You know, “checks”? Those paper things? Remember those?

Since we’re renting out our house now instead of selling it and thus continuing our status as homeowners, some checkups have been in order:

Chimney ~ check.

• Inspection
• Cleaning
• Total: $118

Heat Pump ~ check.

• Annual Maintenance Fee: $169.00
• Leak Found. Leak repaired: $443.00
• Drain Pan Treatment: $35.00
• Pack of Filters: $84.00
• Total: $731.00

Ooch.

That last one took my by surprise. Apparently our heat pump’s been leaking coolant. Surprisingly, it didn’t need more refrigerant – which would have cost another $60 – so maybe the leak is fairly new? It sure left a nice pile of oil under the pipe behind my furnace door that I somehow missed when I, um, cleaned last. 

High School Tennis

So I went to a parent’s meeting this evening put on by the coaches from Conner’s high school tennis team.

Even thought it was totally redundant, what with all the information that Conner’s been coming home and telling me about and everything.

[Snort]

 I have no idea why I had my checkbook in my purse. Normally I don’t carry it around, and writing checks totally wasn’t on my radar, I have no idea why. I mean, I was going to a meeting involving my kid and a school activity. Really, I should be used to this.

• 2 shirts: $54.00
• “donation”: $70.00*
• Total: $124.00

*This donation takes the place of the fundraising that the kids parents used to do. Not a single parent complained that asking for charity fundraising was no longer an option.

The “Activity Fee” bill from the school is still forthcoming.

It’s a whole new world out there, folks. Nowadays, when a match is rescheduled or practice is rained out, the coach is tweeting it to the kids. The same kids who aren’t supposed to have their cell phones on during school hours.

Riiiiiiight.

Apparently, my son is the only teenager left on this planet who doesn’t have a cell phone. Don’t even think I haven’t heard about that.

I’m thinking his dad maybe oughta send his ole’ prepaid phone to us from California, now that he’s joined the Land of the Living and made the leap to a Smartphone. And typing that is now reminding me that he should write a little ditty about why he chose the Smartphone that he did, and the service provider, and the plan. Etc. Etc.

John? You out there? Write that up, will you?

*****

All these bills coming at once depresses me, I must admit. I must admit, because I’ve had my eye on finally getting me my DSLR that I’ve been wanting since, like, the beginning of time. And now I’m not so sure. It’s hard to justify the cost of the one I’ve got my eye on one when you’ve just written out $973 worth in checks like you’re afraid of not using them all up before your address changes again.

And did I mention my birthday’s tomorrow? And it’s kind of a *big* one?

And that my husband wants to get a motorcyle? Oh, that? Yea.

*sigh*

I need me a money tree. Anyone got some seeds?

John’s set to leave for Cali in a couple of weeks, just a few days after his *40th* birthday. Don’t you think it’d be fun to have some friends over tonight for a going-away /slash/ over-the-hill birthday party?

I sure thought so. Even when someone in this family was home sick every day this week. Even when that someone was me. And I still thought so – possibly – when the kitchen sink backed up last night. We plunged and poured in some non-environmentally friendly junk and went to bed and hoped the chemicals would work their mo-jo by morning.

I started to have doubts when my daughter woke up during the night crying with an earache. And I finally read the writing on the wall when the sink was still backed up this morning. You don’t realize how much you use your kitchen sink until you can’t. Nor how many dishes your family actually uses when they pile up unchecked.

Do you ever have problems with communication and your teenager? No? Just me?

Oh, you should have heard the shouting this morning between father and son. “Turn off your 40-minute shower and get down here!” There might have been some bleepity-bleeps in there, I’m not sure. I was too busy frantically bailing the putrid water gushing out of and over my sink and out of my dishwasher and onto my kitchen floor. (Which did I mention is laminate?)

Conner came downstairs unhappy and with shampoo still in his hair, but dutifully impressed: “There’s pee in that water.” Thanks, son. I really needed that spelled out for me.

Home Warranty Blues

We’ve had a home warranty ever since we bought this house three years ago. When you have a warranty, you can’t just call up a plumber: you have to call your warranty service so they can put in a work order to call a plumber for you. Under our warranty, we pay $70 for the plumber to walk in our door, and the rest of the repair/service is covered under the warranty.

As I pulled out the warranty paperwork, I realized that our contract had expired last month. I don’t remember getting the renewal paperwork. Had I spaced off yet another bill?

No, in fact, I hadn’t. “It looks like they decided not to bring your contract up for renewal.”

