drive through window to witness the spectacle that is your family to put a face with the type of people order that many orders of french fries all at once. Then, you will get to the pick-up window and your husband will deadpan, "My wife was really hungry."

8. The projects that were slated to take only a week on paper will stretch into at least 2 weeks, with the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel looking very faint off in the distance, because of all that still needs to be done and because the carefully rendered master list was cast aside in favor of 'winging' it.

9. Your son will come down with the flu during the window of time between getting moved out of the old house and into the new, hampering your ability to supervise help with certain crucial aspects of the transition that will further set you behind on both the move out and the renovation prior to move in. Things like the crucial order of first sanding and removing floor before dusting and washing down walls to prepare for painting, making it necessary to do this lovely little chore twice.

10. You will suffer extreme fatigue after the final 'inspection' on the old house, knowing that the really hard work hasn't even begun yet, and will feel uncharacteristically out of control and snappish, to the point where everyone in your life will look at you like you've lost it...only to realize that you were trying to catch your breath due to a horrible asthma attack you didn't even realize was upon you until you were wheezing and gasping for air...no thanks to all the cleaners being used in the house all at one time. And you will want everyone (even those helping to get things done faster) to go away and leave you to suffer without spectators.

11. The nephew in the household you have invaded (while his parents are in Hawaii and you are in the midst of the renovation) will have an accident while horsing around outside while having a Nerf warfare battle with your son, which necessitates the need of a late night trip to the E.R. for an x-ray on his hand. Thankfully this involves 'only' a contusion and no broken bones, even though your ornery husband decides to tell his sister by a trans-pacific cell phone call that it was a horrible break on the growth plates, and will need titanium pins and intensive physical therapy to restore use. She will groan with regret, ruing the moment she decided to take the trip, until her brother says, "I'm just kidding...it's only a bruise. He'll be better in a day or two with a pain reliever" to which she will reply, "You jerk", but in the same sentence thank him for taking care of her baby in her absence, because that's just the kind of family they are.

12. You will discover that your new neighbors love playing very very loud music at all hours of the day and night, the decibel levels of which will reverberate in your chest like the 3rd row tickets to a lame Stryper concert you went to as a teen, and that said neighbors will, with much profanity the following morning, blame you because the cops showed up to bust them for disturbing the peace at 3 am, all because you're the new kids on the block. (Not the NKOTB, but the new family in the 'hood.) And you will worry for the safety of your home and belongings and dog after leaving the house each night.

13. Your normally stalwart, brave guard-dog will exhibit bizarre and uncharacteristic behavior. Like tugging on the gate of the chain link fence with her teeth to try and open it and get out. Or like jumping in the car every time you open the doors as though to say, "Please, PLEASE don't leave me here by myself again!" until you realize that she is accustomed to viewing everything from the relative privacy afforded by wooden fences where she would spy through the gaps in the boards, but is now 'exposed' by chain link, and doesn't like it one. single. bit. And she will hover around you (because, after all, you are the only mama she can remember) every moment you spend at the new house working, literally dogging your every step. And you will have to speak to her in soothing tones to calm her down. And she will run to you with relief at your arrival each morning, and you will feel great guilt for not being able to do anything about it.

14. Your appliances will not be available for delivery for two full weeks after move in, and your kitchen things will all still be packed due to the renovation dust, effectively preventing you from cooking dinner in your home. (Darn).

15. Because of # 5 and #8 and #9, your renovation will drag on days longer than you anticipated, and you will find yourselves feeling rather homeless, dragging clothes around with you in tubs in the backs of your vehicles for convenience sake. This will be confirmed after one particularly pitiful incident in WalMart parking lot where you were seen in grubby work clothes, messy hair and without makeup on, mumbling about trying to find some clean clothes for your toddler son 'in there somewhere', and you will turn and notice disparging looks being cast your direction from the lady in the nearby car who just watched you change said son's diaper, and you will realize that folks think you are living in a van down by the river.