Wednesday, July 8, 2009

The Little Details

During the past few days, I’ve started slowly compiling a mental list of “little” things I still need to buy. You know, those last-minute kind of things that you neeeever think about –until you need them. And by then, it’s about five minutes after the hardware store closed!

Thinks like new screws for the cabinet doors. Small brads to tack up the freshly-painted new trim in the bathroom (but not until after the new tub surround goes up.) From there, things get a little bigger like flooring adhesive and grout for the kitchen and bathroom floors. I have two brand new diamond blades for the RotoZip and there’s a tile nipper in the kit I bought over the weekend, so I should be in good shape on the flooring jobs otherwise.

I need to start writing these things down, that’s for sure. That’s part of the problem when there are so many things going on at once. And the mother is no help. She’s already six or seven projects ahead. I have to keep reminding her: We HAVE to finish the kitchen and bathroom first. And we HAVE to. I can’t stand it much more. Right now, it’s rough just getting in and out of the kitchen. I still have about a fourth of the old flooring to tear up and then I have to put the backerboard down.

And then, HOW am I going to put tile in there with the appliances? I don’t have anywhere else to go with them! There is no room at the inn in the dining room and I am NOT fighting either one of those bad boys in or out of there again.

These are the kinds of things that keep me up at night. That, and a screaming cat.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

I've taken to writing down all those things, because I'd invariably forget one or more when I went to the store.

If you tile and grout in stages, you could move the appliances to the completed part after it's dry. Normally tile layout starts with finding the middle of the room, so pick a quarter or half and do that first as a place to put the appliances while you finish the rest.

MonkeyGirl said...

Gene has the right idea but I guess he hasn't looked at the dimensions on your kitchen! It is a good thing you are small but mighty, it just might work out after all!

I use the notepad on my phone for making lists so I always have it with me. Works for me but now I need to remember to delete them when I'm done!

Anonymous said...

I use those little lined note pads. The ones that have the wire spiral on top and fit in your pocket.

Around 4 for a buck. They come in four colors so you can track your projects by room.

On the 'front' pages are the to do lists. Flipping them over, the back pages have shopping lists and notes.

NV said...

Gene -- It's no coincidence that your name is the first syllable of GEN-ius. I wasn't sure I could do it that way. But validation from both you and Lawrence works for me!

MG -- Glad I'm not taking that job on TODAY. My small but mighty self is feelin' a bit on the defeated side.

Lemur -- Thanks! That's good advice. With as many jobs as we've got going simultaneously, I may really need to carry one of those.