Huh, what? Without so much as a how-do-you-do?

I know why they did this: because we’ve actually used the warranty. At least three times in the last year alone. Apparently home warranties are like car insurance: you’re not actually supposed to use them.

Peter learning about $399 snakes.

I honestly wouldn’t care about the warranty not renewing our contract if we were staying in this house long-term. As it is, I’d like to have the option of offering a home warranty to the future buyer, so I’ll have to do some shopping around. But that is an issue for another day. Right now, we just need a plumber. (Did I mention the pile of laundry I was planning to do today?)

And why do these things always happen on the weekends?

**Aside** Many reputable companies often end up terminating business relations with a warranty company: it’s just too much of a pain when you don’t need the referrals. We had that happen with the Heating and Air Conditioning contractor who used to be a regular visitor when we had so many problems with our Heat Pump. Ultimately, he helped us secure a new indoor air handler through our warranty — after we paid many, many $70 service call fees — and we haven’t had Heat Pump issues since. However, they became so disenchanted working with our warranty company that they discontinued their contract. (Perhaps because they actually wanted to work for the customer instead of the warranty?) When you have a warranty, you have to go through their contractors. **End Aside**

Anyway.

The plumber showed up in the middle of my ranting writing up above. He snaked our pipes all the way to the main line and chastised us for using that goop (apparently nothing you can buy differentiates between the goop in your pipes and the pipes themselves) and charged us a mere $399 for an hour’s work.

And that included a $25 coupon I got from his website.

*sigh*

It cost $109 just for him to walk in the door, by the way. As opposed to $59 on any given weekday. It’s like the pipes know: Hey guys, it’s Friday! Time to clog up!

And John’s party will have to wait. Too bad turning 40 won’t. Heh-heh.

Conner made the quintessential Father’s Day heart-attack breakfast: lots of bacon and sausage; dunkin’ donuts; and farm-fresh eggs thrown in just to make us feel righteous. Although they’re the best part, in my opinion. Along with the coffee, of course.

Conner didn’t actually make the donuts.

Olivia, of course, made her dad a card. And Peter started daddy’s day out with much wailing and gnashing of teeth that even John couldn’t ignore behind closed bedroom doors and previously closed eyelids. Oh, the injustice! Though for the life of me I can’t recall Peter’s claim to it at the moment. Something he wanted but didn’t get. Obviously, he got over it.

Happy Father’s Day!

We got a last-minute request for a house showing and scrambled (no pun intended) to get ready for it, the little ones already having a t-ball game scheduled during that time. Being completely sweat-drenched and feeling oh not-so-fresh from working in the yard, I decided, showing or no, I had to take a shower. So I did. And the water was cold. Very, very cold.

Our water heater is 15 years old. What are the chances that it’ll last us just a few more months until we get this house sold?

That’s what I thought.

Happy Father’s Day!

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I’ve been busy as a beaver working on my home and (yesterday and) today the focus was the dining room. A couple of months ago, I kind of goofed: I tried to touch up the paint in the dining room… Only I used the wrong paint, and didn’t realize it until it dried. And then I didn’t have the right paint to paint over it. “Oh, well,” I thought. “I’ll just repaint the whole thing with some other paint I already have.” You know, sometime over the next year.

Only now we’re moving this year, so instead of waiting until I got around to it, it became a priority. Along with about 50 other priorities. But I got it done! See the difference?

Dining Room Before…

Dining Room After…

What? You say you can’t tell a difference? Come on. Clearly, the walls over the chair rail in the first photo are simply brown. And in the second photo they’re Sherwin Williams’ semi-gloss Safari. Don’t tell me you can’t see that.

Just to prove that I really did do something, here’s a photo of what the room looked like in between taking the two photos above.

Oh, wait. That’s Olivia, twirling in her new outfit she’s been jonesing to wear, only it’s been cold here in Ohio! But she couldn’t wait any longer so we found a long shirt and some thick tights that she already tore a hole in to wear that made an otherwise very summery outfit appropriate for a Spring that just saw a frost two mornings ago.

And yes, I bought the outfit at the thrift store. For $5, which is a splurge for me, but I knew how much she’d love and it is oh, so cute, yes?

*sigh*

I’m going to miss that thrift store after we move.

Anyway.

So you can glimpse the dining room just beyond her twirling. Here’s a better view.

Notice the china cabinet pulled away from the wall, and the narrow bookcase you can just glimpse at the far right. No easy feat to move those two pieces of furniture, I tell you what. They’re the reason the dining room table is covered with books.

