This post could easily be titled Hell's Kitchen but I'm trying to take a break from all the gloomy topics I usually write about here. I'm an activator. I LOVE to start projects. Then I like to organize other people to carry out the plan and see us to the finish line. This DIY project was very similar to the DIY farmhouse table I wrote about here. Also very similar to the DIY family-coordinated Christmas pajamas I never wrote about because they never got finished. I had a vision for a DIY thrifty play kitchen. When I get my mind set on a project I get super excited and impatient to begin so I picked out the free entertainment center from Craigslist the same day and took the whole family along to pick it up. We had to throw it on top of the Subaru to get it home which always makes for fun looks on the way home from people flying by us. Anwyay, first thing check. Spent all night painting it. Check. Well, I kind of lost my steam from there and I'm pretty sure this play kitchen took longer than a real kitchen reno but regardless, my husband is awesome and here it is ans we are thrilled how it turned out: We started with this entertainment center and used leftover paint from projects at my sister's new house. We missed one crucial step here (sanding it) so we are anxious to see how our paint job holds up.
Cost: $0 Then we cut the holes for the sink and facuet and laid the fermica. The fermica was left in the rafters from the previous homeowners. We found facuet at a habitat store and the "sink" is a bowl from Goodwill. Cost: 7.41 After the sink was in place we worked on the stove. I was over the moon when a local appliance store let me take all the materials for this portion of the project from their scrap pile for free! We used leftover metal from the fridge to mount the knobs and spray painted them black with a can we already had. Cost: $0 The fridge was the most expensive part of the project by far. We couldn't find any steals on metal although we did get $4 off the piece by picking out a damaged piece and asking for a discount. The magnets were hanging on our real fridge and I was pumped to use them for this project because they look so cluttered and constantly end up on the floor. Metal Cost: $30 The side of the play kitchen has a phone, dish towel rack, and peg board (for Nick's keys of course) all found at thrift stores. Cost: $9.99 The only other expense we had were handles which totaled around $8.45 and felt food I found on a garage sale for $4. We have plans of adding a piece of ply wood to the back and making a little window above the sink and microwave above the range. We are calling it good for now as we are trying to finish our basement before a murder mystery party we are throwing in a few weeks. I'm really excited to share our complete basement makeover. It's been a perfect project on maternity leave and super fun to find deals like a $5 couch! The total cost for the kitchen was: $59.85. All said and I done I think we will finish our basement including the play kitchen for under $200 including paint, furniture and some decor. Here are some pictures of our fun!
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It was Tuesday and I was making dinner. Stir fry. Cheap, and more importantly, easy to make. I'm terrible at cooking and my in-laws were coming for dinner so I played it safe. I cut myself almost every time I have to chop veggies, but I got through that part just fine this time and thought I was out of the woods. Until...I made instant rice. Does it get any easier than instant rice? You literally just mix rice and water and put it in the microwave. Unless you're me, you read the back of the box wrong, you mix 2 cups water with a quart and half of water (which was supposed to be the size serving bowl I used). Obviously it doesn't cook. No biggie, I'll just start over. It's super cheap so I don't feel too wasteful. Austin is watching all this play out and being super patient and supportive. I'm standing right by the sink ready to dump it down the drain, he gently tells me "I don't think you should do that, just throw it in the trash." What do I do? Dump it down the drain and made new rice (for all reading who are so un-domestic like me, the ratio is 1 to 1 on the water rice thing). Dinner is served and life is good. Until...I go to do dishes. Why won't the water drain? Because my husband told me not to dump 2 cups of rice down the sink and I did it anyways.
My husband and both of our dads try to fix it, and honestly I'm irritated that they can't fix it and then I'm irritated that Austin's calling the plumber. Well, $300 later, we have a working sink and drain. Ouch. That hurts, especially since I went off payroll Monday, but I think my pride might hurt a tiny bit more though. I love to be right and have so much trouble listening to other people's ideas on how to do things. Unfortunately for Austin, I think I have the most trouble listening to his ideas because I love girl power and think I have to prove it all the time (like when we are working out and I taunt him about how I can do the same things and lift as much and I totally can't). My pride hurts but I learned more than one thing this week. The first, don't pour rice down the sink. The second, hear my husband out on issues I know nothing about, like plumbing. The third, feeling forgiveness is really cool. Austin isn't a dweller. If he had been the one to pour the rice down the sink I'd probably secretly still feel a little anger. Spoiler alert: it wouldn't be a secret or a little. He would know. I'd go on and on about how much it costed us and how he should have just listened to me. When the day was done, Austin hugged me and had the most genuine smile on his face and said, "We will probably just laugh about this someday." He hired the plumber, let me go to Chicago and have fun, and handled the situation. And now it's done and over with. This week I got a tiny glimpse of the type of grace and forgiveness Jesus has for me. How many times I have felt nudges not to do something and I just do it anyways. Gossiping, buying things we don't need, getting angry at my kids, ignoring the need for devotion and prayer, and so much more. I'm forgiven every. single. time. and I'm so thankful. Week 3 day 4 of maternity leave was pretty slow, an updating photo albums and watching tv kind of day. We don't have cable, but we have one year of free HBO which typically results in watching whatever free movie is playing, because seriously who can stand daytime television? It's the worst.
