To clean or not to clean....

I'm sure this is a question we all ponder, but right now it is a really difficult one for me. On Tuesday I have about a million people coming to rip into my walls and such, so the desire just isn't there. I keep trying to figure out why I should go dust the bookshelves when in less than a week they are going to be covered in drywall dust anyways. Some cleaning I don't really have a choice about doing or not, but the dusting and vacuuming drive just isn't there. Some things are just no brainers... don't do the dishes and you have no clean ones, don't wash the laundry and you run out of clean undies... so those things I find easy to do (in the sense that I ever find dishes and laundry easy :). So, now I open this dilemma of mine up to you... should I go clean my house anyways, or do I have a justifiable reason to leave the little dust bunnies alone for another week?

The day with no make-up...

Do you ever have those days where you just don't feel like getting all prettied up? I do! Probably more often than I should admit. Well, today was one of those days. Considering the contractors were at my house an hour and a half earlier than I normally get up the drive and energy just weren't there today. I figured I would shower and put some make-up on later in the afternoon before me and Todd went out tonight, but I just didn't have the drive to do it at 7am. So late this morning I realized that I need a few things from the grocery store. I figure I will see no one that I feel the need to impress, so I throw on some clean jeans and a shirt and out the door me and Bright head. Well of course in the 10 minutes that I am at the store I run into a friend from high school, an ex-boyfriend, and my new neighbors. Ok, usually I see one or two people I know, but a smile and a "Hi!" usually suffice. Well... not today my friend, not today! Doesn't it always seem to go that way... when you think you don't need to look nice you do, and those days when you have really put the extra effort in you see no one! Yep! Just my luck!

And it begins...

So the demolition of my front porch begun today. The more they remove the more I like it. I couldn't believe how removing a few ugly old glass windows would let so much light into my living room. I am getting super excited for everything to be torn apart and put back like new. Right after the long weekend (Sept 5th) is when the real madness will start. That is when the furnace guys come to rip apart every single wall in my home. I am getting sooooo excited. The only thing I don't like is that for some reason it all has to start way earlier than I am normally awake.... and you can really sleep through the noise either. Oh well, I think I can handle it for a few weeks.

We got the money!

So I haven't said much in the last few days, and I feel like I am neglecting this thing. We did get approval from the bank for the maximum amount of money. Which is not what I was expecting at all. When we left on Friday the guy had told us that he thought he could get us about 2/3 of what we were hoping for. Oh well, that's better than nothing. Well Monday morning he called, told me he had crunched the numbers (I really have no idea what it means when they say that) and he had managed to get the maximum amount... What we had hoped for, plus a few extra dollars. YIPEE!! So now we are playing the fun game of what we actually want to do with the money. The furnace was more than I had expected, so we aren't able to do quite as many things as we had hoped. Also, we were hoping that the Alberta government was still doing subsidy for people who were making their homes more energy efficient. Well just my luck they stopped doing that a few months ago... yep just my luck! Oh well, at least we will be able to do quite a lot of what we were hoping and in the end it will increase the value of our home.

Home Renos

I swear the last few days I have been on the phone or the phone has been ringing non-stop! We are looking into doing some major home renos and so I have been calling everyone and their dog to get estimates. Not as easy as it may sound. Some people are too swamped to take on more projects for the next 6 months, some don't do contracts outside of the city, some I just get their voice mail, and the occasional one I actually get to talk to. So far I have had 3 guys come to give me estimates, for 3 different things I might add. I think the biggest pill to swallow was hearing the one guy say that he thinks the estimate for forced air will be close to $10000! YIKES!!! Since they have to take out the horrid space heaters, re-run the gas lines, duct the whole entire has, put in a cold air return, vent it to the outside, get a furnace, and then re-drywall and mud everything. Not to mention I will then have to paint my entire house again, since they will be cutting holes in the walls and running ducting because we can't do it under the house! Oh well, we will see what the bank has to say on Friday. Wish me luck....

What's in a name?

Ok, so lately I have started to wonder why there has to be so much hassle around naming a child. We recently found out we were having another boy... yikes! Not that I won't love him, but I can already imagine the frequent trips to the ER with wounds probably inflicted by his brother. So after a few days of digesting the fact that we are going to have two little boys we thought we should at least look at some names. Keeping with the fact that we are trying to find names that are places as well we went to the atlas. BTW there are WAY more places that can be girls names than boys names. Maybe it's that who male ego thing, where they have to name everything after a woman. Ever noticed that guys always name their cars chick names... You never see a guy with a car named John or Ted, it's always things like Cindy or Rachel. Anyways, we find a list of about 30 names that could be used. Some we threw out immediately, but we got down to a list of 3 or 4 that we like. Now the funny thing is that it isn't the first name that is causing us issues... No-sir-ee! It's the middle name. Besides the fact that we have had a few people use the first name we want, we haven't had issues there. The problem lies in the fact that we have chosen to use family names as middle names. So now everyone thinks that we should be using their name for OUR baby. Did they miss the fact that it was OUR child!! Not to mention that even if we like the people, we sometimes don't like their name. Like Todd's Dads name is Oscar... Sorry but I just can't stick my kid with that name (he even tells me not to :). So if we even mention using someone's name they automatically assume that we have 100% decided. I don't think we will 100% decided till we actually see the baby, and decide that the name fits. And now I have someone telling everyone (I won't mention names... But I'm sure a few of you out there can guess) that we have chosen to name our baby such-and-such after this person when we haven't! Yes, I admit that we had mentioned that it was a name we were considering, but nothing is set in stone. GRRRR... Oh well, I'm the one who signs the papers right? So if I decided to name my child Crap-Bag Carlson then I can... so there!