MIA No More

It's been a while since I've dropped in with news of the Taj.  I was kidnapped by a crazed toddler who now refuses to take an afternoon nap and is slowly driving me insane.  Okay, that's not entirely true. 

He's not doing it slowly.

Anyway, as I sob with devastation at the loss of the Sacred Afternoon Nap, I thought I'd check in.

We haven't been to the Taj since my last post.  We got back to Gilligan's Island and got wrapped up in work and little home repairs we'd ignored in the last big push to move in to the Taj for Christmas.  I hadn't realized how much I'd let slide as far as work goes, so I had a lot of catching up to do there.  And here at the Gilligan, we'd both brushed aside little annoyances like burnt out lightbulbs over the sink and a dryer vent that wasn't properly sealed.  Little stuff, but now that we've tackled some of the To Do list, we both are feeling slightly less slothful.  I mean, it's not like I wasn't busy, but trying to teach Tank to say, "Holy crap!" can only fill so many hours.

But back to the Taj...
I'll tell you one funny thing I've found learned, which is that the comparison between the Taj and the Gilligan houses has gone ass over teakettle lately.  When we first bought the Taj, we looked at it as a very cheap house that we could try to renovate inexpensively.  We love our sweet little Cape Cod on the Gilligan and couldn't imagine that hulking monster in Mayberry ever being worth more than a long weekend trip here and there.  But once we started working on it, we got sucked in.  Little by little, we started making choices based on what we REALLY wanted, instead of what we could find cheap or used.  And as the balance slowly tilted, another weird thing happened:  we started seeing a LOT of projects in the Gilligan house.  Now we're ready to repaint and reimagine THIS house, too.

Thanks for nothing, Taj MaHell.


So, anyway, I'm plotting a trip to Mayberry either this weekend or next.  Tank and I will definitely go, along with Marly the Geriatric Wiener Dog.  Shawn may or may not go, depending on his work schedule.  Who knows?  I might go buck wild and start another project while I'm there.  The den needs painting and we still need a fridge...

Holy crap.

...and then we all drowned in snot

Ah, the holidays.  Twinkling lights, festive foods, songs of cheer...

...and wads of germs.

We left the Taj on December 28th, loaded down with thoughtful gifts and at least a billion microscopic disease-bearing stowaways.  Shawn and Tank had runny noses over Christmas, but nothing serious and I had managed to avoid the whole mess, so we were feeling pretty lucky.  Luck ran out, though, and I got sick by the 29th.  Figuring we were in for a pretty crappy New Year's Eve anyway, we loaded the car and drove BACK to the Taj, arriving late Friday evening.

In the wee hours Friday night, Tank awoke us with pitiful cries and when I picked him up, he was BLAZING with fever.  Welcome, Croup!  Won't you come in and render our lives a living hell for a few days?!  Oh, and throw in a cold+sinus infection+ear infection for me, while you're at it.

Sigh.

Next year, let's just mail the gifts and stay home with hand sanitizer and bleach.  Please.

Well, anyway, Tank appears to be on the mend and I am hopeful that tomorrow I will finally feel human again.

But here let me make a heartfelt plea to all of you who feel compelled to show up at work with the flu, or sneeze all over the Kroger shopping cart handle, or drag feverish kids all over creation because BYGAWDYOUDON'TWANTTOMISSYOURGOODTIME....

Keep your sick ayce at the house.

Seriously.

We'll get together for the 4th of July, or some other non-cold-and-flu-season holiday.

Sincerely,
She of the Sherbet Colored Snot

Everybody Lived

Whew.

We're back at Gilligan's Island, as of last night.  Had a fun, busy, stressful, exhausting Christmas, what with family get-togethers, Taj work and moving!

We did actually make it into the house on the 23rd and spent our first night there.  It felt pretty weird, especially since there were no window coverings in the whole house.  Kinda like sleeping in a fishbowl, but luckily there aren't any line-of-sight neighbors, so nobody got an unwelcome peep show.

We still have to move things and tweak it a bit, but most of our stuff is in and it's starting to look like something!  I've learned a few things, too:
--those bathroom light+fan+heater things are The Bomb! 
--3-year-olds do not transition easily into new homes, even after 6 months of prep work
--only crazy people move at Christmas


So, anyhow.  We survived.  We still need to move the remaining small stuff from Uncle Todd's Cabin, but we are close to being done there and that will be the end of the 3 utility bills per month!
Photos below, but first a Christmas recap:  Michael was given lots of great presents, all of which he liked and will enjoy.  Nobody went too overboard, which was wonderful.  Michael is already richly blessed with crazy family and bad parents, so we try not to overdo the gift-giving!

In addition to some other things, Shawn gave me a Keurig coffee maker, rendering me twice as caffeinated in half the time.  Obviously, nobody pointed out to him the faulty logic there.

Okay, so on to the Taj photos.  Bear in mind that it's still a work in progress!

Tank's Room:

We've got to put some blinds up in there and make better use of the space, but I thought the paint color turned out pretty nicely.  I have a vinyl tree decal to put in there, too, but ran out of time this trip.  Note the toy organizer we scored off a neighbor who was tossing it.  We won't tell Tank it's girly colors if you don't!