The free movie last Thursday? My Sister's Keeper. It started at 11 and ended at 1. At 12:35 I started watching, convinced I could handle it until the next movie started. Worst decision I made all day as it resulted in sobbing into a spit rag. Spoiler alert: if you haven't seen it, it's about a family losing a daughter/sibling to cancer. And the rest of this post really has nothing to do with the movie except for the fact that sometimes all it takes is the remaining 25 minutes of a movie for grief to work some new things out. A lot of people I love are headed into their first year of "seconds" this month. I think most people think that this year of seconds will be easier for the people I love, but it doesn't get easier that quickly. For me, every year of loss is a different kind of hard. At first it's the nightmarish, this isn't real, wake me up when it's over, hazy type of hard. The physical ache and hurt hard. The I can't get up, I'm anxious all the time, living in a fog kind of hard. Thankfully, there is lots of support for the first year kind of hard. Prayers, cards, meals, texts, flowers, gifts, words spoken, and acknowledgement of loss. It's hard to remember what happens between the first year and the next kind of hard. Let's call it survival mode? Deep grieving, darkness, tears, and so much of every type of pain. I think it's hard to truly remember what this phase looked like for me because it hurts to even think about. I think everyone in my family would tell you we don't know how we made it through this hard. What came next was the kind of hard that I had to figure out on my own. Who am I? What's my role in the family? Am I still the middle child? How is my family going to make it through this? Who are my parents? Will they make it? Statistics for divorce for couples that have lost children are crazy high. What if I lose them too? How do I navigate faith when I'm angry? How can I control everything so nothing bad happens again? It's a kind of hard where the fog isn't as thick and the reality of permanent loss sets in. The times where you forget they are dead and go to tell them something only to quickly remember your loss are more few and far between. This kind of hard lasted for years for me. It's a lonely hard because the world keeps moving and forgets? (not sure it's actually forgotten but it seems like it). Acknowledgement of loss is rare and to hear Nick's name would be like seeing a dog walk on its hind legs. Then it shifted to the kind of hard that comes with forgetting some of the simple, mundane things. Replaying a voice or a laugh in your head doesn't come as easily. And going on my first year of 15ths I can't say I consciously remember I had a brother every single day. Calling my son's name doesn't always phase me or remind me of my brother. It's an odd hard. A kick myself for forgetting kind of hard. Then there are moments where you are 26 years old watching My Sister's Keeper on a couch you own with a baby you made and you start sobbing feeling like you are 11 years old again. Too many kinds of hard. The last kind of hard has always caused overwhelming guilt for me. How could I possibly forget? Thank goodness for skilled therapist. I finally found someone I really value to let into this mess. Sitting across from her last week Friday (after I was done explaining how healthy I feel lately yet how I feel guilty) she says, "Haley you just can't have it both ways. You can't remember every single thing about everyone you've lost without the deep physical, emotional, anxious kind of pain. How did I never think of that before? Relief from that guilt and acceptance of this new kind of "hard" that is really much easier (most days) is called freedom. A few suggestions I have to love people well in any phase of hard, because those phases last so so long before any relief or freedom (and even when there is relief there are still days and moments that will bring you right back to the hardest of the hard): 1. Talk about their loved one. Say their name, share memories. I promise it won't make things worse. It might make the person cry, and that's ok. We miss hearing loved ones names and it's always such a gift to know they are remembered. 2. Start a tradition of remembering. My grandparents gave my parents an ornmanet in memory of Nick every single year. One of my mom's friends bought a single stem rose or other flowers for every anniversary of Nick's death. Sweet and thoughtful acts of remembering are cherished and are a gentle way of showing people you care about that you haven't forgotten. 3. Throw a card in the mail or send a text periodically. Receiving something hand written is rare in our cultural. It shows you took time to sit down and show you care. 4. Food. I don't think you can go wrong with this one. I hope everyone knows the joy of being brought a hot meal you didn't have to cook during a hard time or time or transition. Such a blessing. If all else fails, simply ask your loved ones how they want to be supported. They might not know, they might say they don't need anything, and that's ok too. But they will know they were thought of and remembered, which means so much in every phase of hard. |
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Hi! I'm Haley. Archives
May 2019
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