Sunday, October 18, 2009
Changes
When the weather gets chilly, I am reminded so much of my mom. She loved when the leaves changed, the crisp fall air, and chilly nights. She used to take us apple picking, host pumpkin decorating parties, and always insisted on "grabbing a jacket" whether we wanted one or not. One time she mailed Kyleigh pretty fall leaves in a card because I think Kyleigh's fall in Atlanta is so short. Her intent was not to be funny, but I'm glad we have those funny memories to laugh about. I've been meaning to share the slide show we created that played at my mom's memorial service--just don't laugh too hard at the embarrassing pictures of me. Click the arrows for a full screen viewing.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
A Thump In The Night
Thump is an understatement. More like what just Tarzaned (Root word: Tarzan. John made it a verb the other night.) into our house?
At 3:00 A.M. we were suddenly awoken by the loudest sound. It sounded like someone crashed through our roof, took everything down with it, then continued to thrash about for a good two minutes. At first it sounded like someone was breaking in, but then it sounded like the clumsiest break-in ever. And then I heard claws. And animal sounds. John and I sat up in bed and debated over who should check it out. As if I was going to check it out. Pssh. John slowly walked out of the bedroom and tip-toed towards the bathroom--the source of the crashing. The kitties were well on their way to check things out too. The thrashing, hissing, and snarling sounds continued loudly, so John slammed the bathroom door shut instinctively. We stood there, puzzled for a long time. Now what do we do? Neither of us were going to open the door, but what do we do? Go back to bed? Ignore the thing demolishing our bathroom? What is it? WHAT is going on? I was sleeping 30 seconds ago and now I have legitimate thoughts of an alligator flailing around in the tub. C'mon, we've all seen those home videos when gators break into people's homes. John and I discussed the possibilities: cat, raccoon, opossum...gator, ha. Whatever it was had massive claws, a nasty snarl, and a crazy hissing, breathing sound. And it was going nuts. In our house.
What do people do when this happens? I felt crazy already. What would I say to explain this to get help? We trekked outside with flashlights in hand to inspect the exterior of the house. We saw nothing. I told John that we needed to call animal control. He said not at 3 in the morning. He tried to tell me to go back to bed, but our room shares the wall with the bathroom and I could not sleep with an animal hissing, snarling, and throwing things around when it was inches from my face. I tried to convince John that the animal was dead--we hadn't heard a sound for a good 20 minutes. John said he didn't want to disturb the animal in his last moments, so we had to keep waiting. John kept acting out the possible scenarios of what would happen if he did. The animal reaching up to him with his last breaths, fighting to stay alive. I agreed that we didn't want to see that. So I waited. Then I almost had John convinced that he needed to go into the bathroom until the crazy animal started up again full force. Lots of thrashing, hissing, snarling. John looked at me and said, "Yeah right, he's dead. Let's go to sleep. We will call someone in the morning." I finally caught a little bit of sleep, but was ready to make some calls by 7 A.M. We put a call into a "Nuisance Animal Trapping Service." Sounds interesting, right?
Two guys showed up soon after, one decked out in a camouflage shirt. We knew this would be interesting. The big guy with the camo shirt, had gray hair slicked back into a ponytail, and had no fear of the situation after we explained it to him. He kind of reminded me of the bounty hunter guy. He grabbed a stick with a loop on the end of it (we've all seen them in those animal rescue shows) and asked where the bathroom was. We pointed and he opened the door and ran inside. John and I just looked at one another. What was going to happen? We heard nothing. Absolutely nothing. So this is when I started to feel a bit crazy. We heard a wild beast in there just hours ago--now not even a peep. The man exited the bathroom and said, "No critter, no hole." What. The guys decided to go outside and take a look at the house. It involved looking in two crawlspace openings and getting on the roof. John's brother-in-law, Monte, showed up to help us. We were so adamant that something was in the bathroom and had to explain to Monte that they found nothing. Once they were on the roof, they eventually started to piece it together. I stayed behind and talked to the big, bounty hunter looking man, as he chatted about his strangest finds. A 10 ft. boa constrictor last week that was as wide as a football. Monkeys and lemurs finished off the list. The guys returned from the roof and found some wire fencing was pulled back and a wooden board moved. The animal gained entry there and then traveled in the walls. It gives me the creeps just thinking about it. We figured out that it probably dropped from the attic in the wall between the bedroom and the bathroom. We heard it crashing through the wall and then when it landed it was stuck and possibly hurt. It looked like it probably spent some time under the bathtub making tons of noise, and that was what sounded like it was in the bathtub.