And the table we actually use to dine (hello, no white carpet) is loaded with the contents of the china cabinet.

Tip: To gird yourself for the labor-intensive process of moving everything away from the walls in preparation for painting a room, just think of it as a home improvement and a workout all-in-one: concentrate on proper posture; bending at your knees; and taking deep breaths. I’m not at all kidding.

So look again. Big difference, yes? Everyone say, “Yes, Jolyn.”

Oh, wait. There’s Olivia again. Proof  of how much I got done today. See, she’s wearing the same outfit? And it is really, really cute, yes? At least, she sure seems to think so…

Inquiring minds have been wanting to know…

The bathroom before:
And after…

Look! There’s a toilet!

And a shower curtain. And baseboard. Which you can’t see, but it’s just as well. Because I still need to touch it up with some paint.

But it’s major progress. And it looks put together, which is the main thing. And there’s a toilet! Instead of a hole in the floor. And that’s a good thing.

A couple of days ago I noticed a section of the carpet near the kitchen was wet. I figured the kids spilled some water so I got some rags and soaked it up. The next day, the same spot was wet again.

Uh, oh. What are the odds of the kids spilling the same amount of water in the same spot on the carpet two days in a row?

I couldn’t find a trail of water leading from the refrigerator, which was nearby, or from anywhere else. The source of water was apparently coming from underneath the floor, which is built on a slab. I just couldn’t figure it out.

A burst pipe?

A newly sprung well?

Is this really happening?

I called our Home Warranty to initiate a work order for a plumber to come out. Turns out, the water was coming from the refrigerator, which has a water dispenser, with water supplied through a small, white tubing the width of a pencil, which had sprung a leak from a teeny tiny hole the size of a pin prick. See?

Mike the Plumber replaced the tubing, but besides finding its way underneath the carpet some five feet away, the water also made quite a mess behind the refrigerator.

Actually, the mess was because — full disclosure here — I haven’t cleaned behind the fridge since we’ve lived here.

Does anyone actually clean out behind their fridge on a regular basis? I know you’re supposed to… And I must say, I did think about it once, just a couple of weeks ago. Then when the carpet was wet I thought I’d pull out the fridge to see what I could find, but I couldn’t budge it.

Suffice to say, it’s clean back there now. So there’s that. And we were lucky the water didn’t damage the floor or surrounding walls.

Cost of repair: $70

– which is how much we pay for a service call through the Home Warranty. I asked Mike the Plumber how much the repair would have cost me straight out-of-pocket, and he estimated about $100 for parts and labor.

At least we’re getting use out of the Home Warranty, a necessary evil (in my humble opinion).

Heat Pump Maintenance

The same day that Mike the Plumber paid his call coincided with a routine check-up from Steve the Heating and Cooling Man. We paid $160 last year (and the year before that) for a maintenance program with these guys who then come out twice a year to check on the heat pump unit and its indoor air handler. They were instrumental a couple of years ago in helping us get our Home Warranty to replace our indoor air handler instead of repairing it again and again and nickel and diming us to death with the $70 service calls. Our ancient heat pump is the reason we keep our Home Warranty.

(An air handler, for you future home owners, is the electric unit inside your house that kicks on when the temperature drops too low — say, below 30 degrees Fahrenheit — for the heat pump to do its job properly. It’s the main source of a high heating bill during the winter months.)

So the maintenance was already paid for, but Steve recommended a “drain pan treatment” which is apparently a routine addition to an air handler but one we had not gotten since they installed the new air handler almost two years ago. I don’t know why. And right now I couldn’t even tell you what the “drain pan treatment” is for, even though Steve explained it to me quite sufficiently, as best as I can recall. My head is just pulled in so many directions right now what with trying to get this house ready to put up for sale that no sooner do I have one thought than two more are pushed right out so you better get them while they’re hot.

One drain pan treatment: $35

Total Budget Busters (in this post, anyway): $105

*****

By the way — have you been keeping track? A home warranty costs about $500 each year. We pay an additional $160 each year for heat pump maintenance. Just for the record, if we were staying in this house indefinitely, I would never in a million years throw that kind of money away on what is essentially insurance for routine home repair. I would instead put that $660 (and more) aside each year and then pay cash to replace a heat pump in ill-repair, or whatever home appliance happens to go out first.

