Cork Floors: Check

This weekend was a strange mix of old and new. Jordanna and I listened to NPR, demo'd a kitchen, had impromptu plumbing sessions, repaired some frightening construction, and installed a floor. For us this is like an extended date. It took us back to the heady days of Tucson remodeling and Yuri Gagarin. And then all of a sudden Cayden would come running through the construction zone trailing Nana or PopPop and we would remember that we actually live in PA and have a kid.

In point of fact, we would have gotten NOTHING done this weekend if JD's parents hadn't driven up Friday night to watch Cayden all weekend. They entertained him solidly from Friday evening till about 7pm on Sunday. I think I spent a total of 2 hours with my kid this weekend. That being said, we tore out our kitchen and began the remodel in earnest. As the pictures below will attest to.

Post cabinet demo, during the floor leveling

Tim chillin in the makeshift kitchen

For some reason our shopvac wasn't working very well...

JD's job was to trowel out adhesive, my job was to cut and lay tile

The finished product

Cementitious floor filler rocks

Photo Update

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Alrighty then, two posts in 20 minutes, I'm the man. Here's a random photo dump. Enjoy.

Flash and Sor on the 7th hole fairway.

Christening the new Woodchuck glass.

He VERY seriously reads his Car and Driver at the table.

Mommy reads to Cayden on the potty.

Moblie Suit XM-05

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Once upon a time, while on our honeymoon in Japan, I came across something that had enough pictures on the packaging that I could identify what it was. So I bought it immediately. This may sound silly to the traveler who has not experienced Japan but I assure you that after buying a "sandwich" consisting of spaghetti in a hogie roll you learn to purchase with discrimination.

Turns out it was a very cool snap together model of a Gundam Mobile Suit. I never really got into the whole "Gundam" thing (name someone who has, I dare you) but I like models and even more specifically models that do not require glue. So I bought the model in question, shipped it home to America at great personal cost that far exceeded its worth on Ebay, and finally got around last night to assembling the poor thing.

Here then is the assembling of the Mobile Suit XM in more detail than anyone really cares about.

The extruded plastic is really very impressive.

Unless you can read Kanji/Hiragana/Katakana you're an illiterate model builder.

Bilaterally symmetrical.

Torso before...

... torso after.

For some reason my model doesn't look as cool as the picture on the box. Go figure.

Shipping

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As many of you probably know I do not work for the better part of the summer and consider my 9 weeks of vacation barely adequate to recover from the spiritual expenditure of teaching High School Science. That being said, my mission for the next 2 months will be to remodel our kitchen. We have already remodeled a kitchen once and so it's not quite as daunting a task as it may appear. I'll be "updating" the base cabinets, wall cabinets, lighting, electrical, flooring, counter-tops, oven, cooktop, dishwasher, and sink. About 75% of the kitchen is in the basement right now tagged and ready to be assembled and installed. Some things are still in flux though and we're still ordering some materials.

For example, last week Jordanna ordered 5 backsplash tiles of beaten tin from Florida. Each one cost $13 so without shipping the tiles cost $65. When we got the bill it came to a total of $215 and Jordanna went ballistic. She stormed into the living room and swore that we would be calling our credit card company, canceling payment of the order, and reporting them to the Better Business Bureau for fleecing us on shipping.

Apparently when she called them they apologized for any misunderstanding and checked our shipping order carefully. That's when it was discovered that the tiles were in fact not scheduled to be shipped to Pennsylvania but instead to Palau. A small island nation in the South Pacific Ocean.

I'd love to say that the story ends there and we rerouted our tiles to PA instead of PW, but that's just not the case. After being informed of the development of our tiles' world tour I took it upon myself to investigate and then adopt the flag of Palau as the official flag of our remodel.

Because it really should be your flag if you live on an island in the middle of the Ocean.

Houdini

When I distractedly told the kid it was fine for him to get in the kitty box, I never dreamed he would actually fit...

Dinner Time

J: what are you grinning at?
C: Thomas and Percy and Bertie and Recycling Car

The Ups and Downs of Two

Cayden and I have been engaged in epic battles lately. One minute we are making up silly games and laughing our head off, the next he is slapping me and crying. Don't get me wrong, he is a ridiculously well behaved and easy to reason with two year old. We are terrified at the idea of taking on another child, because we haven't accumulated enough good karma to win the lottery twice. Its just that two is, quite literally, an insane age. You can see his emotions and thoughts accumulating inside his head until they need to explode. On a good day, the explosion is laughter and goofiness. On a bad day Mommy has to remind herself NOT TO HIT THE BABY BACK.

Last night at dinner Cayden was playing peek-a-boo with his blanket, throwing it over his head, then tearing if off and laughing hysterically. After about 5 iterations of this behavior, he yanks off the blanket, giggles and says, "I a little funny. Cayden is a little funny". If you want to know what me snorting pizza through my nose looks like, you should join us for dinner sometime.