Carpet installation fiasco

Posted on July 23, 2010 by viviankirkfield

At 9am this morning, there was a knock on the door. It was our carpet installers, here to install new carpeting for our downstairs floors. For the past week, I had been working like a mad-man (or mad-woman) to clear off tables, empty bookcases and clean out cabinets so that the installers would be able to move the furniture in preparation to laying the carpeting. Of course, it doesn’t help that our furniture is HUGE, a carryover from our days in a 14 room house. Even though we sold, gave away, threw away LOTS of STUFF when we downsized to a small 6 room townhome, everything we have is BIG.

After the carpet installers came in, they spent an hour moving much of the furniture to other places (outside patio, garage) and they began measuring the floor so they could determine how the carpet should be laid. When they went out to their truck to call the carpet store and were gone for quite a while, we began to worry. And, as it turns out, we had good reason to worry. When they returned, it was to tell us that the man who had done the measuring (from the carpet store) had under-measured the length of the living room by 2 feet!!!!!! So, they had to move back all of the furniture and the carpet store is ordering a new length of carpet to be laid next Tuesday. How frustrating! Will I put back all of the books, knickknacks, and other STUFF that I had boxed up and put in the garage? You bet I won’t!

I’ll wait at least until the carpet is down on the floor. And maybe, if we haven’t needed the STUFF by then, we actually don’t need it at all.

That’s one way to get rid of clutter!

I’d love to hear other carpet installation horror stories…perhaps it will make me feel better.

Andy Rooney’s in my kitchen

Posted on July 19, 2010 by viviankirkfield

Last night, on 60 Minutes, Andy Rooney did a segment on gadgets one finds in the kitchen drawer. He said that most of the items he found in his kitchen drawer had not been used for 20 or 30 years.

It made me think about my kitchen gadget drawer (don’t we all have one?). So, this morning, I decided to empty it and check out what was in there.

Here is a list of what I found:

Rubber gripper for opening bottles (I use this ALL the time)
Graham Kerr sheet metal thing with ruler marking on one side (maybe for pastry making…have never used it)
Orange cylindrical plastic thing (lemon juice extractor?)..I actually have 2 of these
Wooden honey dipper (not sure what you call it…when I need honey, I use a spoon)
Green plastic grapefruit sectioner (we don’t eat grapefruit)
Orange Tupperware spreader/spatula (never used…will take it out of gadget drawer so I will have it when I need it)
Yellow plastic cylindrical thing labeled Sunkist (maybe for extracting juice from an orange)
Old-fashioned metal garlic press (I usually hit the garlic clove with the flat blade of a big knife)
Wooden double mini rolling-pin (didn’t know I had this…could have used it several times in the past)
3 top-notch wine bottle openers (my husband has a small glass of wine with dinner and I don’t drink)
Old-fashioned metal can opener (just in case the electric can opener doesn’t work, I guess)
Lobster/crab leg cracker and set of picks
Red plastic flour scooper (why isn’t it in the container with the flour)
A dozen assorted wine bottle corks (I keep throwing them away and my husband keeps putting them in the drawer)
Broken tea strainer
Metal melon ball scooper (I can’t remember the last time I scooped melon balls)
Vacuum pump and rubber corks for sealing open wine bottles
Wooden roller thing (not sure what it is for)
My oldest son’s original baby spoon (he turns 38 this month)
Set of cheese spreaders/cutters (use them at Christmas)
Set of 4 multi-colored mini rubber prep bowls (so small I don’t know what I could prep in them)

And that’s it! Do I just put it all back? Dump some of it?

What’s in your kitchen gadget drawer? I’d love to know that I’m not the only one with items I have never used and have no clue what they are for.

Does it always get worse before it gets better?

Posted on July 14, 2010 by viviankirkfield

The other day I wrote about the new carpeting we are getting.

I was excited, not only for the new carpeting, but also because I was looking forward to the opportunity to CLEAR OUT ALL THE CLUTTER that tends to accumulate on bookshelves and the dining room table and in cabinets and drawers. In fact, in and on virtually any surface or space that is available to park papers, books, the odd piece of clothing…you name it and it is probably there…somewhere…but please don’t ask me to find it!

I guess I should have known by now, having moved several times during the last 4 decades, that things would get worse before they got better. It definitely looks like we are moving…with half-filled boxes on the floor and the dining room table littered with papers (do we really need that piece?). I’m glad our children are grown, because adding little ones into the mix would only make it more difficult.

However, there is a shining light in the distance…my heart beats with hope (or is that from walking up and down the stairs 20 times with boxes of books?)…the 2 bookcases are EMPTY!

Next step: wrap and box the dozens of framed photos and knicknacks on the piano and sideboard.

At times, it does seem overwhelming. Parenting can seem like that also, don’t you agree? So, I guess I will try to do some of the things I did when my children were young that helped me put everything in the proper perspective:

Make a list of what I need to do each day…the night before! (You sleep so much better when you’ve written it down.)
Get a good night’s sleep! (Not always easy to do with little ones…have a cup of soothing tea before bedtime, close your eyes for a few minutes, breathe deeply, visualize the job done.)
Do the hardest or most unpleasant thing first…it empowers me and energizes me for the rest of the day! (There is a book out there called EAT THE FROG! Check it out…it talks about this phenomenon.)
Take breaks to walk, dance to great music, sit in the sun for a few minutes! (All work and no rest or play can burn you out quickly.)
Ask for help if I need it! (Sometimes we are too proud to ask for help because we think we should be able to do EVERYTHING by ourselves…is that you?)
Spend time with the ones I love…in person or on the phone…this renews me! (If you have children, no matter what you are involved in, please try to spend positive time with them…someone once said: To be in your children’s memories tomorrow, you have to be in their lives today…so true.)

I hope this list helps some of you…just making it has already helped me!