Home

The real estate agent is chosen, the timeline is in place, the projects are planned.  I do believe this is the right time for our family to move on, but I am sad to see our home go.  We will be here for a little while longer (maybe a month?), but it won't be the same because we will be renovating and packing and only half at-home here.  So, I wanted to remember what it was like when we really lived here - sorted laundry in the living room, dirty dishes in the sink, baby stuff everywhere, all of the little bits of life that make this Home.

Before I get all teary about the place where Ray and I spent our first days as newlyweds and then new parents, where our family and friends have been to visit, where we have spent countless hours working on "projects"... 

Speaking of projects, let me remind myself part of why we are leaving (note to self: save post to Favorites and reference frequently during the next 6 months as nostalgia and delusion set in).  Things I will not miss:

- The infestation of spiders between the back door and the basement door, with spider webs crossing every walkway option.  This requires very careful navigation (day time only - do not attempt after dusk) and has resulted in more than one occasion of Ray and I doing the OMG-spiders-are-crawling-on-me-dance and stripping off layers after one wrong step.  I am sure our downstairs neighbors find this entertaining and might even conspire with the spiders.

- The beautiful original doorknobs that fall off occasionally when you try and open or close the door:

- The stairs in the front that add such lovely curb appeal but make it impossible to carry Roscoe and a diaper bag and a stroller up and down.  So, we store the stroller in the dungeon, er, I mean basement, and need to put Roscoe in his carrier to go get the stroller and then try and get the stroller out the door and up the basement stairs with Roscoe still in the carrier and then go back down to close the basement door because you can't do that at the same time as squeezing through.  Oh, and then put him in the stroller and go wherever you want to go.  Repeat upon arriving home.

- The fact that we pay for parking 3 houses down (but still get the occasional parking tickets - UGH), but if I grocery shop or even just have 1 extra bag to bring in I have to decide where to leave Roscoe because I cannot carry him and more than a couple of bags from the car and up the stairs.  Leave him in the car?  At the bottom of the stairs in his seat?  Inside the house in his crib?  Carry him and 1 bag at a time 5 meeeeellion times down the block and up the stairs?  sOh to have a place to park the car that is actually near the door and not have to worry about the crazies that wander the streets just to unload my groceries.

- The bathroom window that does not close and makes it FREEZING cold in the winter (and summer - silly SF) with a perma-breeze.  Miserable pregnant women should not have to freeze their arse off to use the bathroom multiple times in the middle of the night.  If we close the bathroom door to try and keep the chills contained the bathroom door rattles loudly, so we have to stuff a piece of cardboard in between the door and the frame to minimize the banging.  Yes, it is loud enough that it keeps me up at night.  My lovely dad tried to seal the window last time he was here and it was so much better for several months, but then the wind BUSTED IT OPEN.  I give up, Window, you win.  

- The single pane windows throughout the house, but especially in our bedroom.  100 year old single pane glass is about as much of a sound barrier as saran wrap.  And this is the city, people, and there are homeless people all hours of the night pushing around their grocery carts full of aluminum cans and blasting their boom boxes.

- Our neighbors.  Not all of them, just the unit next door and the rotating cast of crazies.    

- Our kitchen.  I. Hate. That. Kitchen.  This is (partly) why:

Stupid half-ass tiled rubber squares.  Yes, this is the old linoleum showing:

There was a non-functioning hood here at one time that fell off the wall soon after we moved in:

Ooo, cutting edge stainless steel backsplash.  Or piece of thick tin foil that is cut around the outlet plate (but not attached to the wall) and only goes halfway across the "backsplash area" (cleverly covered by microwave oven):

Oh, and looky here - yet another linoleum pattern under the half-finished rubber floor:

And what might one do if one tore out all of the kitchen cabinets and bought 2 Ikea "cabinets" only to find that the cabinets actually don't fit?  Why, cut a hole in the wall, of course:

- The stingy hot water heater.  I hope and pray it lasts through a quick shampoo and condition and soap - shaving legs would be laughable.  Or when I forget (still) that I cannot shower within an hour of using the washing machine.

- Oh and the rat poop all over everything in our basement storage.

I am sure there is more that I have repressed, but I think that will be enough to remind me of why we are moving when I get all weapy about it.  Home, sweet home.  <3