 

 The living room, after the tree was down.  Santa had the train running around the tree when Michael woke up on Christmas morning.

The den fireplace, which works perfectly (nice surprise there!)

 

Best pal/Gilligan next door neighbor came up on Monday and presented the boys with Big Guy and Little Guy caps.  Little Guy looks deranged...he may have been in the Keurig.

After a sizeable SNAFU on Thursday, we finally got the washer and dryer hooked up on Tuesday.  I did about 7 loads of clothes, since everything was dirty by then.  LOVE my new LGs!

 

I'll take more photos next trip, after we move things around to suit us better.

I'm just glad we made it in time to celebrate Christmas there.  Everything else will work itself out!

Hope you all had a great Christmas and that 2012 is very, very good to you!

Merry Tajmas!

Hope everyone is doing well and managing to finish up Christmas lists, etc.  The family unit is packing up here at Gilligan's Island, preparing for the ride to Mayberry for a Christmas to remember.

We'll get in sometime tonight, paint and work on floors tomorrow and tomorrow night and then...we hope...move our stuff on Friday, so that we can actually be in the Taj for Christmas!  Whew!  I'm tired just thinking about it.

Photos of Taj-y Merriness to come, but in the meantime, here's Tank with his Santa bubble beard, to wish you good tidings of the season: 

Time to get merry, fo' shizzle!

It's Not All About the Taj

While recent developments Taj-side have dominated my posts, other things do go on besides work on the house.

Last week, Tank went to see Santa Claus and performed admirably.  The only catch was that I had "coached" him for several days, talking about how he'd go see Santa, sit on his lap and say, "Cheese!"

Have I mentioned Tank's "Cheese!" face?  It's been with us for a year or so now, casting its blinding sunshine across all our family photos.  Observe the cheesiness:

I say CHEESE outside

I say CHEESE at Uncle Todd's Cabin

I say CHEESE while watching "Flushed Away"

I say CHEESE when Daddy and I get ice cream

I say CHEESE in a Santa hat

You get the idea.

Anyway....

 After the nice mall Santa photographer took extra sets of pictures for us, we gave up and selected a Cheese Face picture for this year's Christmas card.  Sometimes, you just gotta go with the flow.

And there you have it, folks. 

Your Christmas Cheese.

Why I'm Probably Under Surveillance Right Now

Actual conversation between me and the Sainted Singing Plumber:



SSP:  That sure looks nice, but you can't move in yet.

Me:  Yeah, I know.  Clint, the Christmas-Stealing Grinch at the City of Mayberry said we had some more things to do...

SSP:  *Sympathetic noise*

Me:  ...and that's why I killed him.

SSP:  ????

Me:  He's buried under that stupid pool cover he insisted we get.  So, anyway, if you smell something, it's Clint.

SSP:  Um, yeah, well...ahem...we'll just get the rest of our stuff done by Friday and you'll be good to go.  You can dig up Clint and get him to sign off on it.

Me:  Cool.

SSP:  You ought to think about being a comedian.

Me:  It's cute that you think I'm kidding.

So Close I Can Smell It...

....or do I just really need a shower?!

Can you believe it?!  We are ALMOST DONE!  Okay, not almost done with the whole Taj, but almost done with the laundry list of things the City of Mayberry said we had to do to move in.  Woo to the hoo and then some.  I'd break out the champage, but I think moonshine would be more appropriate.

Over the Thanksgiving holiday, we primed walls and ceilings in most of the rooms and even painted the master bath and a couple of ceilings.  This past weekend, we loaded up a UHaul trailer with all the crap that's been in my dining room and took it to the Taj.  While we were there, we painted the living room, dining room, hall and Tank's bedroom. Photos, you say?  Why yes, I DO have some:

The living room floor, after I spent a whole day on my knees, scrubbing and waxing the dang thing.

Here's the living room, sort of set up.  Ignore the stupid non-working lights on the tree.  I am extremely hacked off about that, but whatever.  The Craig's List finds work well enough in there and you can't beat the price!

Here's Tank's room with its Bath Bubbles paint:

All in all, I'm pretty happy with our progress.  Naturally, I'd like to be farther along than we are, but I think that's just me.  My hope was to be able to spend Christmas at the Taj and it may in fact be possible, but it's going to be really close!

The master bathroom was completed today, despite a snafu with the sink faucet.  The Sainted Singing Plumber picked up a replacement I ordered online from Home Depot and got-er-done.  So to speak.

Shawn had been curious about the state of the dishwasher, so he asked if the SSP could check on it.  I got a texted photo of mangled wires and debris.  I texted back to ask if that was the dishwasher and it was.  His response to my inquiry as to whether I should buy a new one?  "Absolutely."  And we still don't have a fridge.  But, somehow I am still optimistic.  Probably because I have been driven stark raving gazonkers by this whole stupid process.

Oh, and Shawn is looking at jobs in the Greater Mayberry Commuting Area.

Oh, dear.

More later, once my poor, crippled, arthritic hands recover from all the trim paint!