My friends Lucy and Bill once told me about a friend of theirs who came and lived with them a short time to help them with some projects on their fixer-upper. They had just bought an old home in rural Ohio –parts of it were over 100 years old. But additions had been made over the years, bringing it to about 1600 square feet of comfortable living space. Awesome and eclectic living space.

Bill and Lucy have continued to make improvements to it during the six years they’ve now lived there: He’s installed flooring; they’ve painted everything; updated the kitchen… And they have the most amazing organic garden in the land they own beyond their back yard. Oh, and Bill’s getting ready to install a whole new bathroom — as in, from scratch. Currently they just have one. Someday, they’d like to sell, and an additional bathroom will open their house up to a whole new market of buyers.

But back to their friend.

So this guy comes down and hangs with them a few weeks while using his trade skills to convert their whole house to central air. As in, central heating and air conditioning. You know, instead of using one of those window units in the summer and floor radiators in the winter? And all he asks for in payment is food. And beer. And I was like, “Hey, everyone needs a friend like that!”

Well, folks, this past weekend, Lucy and Bill were my friends like that. I opened my mouth to beg and they held up their hands and shook their heads as if to say, Don’t say another word, of course we’ll help.

Disclaimer: we were talking by phone so of course I couldn’t see their hands or their heads. In fact, I couldn’t see Bill at all because he was at work. But Lucy spoke on his behalf and took note of the projects I needed help with and said Bill would call if he had questions. He didn’t. They came and they worked and they quite possibly saved my life. Okay so perhaps I’m being melodramatic but seriously, it was so awesome and I am so grateful. Everyone needs friends like these. Especially when their husband is deployed. And they find out they’re moving this year instead of the next.

So they fixed my screen door. (Bill had a little help.)

They fixed our daybed trundle that Conner and his friend broke had recently broken randomly and spontaneously for no reason whatsoever.

This was a really big deal, because I had tried and tried my hand at whacking the thing back in place fixing what I could tell was the problem but I simply didn’t have the brute strength to make it budge. I also became concerned I might hurt myself and since I was home alone I had visions of the kids running in after school and finding their mom comatose on the basement in a pool of her own blood after severing a major artery and becoming too weak to climb the stairs to the phone.

I have no idea why I’m feeling so dramatic this evening.

My point is, Bill did hurt himself. And he bled. So my fears were not unfounded. Oh, and I felt really bad. But he’s a man’s man, so he shrugged it off after appeasing himself with a beer.

Wait, never mind. That was later.

He also replaced some tile in the bathroom shower-bath. First, he scraped out the gunk the tiles had been falling off of.

Then he measured out some backer board and cut.

And cut again. Because the pieces kept breaking when he popped them apart. We decided that must be why you can’t buy smaller sheets of the stuff when you only have a small project to do. They know you’re going to need more.

Here’s the tile area before he installed the backer board…

And after installing the backer board….

Then after installing the tile to the backer board with some adhesive stuff. Wa-la!

Bill has this awesome tool he calls The Scribe that he inherited from his grandfather.

Bill’s pretty laid-back, but don’t touch The Scribe.

(If you look real close, you can see the band-aid where he hurt himself while fixing the trundle.)

(Just in case, you know, you doubted me.)

He also installed a new toilet.

Re-secured a dormer-threshold thing that the kids and I kept tripping on.

And fixed a random cable outlet that was hanging out of the wall.

Did I mention this was all after Bill went shopping with me to get all the stuff we needed to do all of these projects? Because puh-lease, like I have a clue.

Except now I kind of do, because I had to pay way more attention to what was going on here than if The Hubs were just doing all of this over a longer period of time and all I had to do was keep the kids out of his hair.

Another bonus about Bill and Lucy helping? Our kids play awesome together. To them, it was just one long play date.

Needless to say, everyone was tired at the end of the day.

The total for project parts: $165.10 — a little over $100 of that was just for the new toilet.

Bill also gave me a brief tutorial on grouting before they left, so’s I can actually take care of that myself once the tile adhesive has properly cured. We also got the necessary tools to scrape out some old grout from the Master Bath (all the work Bill did was in the main bathroom) that has been corroding over time. Only it turns out the stuff that’s corroding really isn’t even grout at all, but rather some strange quick-fix the previous owners must have resorted to when what I can only guess was the original 70′s installation needed to be repaired. (Adhesive? Caulk? Mud? Whatever they used, it definitely wasn’t grout.)

So that’s added to my list 0f to-do’s, once the tiles have set in the shower that Bill worked on, I’ll grout them so that shower is usable before I scrape away at the non-grout/caulk/mud in the other shower to prep it for re-grouting.

