Sometimes the tortoise does not win the race. Sometimes the early bird does not get the worm. Sometimes waiting a year to find an affordable oven does not pay off. After searching Craiglist and outlet stores for months and months, we ended up paying for a brand new range that fit our irregular opening. What did we learn? Stewardship of resources is a good habit, even if does not always translate into dollars saved. I am sure Tortoise and Early Worm retired comfortably, despite minor setbacks.
Our front door was framed near the turn of last century. It was sized just right, until the advent of King-sized mattresses, Costco overstuffed furniture, or in our case, industrial sized refrigerators. We drove over to Mill Work Outlet, a family run door supplier, and searched for a wider style. To correctly hang the door, Clint and I stood on either side of it, and moved shimming pieces for the right adjustment. It was a humbling communication experiment. A job that we planned for ten minutes turned into hours of back and forth directions. We were an inefficient yet successful team! 
From years of teaching high school, I believe projects have beginnings, middles, and ends. A definitive launch, and a ceremonious finish. Not so in the remodeling world. With the kitchen “almost” complete, we have moved on to the living room. This staggered progress is less satisfying, but more efficient. We have now dry walled, spackled, and painted the living room. Clint installed recessed lights, and called the living room done—“almost”. Both the kitchen and living rooms are quite smart and will soon graduate with honors. 
When Clint and I got married last June, family and friends showered us with gifts. These packages were safely tucked in the attic until we could enjoy them with our completed kitchen. Now is the time! We brought down box after box and ended up with a huge pile of cardboard and Styrofoam. Christmas has come early for the Nelsons! 
I used to press my nose against the shiny hardware in Restoration Hardware’s window. I never stepped inside, for fear there was a shopping fee for handling merchandise. This spendy shop is filled with elegant, artful, and overpriced house wares. My heart was set on something from this store, but our budget disagreed. While visiting a friend at the Common Folk boutique, I fell in love with their hardware and ran outside to avoid temptation. Their sidewalk sale then caught my eye. 14 vintage door handles sat in a porcelain blue bowl. I heard a faint “Hallelujah Chorus” as I brought the bowl to the counter, and paid $2 each! Thanks, Common Folk!
Last spring, we bought an oven hood from an Albert Lee clearance event. Albert rightly titled it “event” rather than “sale”. With frenzy akin to Black Friday, shoppers literally ran down aisles ripping tags off of desired appliances. I sprinted in my three inch heels to a neglected store corner to snag the last stainless steel hood. It was retail warfare at its finest. Clint just installed our sparkling hood, which also required squeezing into a not-so-large opening. Note to self: buy more measuring tapes. The hood now sits lonely, awaiting its oven companion.
In ordering countertops, Clint and I opted for the gaudiest granite name we could find: Black Galaxy. There were some close seconds, including “Brazil Butterfly” and “Desert Rose”. While these names paid homage to the 90s pop world, they were all legitimate choices from the glossy retail order forms. A few weeks later, two gentlemen showed up with three slabs of “Black Galaxy” and a few tools. Not the sky-defying experience I had in mind. But their Spartan approach worked well, and within four hours, the room was transformed.
With our kitchen nearly complete, I am looking into careers in the naming business. My limited lexicon and lack of textile experience should work to my advantage. “Smoky Licorice” or “Dark Speckles” would just as well describe our stone—or future songs by Sting.
You can’t grease a fridge to squeeze it through small spaces. We tried. At the Sears Outlet, we found the perfect fridge. It’s a stainless steel beauty with French doors, and pull-out freezer, and tall shelves, and Humidity controllers, and a plethora of buttons. This Samsung model (nicknamed “Sammy”) was slightly too wide for our archaic door frame. With no other way to invite the appliance in, we stored it in our neighbors’ garage. Millwork Outlet provided a lovely new door, and Clint cut a larger opening for it. So, a week later, we brought steely Sammy home and slid him beautifully through our new front entrance. Theoretically, this fridge should’ve fit in its kitchen opening. But there’s a funny thing called “clearance” that French doors require to open. We’re now contemplating a hatch-back variety. Or perhaps we’ll try slicking Sammy once more.
