While Matthew Was Away

While Matthew was away, visiting his parents, we had a few minor incidents at home. 

1. A few days after Matthew left, our toaster oven died, not that long after we purchased it. I quickly got a replacement promised but it was a sad week or so living without it.

2. The same day, I pulled out our ladder to finally get to a bulb all the way in the vaulted ceiling of our stairway that has been burned out for the last couple of years (ladder didn't help, I finally needed to borrow a specialty bulb changer from a friend). But while I had it out and was feeling all gung-ho about home projects I finally poked at the brown spot in our ceiling. The brown spot that appeared a few years ago when we found out that the bathroom right above it had a leaky pipe. Thankfully we got the leak fixed and the brown spot hasn't grown anymore, but I've been curious about it. So with my handy ladder, I poked it. I poked the brown spot and got crumbling drywall as my recompense. But hey, now I could at least verify that the leak really was fixed. It was. 

When the kids came home from school and we now had a hole in our ceiling and a busted toaster oven, all days after their father left, they were convinced we were doomed for the next two weeks. 

The kids HATED looking at that hole, Dude kept asking if we could tape a piece of paper over it.

But look at that beautifully-lighted stairwell.  I love looking at that.

3. Maybe that's why Dude was so willing to help with dishes. I told them that with their father gone I was going to need some help with doing the dishes, not just emptying the dishwasher of which they are already in charge. Dude was all over it. Eager to get in there and get a chance to be on the other end of the dish duty. I was so grateful for his helpful attitude. But while he was all enthusiasm it was clear he needed guidance; that just watching his father do nightly dishes for the last 9 years of his life, and emptying the dishwasher for the last 3 years, didn't make him any more aware of the process.

Dishes were heaped into a large pile in the top rack of the dishwasher. Dishes that were claimed to be handwashed were not all the way clean. I really did appreciate that he didn't complain about the extra task, and he genuinely seemed happy to help, I just realized that there was still training on my part that needed to happen. Somehow it was a mom-fail, a mom-win, and a mom-teaching-opportunity all in one.

4. Last year for Christmas, Matthew bought me a couple of diamond art kits. Last year I completed both of them and then they proceeded to sit unattended until I figured out what I was going to do with them. I finally figured out what I was going to do with them! I covered them in mod-podge, bought frames (one of which I had to stain first), secured them in said frames, and finally, mounted them to the wall. So many tasks, and all completed. I think I might have been more proud of actually getting them officially done then in the day by day work on them.

5. The last project I attacked was opening the locked drawer in Dude's dresser. It's an old dresser with a cool lockable drawer, but either we lost the key or the key we had was no longer working because that drawer was a vault. 

I took my problem to facebook and got all kinds of advice. I looked up videos on lockpicking and tried implementing what I saw. I tried a credit card. I tried a handsaw. All solid forms of picking a lock. None were effective. But the handsaw gave me the idea to try my trusty sawzall (a birthday present from a few years ago). Within mere seconds the lock was cut and access to the contents (a couple of pokemon cards and legos) were made available to my darling boy.

 

I felt a bit bad for the dresser, but I also felt invincible and like mother-of-the year. 

2. a. When Matthew got home he was nervous about fixing that large of a hole in our ceiling. But with enough researching and youtube videos he was willing to attempt it. True to Matthew form, what starts out as all anxiety and a desire to hire out eventually ends with him and all of us so proud of what he accomplished. We will be handy homeowners yet.