After a thorough search, two traps were set up outside the house where the crawlspaces lead to the outside. We sat and waited. Late last night, we heard the trap. John and I headed out and saw a decent-sized opossum in the trap. We called the animal trapping guy and he came out this morning to pick up the critter. I started to feel really bad about trapping the animal and having to call the service on him. I had second thoughts about the whole thing after I found out they have to "dispose" of them. Why can't they just release them? John and I chatted and we knew it would be crazy to try to put the trap in our car and drop the opossum off to live a new life somewhere else. I had thoughts of that scene in Tommy Boy when the deer wakes up and attacks everyone in the car. Probably not a good idea. I couldn't bare to see the little critter this morning. I definitely didn't want him back in our house, but I couldn't think about the alternative either. Maybe I will get closure on the ordeal, but for now I won't focus on that part.
Tonight I look forward to a good night's rest without the chaos of an animal in my house or outside my bedroom window in a trap. Bella is very weary of the bathroom and whenever she hears a noise in the house, she army crawls by the bathroom. I hope we all don't feel on edge for too much longer. No more animals tarzaning into the house, please!
At 3:00 A.M. we were suddenly awoken by the loudest sound. It sounded like someone crashed through our roof, took everything down with it, then continued to thrash about for a good two minutes. At first it sounded like someone was breaking in, but then it sounded like the clumsiest break-in ever. And then I heard claws. And animal sounds. John and I sat up in bed and debated over who should check it out. As if I was going to check it out. Pssh. John slowly walked out of the bedroom and tip-toed towards the bathroom--the source of the crashing. The kitties were well on their way to check things out too. The thrashing, hissing, and snarling sounds continued loudly, so John slammed the bathroom door shut instinctively. We stood there, puzzled for a long time. Now what do we do? Neither of us were going to open the door, but what do we do? Go back to bed? Ignore the thing demolishing our bathroom? What is it? WHAT is going on? I was sleeping 30 seconds ago and now I have legitimate thoughts of an alligator flailing around in the tub. C'mon, we've all seen those home videos when gators break into people's homes. John and I discussed the possibilities: cat, raccoon, opossum...gator, ha. Whatever it was had massive claws, a nasty snarl, and a crazy hissing, breathing sound. And it was going nuts. In our house.
What do people do when this happens? I felt crazy already. What would I say to explain this to get help? We trekked outside with flashlights in hand to inspect the exterior of the house. We saw nothing. I told John that we needed to call animal control. He said not at 3 in the morning. He tried to tell me to go back to bed, but our room shares the wall with the bathroom and I could not sleep with an animal hissing, snarling, and throwing things around when it was inches from my face. I tried to convince John that the animal was dead--we hadn't heard a sound for a good 20 minutes. John said he didn't want to disturb the animal in his last moments, so we had to keep waiting. John kept acting out the possible scenarios of what would happen if he did. The animal reaching up to him with his last breaths, fighting to stay alive. I agreed that we didn't want to see that. So I waited. Then I almost had John convinced that he needed to go into the bathroom until the crazy animal started up again full force. Lots of thrashing, hissing, snarling. John looked at me and said, "Yeah right, he's dead. Let's go to sleep. We will call someone in the morning." I finally caught a little bit of sleep, but was ready to make some calls by 7 A.M. We put a call into a "Nuisance Animal Trapping Service." Sounds interesting, right?
Two guys showed up soon after, one decked out in a camouflage shirt. We knew this would be interesting. The big guy with the camo shirt, had gray hair slicked back into a ponytail, and had no fear of the situation after we explained it to him. He kind of reminded me of the bounty hunter guy. He grabbed a stick with a loop on the end of it (we've all seen them in those animal rescue shows) and asked where the bathroom was. We pointed and he opened the door and ran inside. John and I just looked at one another. What was going to happen? We heard nothing. Absolutely nothing. So this is when I started to feel a bit crazy. We heard a wild beast in there just hours ago--now not even a peep. The man exited the bathroom and said, "No critter, no hole." What. The guys decided to go outside and take a look at the house. It involved looking in two crawlspace openings and getting on the roof. John's brother-in-law, Monte, showed up to help us. We were so adamant that something was in the bathroom and had to explain to Monte that they found nothing. Once they were on the roof, they eventually started to piece it together. I stayed behind and talked to the big, bounty hunter looking man, as he chatted about his strangest finds. A 10 ft. boa constrictor last week that was as wide as a football. Monkeys and lemurs finished off the list. The guys returned from the roof and found some wire fencing was pulled back and a wooden board moved. The animal gained entry there and then traveled in the walls. It gives me the creeps just thinking about it. We figured out that it probably dropped from the attic in the wall between the bedroom and the bathroom. We heard it crashing through the wall and then when it landed it was stuck and possibly hurt. It looked like it probably spent some time under the bathtub making tons of noise, and that was what sounded like it was in the bathtub.