Craigslist has been our surrogate neighborhood garage sale since the purchase of The Blueberry. This mecca of recyclables has provided everything from Clint’s truck to Hardie Plank siding. We have also had run-ins a unique breed of Washingtonians. Craigslist posters seem to fall into three basic categories: Freddy the professional poster, the anti-clutter Smith family, and Tina the desperate city hopper: Inspired by SPAM, ******!!!!!! FREDDY USES CAPS AND UBIQUITOUS EXCLAMATION MARKS TO LURE YOU TO HIS HOMEROOM FLOOR!!!!!******
The Smiths put their Pottery Barn collection up for $5, which sells in 3 minutes. Disappointment marks the 307 calls they receive after selling the amazing deal.
Tina is moving to Japan in an hour and needs to purge her entire apartment. If potential buyers change their mind, she calls them back to explain that the 30” oven will go on a diet to fit in the 29” opening. And she’ll throw in a pink fondue set.
There are some things Clint will always be better at than I: packing boxes, loading U-Hauls, parallel parking, and installing cabinets. All require spatial skills he learned from playing video games (and perhaps a bit from his degree in engineering). These wooden containers of cabinetry came floating down the kitchen as Clint and his dad quickly found the right location to place them. We now are ready for granite countertops, and a game of Tetris, in our nearly finished room of food. Well, now I’m off to pack some boxes into a u-haul that I’ll parallel park for practice.
While Clint and I were dating, we took a day trip to Bainbridge Island. We wandered into an inn with guests finishing dinner under strings of lights in the courtyard. It was too romantic not to dance, so we did. After our wedding, we returned to this same small inn. We didn’t have dancing at our wedding, so I danced with Clint in my wedding dress in the courtyard. The Eagle Harbor Inn has secured a place in our traditions and our hearts. The weekend was filled with swinging on park swing sets, munching at farmers’ markets, and just slowing down. Here are some things we’re (starting) to learn about marriage:10. Goals must be flexible
9. Building a house is hard
8. Clint is a verbal processor; Jen is an internal processor
7. Forgiveness keeps us unified
6. Meals together— on the floor; at a restaurant; surrounded by paint cans—are equally delicious
5. Luxury is relative
4. Laughing keeps us from taking ourselves too seriously
3. We love each other
2. We need to be headed in the same direction
1. That direction needs to be toward God
2:30 Tuesday: We rented a sander from Home Depot. Besides a 10 minute catnap, Clint powered through the night to wrap up the floor project.2:17 Wednesday: We returned sander with 3 minutes to spare. When Clint said it would take him a day to sand the floors, he meant it literally.
3:00 Wednesday: We returned home to cover the floors with construction paper. This will protect the sanded hardwoods when the cabinets are delivered and installed
4:00 Wednesday: Clint passed out on the newly sanded and papered floors, waiting for the cabinets to come;
4:36 Wednesday: The kitchen cabinets arrive!
Is it weird to have a date night at Lowes? If so, we’re in trouble. Before anymore progress could be made on the kitchen, the walls needed paint. We took our samples of cabinet wood and granite and set off to find a perfect wall color at Lowes. When I came across a shade of beige entitled “Earl Grey”, and I couldn’t resist. As an avid tea drinker, it was a fitting hue. Colors can be deceiving, though. After painting a section of the wall, it looked really dark. Once paint is mixed at Lowes, it is not returnable, so we bought cans of white paint and mixed two parts white to one part Earl Grey. I guess that makes it a London Fog. So, maybe our next date night will be spent drinking tea lattes in our freshly painted room.
That Book of Murphy’s Law whacked us in the head when we continued our floor refinishing. It seemed so simple. Rip up linoleum, and uncover well-preserved hardwoods. We didn’t anticipate the linoleum’s laminate glue residue would be such so tenacious. Clint first gently spritzed the floors with water, then lay wet sheets on to loosen the glue, and finally resorted to dumping buckets of water to help with removal. The linoleum manufacturers must have intended flooring decisions to be lifelong. But, unlike diamonds, linoleum is not forever and is definitely not a girl’s best friend. Clint spent days scraping, inch by inch, the gooey sludge from the floors. As he finished, we tucked the Murphy Law book away in hopes we wouldn’t need it again.
The word “linoleum” rolls off the tongue like butter. The liquid consonants and long vowels create smoothness of sound. This beautiful word is wasted on its true meaning: a cheap plastic composite that reminds us why the 1970s is fondly forgotten. In order to refinish the original pine wood floors, this layer of linoleum needed to go. Shockingly, the project took less time than we planned. We pulled the floor pieces in large sheets and finished in thirty minutes! We kept waiting for lightening to strike and uncover a book of Murphy’s Law. No such misfortune occurred, and we spent the rest of the day relaxing.
