Changes

 Just traveling along the road-

 

Enjoying the scenery.  Smelling the flowers- 

 Watching & living the seasons as they come and go.

 And then there's a curve.  Sometimes unexpected.

 And then a warning sign.  Not only is the road ending, but it's means changing directions.

 

 And that means stop.

The stop sign appeared very abruptly this morning with a phone call.

"We have a house".

I really don't go out walking much. It's a shame.  I admire others who do, I know I should.

During the 2 1/2 years we've lived here I am ashamed at how few times I've found myself out walking the road.

The times that I have tho, I always have found myself intrigued by those road signs.  It seems the story of my life.  I cannot imagine growing up, living in the same house for *18* years.  It didn't happen with me.

I can't imagine living in the same house all my *married-grown-up* years.  It didn't happen with us either. 

In January this year, the road looked the same.  There was no changes in sight.

then the curve. A new job across the state.  Since then the future & distance has been pretty much obscured from sight. It has been tolerable, but very bumpy and uncertain.

Time passes.  Some days drag, but mostly the weeks fly by.

And then there's the sign.

It's means decision,

It means change.

As opinionated as I can be, decisions are not my strong point.

It can make my life pretty miserable.

Mostly for myself, but probably somewhat for others who have to listen to me too.

So how long from the warning sign to the stop sign?  Sometimes it

seems to go on for a long time.

In reality really not so long.

And sometimes the decision is taken right out of my hands

and if it's something that I've been really searching the answer for

in the right place, that is a good thing.

The stop sign is right in front of me now, it's time to let go

and move on.

 **************************************************

Then again-

how insignificant my changes seem

in light of other things that have happened this year.

Some friends lost a child.

Some lost loved ones.

Causalities.  

Shootings in the news.

Fires have been burning, it's changed peoples plans, their days,

in some cases taken their homes or livlihood.

My friend deals with cancer. A life altering experience.

And me?

Well, I get a change of scenery.

The opportunity to make new friends,

expand our horizons,

live with my husband again,

and set to work re-decorating a new house!

Paint me happy

 I'm a horrible procrastinator.
When we moved in this house we got the living room & dining room repainted.  During the time we lived here in the last 2 1/2 years we also got all 3 bedrooms repainted.
The kitchen probably needed it nearly worse than the other rooms, as it had been water damaged.  However I could never make up my mind what color I wanted it, I liked the red that it was, and I kept putting it off.  After all, there was always something else to do.

Here's what it looked like:
(Before)
 http://www.lmand12js.blogspot.com/2010/06/part-3-of-house-tour.html

Fast forward to March this year.  Husband got a new job across the state and so there is high expectation that we will be moving.  We had originally planned to wait till May, when school was out and his probationary period was up to move so we didn't spend a whole lot of time looking as we knew we couldn't be out of this place before August.
May has came and went, school is out and now June has disappeared also.  We still don't have a place to live, and our joking comments about not really wanting to move from here are closer to becoming a reality than we would like.
Mostly it's just really nerve-wracking to not know if you're moving or staying put.
Of course there's also the inconvenience of the husband living 4 hours away and only being home on weekends.

Back to my kitchen. In the middle of the whole waiting process of "moving or not, and when" .
I decided I'd go buy paint for the kitchen.   Impatient waiting calls for drastic measures.  It should solve the dilemma, right?
I mean after all, if I buy paint & paint the kitchen & porch, one of two things will happen.  Either we will get a house & move, or we won't and we will just stay here.  Right?  Makes sense to me!

Last week I bought paint. I spent my birthday weekend painting and cleaning my kitchen. You know--the cobwebs & grease that accumulate while I'm busy cleaning other people's houses.  The process was slightly delayed by  having 4 grandkids there on Saturday  while our son was working on re-roofing the house.  Life doesn't get put on hold just because I was painting.

I might have been a bit frazzled over that except for the fact that I was really treated quite royally for my birthday. 
On Friday I was treated to a lovely lunch (and company) compliments of my sister.
Saturday I was treated to a lovely breakfast out, compliments of my two sister-in-laws.
Saturday evening I was treated to a lovely dinner out compliments of my son.

It's really pathetic that I had my camera along on all three mentioned occasions & didn't get any pictures.
It's really pathetic that the only picture I have of my birthday is this one of
the beautiful bouquet of flowers that I bought myself and the totally delicious cake that I made for dessert following the delicious meal I made Sunday evening.
My family thanked me by singing happy birthday to me.  :)
This really wasn't suppose to be a post about my birthday,
It just jumped in and hi-jacked  the middle of my post.

I finally finished up the kitchen on Monday and on Tuesday I started on the porch.
My July 4th holiday was spent working. (I'm not complaining, mind you, I LOVE a free day to get my projects worked on)
 The ceiling is painted, the walls & woodwork are all washed, the Curtains washed & re-hung, floor is scrubbed & the windows are sparkly clean inside and out.


 Here's the "After"
The porch--

 Actually there was much more cleaning to be done in here than what I painted.  We all voted to leave the walls, and I only re-painted the ceiling.  It is an original porch ceiling and was painted a light blue.  Amazingly the lighter shade of paint I chose for part of the kitchen was only just a shade darker than the original ceiling paint.  I brushed a very light coat on it to try to retain the older and worn look, and still make it match the kitchen & look nice.

Around the kitchen--

 Had to paint my "chicken nests" too

 I actually have two different shades of blue in the kitchen.  It's really not as different as I had thought. You can maybe see in this picture, the wall on the right is just a little lighter than the one on the left.

 My chicken nests are the darker shade.  You can hardly tell.

I had really expected the color to be a bit more teal than it is, I didn't intend to end up with a "blue" kitchen.
I do like it tho & husband & kids have said they really like it too.

 Paint me happy, I'm done for now & off to pick up grandkids for a weeks visit.