Woo-hoo! Just call me Dottie Do-It-Yourselfer!

Since I just paid a guy $175 just to grout a section of tile the size of an outhouse I can only imagine what I would have paid someone to do half the fixes that Bill did out of the goodness of his heart. And for food. And beer.

And now I know how to grout, too. Not that I’m eager to try my hand at a whole floor, mind you. But since Bill confirmed what I had suspected — that the grouter guy who did my floor is not someone I should recommend  (it wasn’t a horrible job; just not clean) — then, you know, at least I’ve gotten my feet wet, so to speak. And the next time we find out we’re moving unexpectedly with unfinished projects in the queue (which will never happen again I swear) and my husband’s deployed? I might have a clue.

Hmm… You might notice a few things are missing.  Like the base board, some quarter round, some grout in the tile… Oh, and a TOILET and some TILE ON THE WALL. You know, little things.

This is a problem because we need to sell this house. Yes, we are moving. Surprise!

Anyone wanna buy a wonderful family tri-level home in Ohio? I promise you the other two baths have their toilets installed and working just fine! And we’ll get you one in this bathroom, too. Soon.I promise.

For now, I just got some grout done. I was going to do it myself. Really. Even though I have no idea what I’m doing. (That’s what the internet is for, right?) But The Hubs really, really, wanted me to call someone. So I did. Because I actually do have plenty of other things to do with my time. I’m as busy as a one-legged man in an a$$-kicking contest pardon my french a’moi trying to get this house ready to put up for sale with barely a moment’s notice.

So I called in Sydney da man. Or Todd, his boss, actually, who sent Sydney, who came over an hour late. But he grouted and he sealed — with this new-fangled two-for-one  concoction. And it’s not dry yet, but what do you think?

Okay, okay… So you might have to use your imagination. But I promise you, there’s grout in there.

And there better be, seeing as how I wrote a check for $175. Which feels like extortion, yes. Because I know, I know… this isn’t difficult to do yourself. But do it myself I have never done, and I decided trying to grout for the first time four days after you find out you’re moving in four months (or less?) and about four minutes before you need to put a house up for sale is not the time to try a new hand at home improvement. People who are in a hurry are not at leisure to pinch pennies.

So yes! We’re moving! This summer! A year earlier than anticipated! It’s good, and it’s not good. More later. For now, I need to go light some candles. That grout stuff stinks.

The kids and I are getting ready to wrap up visiting family this whole week in Kansas, where I grew up. We all spent Easter at my sister Cheri’s  who has this awesome covered back porch that served as our conversation area on that beautiful afternoon.

*Side note: Wind and Humidity are regular companions on the Kansas prairie. Beautiful days are not to be taken lightly.

I noticed Cheri’s center table being new since the last time I visited and commented on it. Turns out, this “table” is actually a fire pit with a top she finished herself from some wood she purchased from Home Depot for $20 (or was it $25?).

She needed a place to store her fire pit during the warm months, and she needed a table to take its place. Wa-la!

I love love love dual purpose creations like these: space-saving and money-saving. Necessity is the Mother of Invention and all that.

What solutions have you created out of necessity? Any dual-purpose inventions that saved you money and space? I’ve been wracking my brain trying to think of something comparable to share; I’m always “making do” with what I have when moving from household to household… But nothing is coming to mind. I think I have too much Kyrgyzstan rolling around in my brain. (Have you seen what’s been going on there?) If I think of something, I’ll add it to the comments. So go there, now. And add yours, too.

Excuse me while I dig up the dead horse to beat it yet again, but snow has thrust itself into the Common Theme category around here and I just can’t escape it.

The driveway is buried in there, somewhere. At least the city plowed the street overnight…

Live Update:

• Number of School Snow Days: 3
• Number of Times Shoveling the Driveway: 4
• Number of Dollars Divvied Out to Teenage Labor: 40
• Number of pinkies injured while shoveling: 1

Conner and his fellow eighth-grade friend had this Grand Plan to go around with a snow plow and really rake in the bucks shoveling neighbors’ driveways. That is, until they discovered they couldn’t push the plow through the deep, dense, impacted snow.

They’re still making some Snow Day bucks, just not so quickly.

The going rate?

Seems to be $20 a driveway, or $10 a piece. Halve that if you’re me.

Hey, I got a budget here, people. And I didn’t factor any of these entrepreneurial spirits into it.

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