More choices have been made -- see above for my new chestnut flooring. As of now, the cabinets will be a nice buttery cream color and the island will be a chocolate brown. I'm thinking of a muted gold for the walls. Or a muted green. Or a muted slate blue. It will definitely be muted.
These choices are very stressful! Why is that? I've survived many other poor paint choices -- what's the big? Oh, who am I kidding... it's not about the paint, it's about the money. The sheer, staggering most-of-a-year's-salary size of the bill. I'm hard wired to spend only on utility and not on pretty. If the lovely maple cabinets are $1000 more, I must have painted. I won't choose to open up that doorway, even if it would make the space more comfortable, until it becomes clear those new headers were going to have to go in anyway and the money isn't an issue. Spending money on improved mechanicals is one thing, spending money on the beautiful teak flooring is selfish. Of course, I have a budget. The cuts have to come somewhere. What am I going to do ... decide that the floor doesn't need to leveled after all? I don't think so:
Still, I realized today that I've been repeating an obscure little mantra to myself: "I'm improving the city's housing stock." Yeah, so important these days, with all the foreclosures! (Huh?) But clearly I feel I need to tie my remodeling project to the greater good in order to justify the expense to myself. If you know me, I assume you're not surprised.
Say something encouraging, y'all.
7 comments:
Hang in there, Sass. You are honestly doing great things. Your floor choice looks great, and your color options are definitely on the right track.
Much of what you're feeling right now is similar to what I went through in buying my first house. It's horrifyingly stressful, but there never seems like any good reason why it is. You're always thinking it shouldn't be that hard, but it always is. It's just the nature of the beast.
As someone who remembers your house from not long after you bought it, I can say with full confidence that you should be tremendously proud of everything you've done with it. Seven or eight years ago, I never would have imagined that little shack to look as cool as it is shaping up now.
You always joke about living in squalor, but you have a wonderful history of taking small but constructive steps to work your way out of it. It's working wonderfully, and most important of all, you deserve it. You've done a lot with a little, and you deserve to feel proud and enjoy it, dammit.
Off soapbox now. Hang in there. It's worth it. So are you.
Thank God for you B., yer the best. I think I'll tape your comment to my computer screen and stare hard at it for no less than 10 minutes per day.
Can't wait to see your new palace. Hope the initial financial shocks have calmed into a pleasant humdrum of homeownership.
I think your flooring choice looks sophisticated, but not snooty, durable, but not industrial. It's
inviting and warm and not at all fakey. The whole project will brighten your whole house, and by extension, the whole block.
k80
Mama told us not to hang onto men who are fixer-uppers, but there is nothing advised against these little homeplaces we find and fix up to be our own.
Love your floors.
Ditto to Hammersox! Look on the bright side, by the time you get done with your project, you can be a consultant for kitchen remodeling, and we (CMZ) can be your first customers. What I am astonished by is that you left your second oldest brother out of the kitchen destruction process. Such joy...... Love ya
Thanks all. Yes bro #2 would have been invaluable, but he paid his dues in the Great Siding Teardown of 2004. Besides, I hear he's busy dealing with meat-based emergencies ... for which he is so eminently qualified.
I'm jealous. I want a kitchen off my own to rip apart and make beautiful! I could rip apart my kitchen, but then I'd be evicted.
-cK
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