The end of Rachel’s escape hatch

When Rachel used to get overwhelmed by a particularly nasty cuticle or a tan line, she could be found trying to claw her way out of her cosmetic misery through the hole in our kitchen floor. No more! My dad and I sealed up the hole and put in a subfloor. While I fear what will happen the next time she breaks a nail sipping margaritas on the front porch, I’m confident she will be able to handle it. Maybe.

Airing our dirty laundry

My dad and I worked all day to put up the framing for our new laundry room. This space will serve as a temporary kitchen for a while during construction and we’ll be going to a laundromat. Rachel and I figure we can act out our romantic comedy fantasies of meeting over a load of towels while she’s reading Guns n Ammo and I’m reading Dave Eggers. My 75-gallon fish tank will go on the wall that faces the windows so we can relax and look at the fish over morning coffee.

A lot more than 7 tiles...but at least I don’t have an “X”

Although it required me to be on my knees for an entire day, I much prefer tiling the bathroom to squeezing a word out of Scrabble tiles. My dad’s wet tile saw kept me looking like I visited a very dirty water park all day. But it did the job! And quickly. I am now contemplating doing a tiled backsplash in the kitchen. Rachel painted the walls a very classy beige (as opposed to a boring beige) and the master bath is looking pretty polished. Grout goes in next! And the Quickrete bucket.

Powder Poof!

Last time you saw the bathroom it was the smallest framed room ever. Now it is the smallest room ever. All the drywall is in, a nice primed door is up and Rachel put up a cool sky blue to remind folks of the world outside as they are entombed in the hall bathroom. We have also set up a bit of a competition between the toilet and our previous form of plumbing. Rachel keeps reminding me that it is ok to use the “fancy toilet” but I have trouble breaking my “Quickrete habit.”

Bella Grove Moss

No, it’s not one of the new Brangelina brood, it’s the color of our bedroom. After a less than stellar flirtation with “Wheatgrass” (we should have known), we are on our way to sleeping in the middle of a color that sounds like it climbed out of Middle Earth. Rachel sorted through no less than 5,000 paint chips with glee to find this one. Again, I think the organic stripper has altered her.

Check out our improved closet too! I took down all the plaster (the oldest walls in the house, we think) and installed drywall. A wider doorway makes the small closet look palatial. We are thinking of asking California Closet Company if they can install a portal to another dimension. I hear they have room enough for Rachel’s dress collection in Narnia.

Ridiculous as the “desk chair” post...

don’t call it a come back!