To dream the impossible dream...

This week was one of those weeks I was feeling at odds with things. I'm sure it's partially due to the void of not working on the house. I'm kind of addicted to accomplishing something and the house fulfills that quite nicely. If I'm not getting that fix, I get kind of restless.

The impossible dream, I refer to in the post title, is of course the idea of organizing our basement. Steve and I spent about 4 hours down there going through screws, nails, and tools in the hopes that when we need it, we can find that one screw we are looking for.

I know it's impossible dream, but we have to try. What would the world be without a little Don Quixote spirit. There's a reason why that story is a classic. It's funny, and it can be related to many things from everyday life in my opinion. It's about hope and whether we are aware of it or not, we are all living on hope on some level.

Okay, now that's enough of the introspective stuff, let's get down to what we actually did!

Ever since the BIG project finished up last Fall, we've had a pile of paint cans to go through. You see, we have a "system" for organizing them.

With Steve and I, we are pretty much as organized as our schedules will allow. The busier things get, the harder it is to be organized. Last summer got a little crazy and things got a bit messy.

We write down all the formulas with the room each paint color belongs to. We also mark the cans with a sharpie with what room they belong to. We combine any cans that can be combined.


I also went through the shelves and organized what was there. Luckily all the paint fit on the shelves. We like when that happens.



Then we tackled the (ejem) organization of our various nails and screws and other miscellany.



We have quite a few trays like what you see here with various boxes or little brown bags. We went through all of this. and separated out in categories like: brass screws, black screws, small, med. & large wood screws, etc... Where we needed to, we broke things down more or less. Glazing points, for example, have their own little drawer.

Bonus: We found the extra nail set we'd been looking for!

I even went through our electrical supplies. We still have to go through plumbing supplies.


And the result? This shining beacon of organizational nirvana. Now we just need to get a few more of these and we'll be in good shape.



And while we were doing all this, we were listening to The Drive on our favorite work site boom box. I usually listen to either XRT or NPR, but somehow the station got changed.

The day this thing goes will be a sad day indeed. I have such fond memories of it, that I'll probably have to bury it in the backyard and maybe even mark it with a little stepping stone or something. But let's just hope that day never comes.

Last summer, we realized that the boom box was older than our contractor and found that pretty funny. Funny how such a junky thing can be so treasured. Do you have any ratty old objects that you are attached to like this?

Assume the position

And just what is the position, you might ask? And what exactly does it entail? Why I can only be referring to the worship of the plumbing gods of course.

In this case, we had the typical holiday time clogged drain. It is my belief that if a sink or toilet isn't backing up during the holidays once in a while, something is terribly wrong.

Last year, you may recall it was the upstairs toilet.



I have a little organizational tip that helps us in times like this. We three hole punch all our warranties and appliance manuals and put them in large binders. Then, when we need them, we know exactly where they are. In this case, we needed to look at the faucet specs to recall how to disassemble it and clear the drain. The 2nd floor has it's own binder too.


And the cause of the clog? Long brown hair. In our house, I am the cause of all clogged drains.


It's working like a charm now though.

At certain times I like to look back to the exact date the previous year or years and see what was going on at the time.

I happened to do so this morning and last year's post on January 2nd made me laugh. And it relates to plumbing too. Ah, the memories...

Getting Back to Normal

At the end of May, we moved Steve's office from the basement to our dining room for the post replacement. Truth be told, I never liked him working down there. We have asbestos piping still and I felt relieved having him out of there.

The dining room got even more cluttered when we moved everything out of our den (for gutting) and into it as well. It was one of those cases where you kind of have a pathway through a room and no longer have a room. It was kind of embarrassing to me so I never posted a photo of the mess. The picture here was taken on a good day, when our dining room table was clear of any clutter.

This weekend we got our dining room back. We kind of need it for Thanksgiving, it was just in time. The table in the corner is only a temporary side table for Thanksgiving. We had to keep my desk there also because of limited space in the den. Eventually, we are hoping to build a longer desk in the den and fit my workstation there also. Or maybe I'll get a laptop and we won't need this desk anymore!

We moved Steve's office into the den. We still need to install picture molding and hang pictures in there and some of the furniture etc... is only temporary, but it's not too bad for a temporary solution.


Things feel alot more organized now and I'm breathing easier.