After a thorough search, two traps were set up outside the house where the crawlspaces lead to the outside. We sat and waited. Late last night, we heard the trap. John and I headed out and saw a decent-sized opossum in the trap. We called the animal trapping guy and he came out this morning to pick up the critter. I started to feel really bad about trapping the animal and having to call the service on him. I had second thoughts about the whole thing after I found out they have to "dispose" of them. Why can't they just release them? John and I chatted and we knew it would be crazy to try to put the trap in our car and drop the opossum off to live a new life somewhere else. I had thoughts of that scene in Tommy Boy when the deer wakes up and attacks everyone in the car. Probably not a good idea. I couldn't bare to see the little critter this morning. I definitely didn't want him back in our house, but I couldn't think about the alternative either. Maybe I will get closure on the ordeal, but for now I won't focus on that part.
Tonight I look forward to a good night's rest without the chaos of an animal in my house or outside my bedroom window in a trap. Bella is very weary of the bathroom and whenever she hears a noise in the house, she army crawls by the bathroom. I hope we all don't feel on edge for too much longer. No more animals tarzaning into the house, please!
Thursday, October 01, 2009
HGTV should be calling at any moment
John and I took on a fun home project recently. I had this old, unfinished dresser from college. It was a hand-me-down from a friend who was graduating and I needed a dresser. It served it's purpose in college and then was stored at my parents' house. I knew it always had potential, but never got around to making it happen. The dresser had random writing on it, a quarter jammed into one of the handles, a screw randomly placed in the dresser that served absolutely no purpose, and other markings that made it have "character." There was no doubt it needed some love.
I did minimal research online about how to stain and finish a dresser. I only have faint memories of sanding one piece of furniture in my childhood (Ky, do you remember this? On the back deck in NJ?) and it seemed like it took 12 hours to sand. I guess it was a big project for kids. We headed to Home Depot to get our supplies and got to work on sanding the dresser. I grabbed the sandpaper, started to sand, and was completely shocked because my body was covered with goosebumps. The sanding process totally creeped me out and I did not expect that reaction at all. Total heebie-jeebies! The friction was like nails down a chalk board. I even have a hard time typing about it right now. John gave me some strange looks and continued to sand, as I continued to have a very adverse and strange reaction to the sanding process. I honestly didn't know if I could continue doing it. I definitely didn't sand as much as John did, but I was able to work up to a pace that was manageable. We stained the dresser and the following day sealed it.
Look how great it turned out! It's amazing what a little TLC can do.
The supplies
Unfinished dresser
I believe it says nice things like, "Devo", "Ratner", and "12/16/94." Then another person came along scribbled "Sucks" next to "Devo." This dresser has been around the block--all before my time.
John removing the randomly placed screw.
All sanded and ready for the stain!
Adding the stain. We went with a dark jacobean stain.
Getting every nook and cranny.
All finished! Even the cats sit and appreciate it.
Finished product.
I did minimal research online about how to stain and finish a dresser. I only have faint memories of sanding one piece of furniture in my childhood (Ky, do you remember this? On the back deck in NJ?) and it seemed like it took 12 hours to sand. I guess it was a big project for kids. We headed to Home Depot to get our supplies and got to work on sanding the dresser. I grabbed the sandpaper, started to sand, and was completely shocked because my body was covered with goosebumps. The sanding process totally creeped me out and I did not expect that reaction at all. Total heebie-jeebies! The friction was like nails down a chalk board. I even have a hard time typing about it right now. John gave me some strange looks and continued to sand, as I continued to have a very adverse and strange reaction to the sanding process. I honestly didn't know if I could continue doing it. I definitely didn't sand as much as John did, but I was able to work up to a pace that was manageable. We stained the dresser and the following day sealed it.
Look how great it turned out! It's amazing what a little TLC can do.
The supplies
Unfinished dresser
I believe it says nice things like, "Devo", "Ratner", and "12/16/94." Then another person came along scribbled "Sucks" next to "Devo." This dresser has been around the block--all before my time.
John removing the randomly placed screw.
All sanded and ready for the stain!
Adding the stain. We went with a dark jacobean stain.
Getting every nook and cranny.
All finished! Even the cats sit and appreciate it.
Finished product.
Peony-scented drawer liners.
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