Nesting

Almost every time I walk by the front door I see the robin sitting on her nest. She voices her objections loudly and clearly whenever we open that door.

I was thinking recently about how in the latter stages of pregnancy some women are said to be "nesting." I am not expecting a baby (that would be a pleasant surprise but would certainly be a shock considering in the past almost 16 years of marriage we've never conceived a baby without significant medical intervention), but I was reflecting recently how over the past eleven months I have been very focused on projects around the house. First I went into painting mode - I painted Nadia's room purple, the kids' bathroom green, the downstairs bathroom blue, the dining room light green, and the living room orange. I'm not convinced I made the right choice for the living room, but I love all the other choices. I also repainted the hallways, kitchen, master bathroom, and family room, but I didn't change the color in any of those rooms (all  are still some shade of white). I also painted the green trim on the shed. This summer I want to do some more exterior painting.

The paint was cheap. Replacing the flooring in three rooms was definitely more expensive. I am so very glad we changed out the kitchen flooring. Of all the changes we made in the house over the past year, that is the one that put the biggest smile on my face. We also traded our kitchen table and chairs for a different set (didn't cost a penny). The most recent update was purple carpet in Nadia's room. Next on the list is the master bedroom carpet. I have decided to sell some things and put the money I get from selling a few items with the birthday money I got and hopefully that will be enough to update our carpet. I'm thinking of going with a dark blue as the walls are light blue in our bedroom. Most of the house was very neutral the first 8 years we lived here meaning almost all the flooring was off-white and almost all the walls were white. I have been enjoying having more color on the walls and floor. I still love the green curtains I got from my parents last year on my birthday for the sliding glass door in the kitchen. That was another thing that changed from off-white.

We also got a new refrigerator in the past year. I am amazed that our dryer is still working (21 years old). I imagine that will be the next appliance we'll need to replace. Paul replaced a door in the fall on the side of the garage, added two shelves in our closet, and installed a new faucet in our kitchen sink. Hopefully in the next couple of weeks he'll be able to install the ceiling fan that my Dad gave to Nadia for Christmas for her bedroom. I remember in our early years of marriage that every year I got a piece of good jewelry for my birthday. At the age of 45 the two suggestions I gave Paul were either a storm door (we don't have one) or a new kitchen faucet. He picked the faucet, and I love it. Similarly, usually when I get some money for Christmas or my birthday my first thought is to use it for something related to photography -  a class or a new lens, etc. but this month my first thought was something for the house like a pressure washer or carpet for the master bedroom. I have never been keen on the off-white berber carpet, but since I never was able to get the blood stains out from five years ago, I am even more excited about getting new carpet in that room.

Ironically the most expensive home improvement project we did in this house over the past almost nine  years was the fence, and the reason I find it ironic is that I regret that investment. It really wasn't ever helpful, and it means we need to do more weed whacking. It would be easier to take care of the lawn without the fence. If we get a dog some day, then hopefully at that point we'll reap some benefits to the thousands we paid to install a fence in 2009. Right now I wish we had chosen to replace the deck instead. It's in really, really sad shape. Our next door neighbor just ripped their deck out recently, and he and his father are building a new deck. I could stain our deck and that would improve the appearance a little, but ours also needs to be ripped out. The thing is we hardly ever use our deck so I can't see spending hundreds much less thousands of dollars to put in a new deck, but we'd at least need steps as our kitchen is higher than the ground. So I'm trying to figure out what to do about that. If money were no object I'd replace the flooring in some other rooms (like the dining room for example), but of course money is definitely a factor so I doubt we'll be doing anything else in our house in 2017 unless something breaks and we're forced to fix it (like we had to do with the water heater about 18 months ago). When we decided not to move the middle of May last year, that was when I really became more focused on personalizing and updating our house. Removing an apple tree was also a big project last summer, and in the next couple of weeks I hope to plant some blueberry and strawberry plants that will hopefully give us fruit in the future!