Getting Our Homework Done: Day 32

My last post featured a photo of the Excalibur, a huge wooden roller coaster at Funtown Splashtown, USA in Saco, Maine - we rode it last week during our vacation. One of my friends asked me how riding that roller coaster compared with undertaking a home renovation project ... a great question! My answer: it's a lot faster, a lot cheaper, and a whole lot less scary. Of course, these two things are really very similar. They both involve that feeling of loss of control, and they both are filled with ups and downs.

This was never more true than our return home from vacation on Sunday night. As people who know me can attest, I like to keep things pretty "orderly" in life ... organized closets, clothes neatly folded, papers filed, that sort of thing. Living in a construction zone challenges that order on a daily basis - and for me to live in two rooms (and keep my sanity) means that I try to keep what I can in order. So, the original plan was for us to return home at a reasonable hour on Sunday - to give us enough time to unpack, go through mail, and clean up a week's worth of construction dust.

Ah, plans. With a weather forecast of a picture perfect beach day - 78 degrees, no humidity and blue bird skies - who was I to drag my family home early? I gave in, we headed to the beach and figured we'd deal with the consequences. Well, when we returned home at about 9pm, with two tired kids and a car full of bags to unload, we unlocked the front door and hoped for the best. At first glance, the living room area (part of the construction zone) wasn't too bad - the usual dust, no biggie. We have been intermittently blocking off the kitchen/dining room area (aka our bedroom) with sheets of plastic and tape during the construction to block the dust from wafting through to that side. As we lifted up the plastic to walk into the kitchen, we were immediately hit with the horrible stench of - pretty unmistakable - dead mouse. Can't miss it. I'm not particularly fazed by the fact that there was a mouse in the house - who hasn't had one of those? Nor that it was in there, dead somewhere. It was just that the smell was overwhelming - it had been trapped in that blocked off space all week. Welcome home!

Fortunately, we found the poor thing pretty quickly and disposed of its remains, maggots and all (not exaggerating). Opened up the windows, broke out the lysol and disinfecting wipes, lit some candles, burned some incense ... and proceeded to try to unpack and sweep up sawdust until well after midnight.

That was one of the downs, for sure ....

By the end of the day Monday, however, the smell was finally going away and spirits brightened, especially when we saw some of the progress upstairs in the new master suite and kid's bedroom. It is hard to tell from pictures - but when you are standing in the space, it is very cool. Loving the high ceilings and architectural features of Brad's design.