Finding Direction: The Wind Vane Chronicles

So - what do you want to hear first?  The good news or the bad news.

Me - I always like to get the bad news over with first and end with a happy not.  I'm hoping that's how my life ends, too.  On a very good note.  And no, I don't mean whether or not I accidentally slip into the pearly gates.  My salvation is already a done deal, thanks to the grace and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ and God our Father. 

I'm talking more in terms in how I go out of this life to that blissful sleep until resurrection day.  Of course, no one can predict how their life will close this earthly chapter, but I'm hoping it's not some kind of cliff hanger or something.  Dying peacefully and quietly in bed would be a good way to go if you're listening to my prayers, Abba.

In the meantime . . . as you know if you've been reading my posts for any time at all, we're been working on getting a house built for well over a year now and it has become very tiring.  If you remember, just last week and weekend we were greatly demoralized by the theft of over $1,000 worth of things we'd taken out to the house in preparation for our move in, which keeps slip sliding away, to quote an old Paul Simon song.

That, along with a string of other bad news through me into the beginnings of what seemed to me to be a the time could become a major depression.  But just last Tuesday afternoon I wrote a post here about it asking for your prayers and cheers and I received them galore, for which I remain very thankful.  Because they helped!  Tremendously!

I've been in much better spirits since then than I'd been in for a while so that when the latest house building snafu arose the middle of this past Friday afternoon, I actually took it rather calmly and didn't get the least bit upset.  Well . . . maybe a little, but hey - it wasn't depression!

Here's the deal - our house is about 98% complete - finally - after lo, these many months - and months - and months - and we were quite close to being able to move in.  In three days last week we got about 99% of the electrical work finished, got the yard sodded, had carpet and wood flooring installed and got the bathroom vanity tops installed and most of the plumbing finished.  We even have commodes now.  (And yes, Greg, they are indoor!)

Then disaster struck.  Well - maybe a minor disaster to you guys, but it seemed pretty major to me and Tom at the time.  Mid-afternoon Friday, I happened to call our builder from Home Depot (which is getting tons of our business already and we haven't even moved in) who was just fixin' to call me.  Big snafu.

You see, our formica kitchen counter tops were ordered weeks and weeks ago and the company kept telling us that they were coming, were coming, were coming.  Finally it changed to they were on "back order."  Friday afternoon for the very first time the company tells our builder that not only are the counter tops on back order, there is not a piece of formica in the pattern I'd picked out more than a year ago in the whole U. S. 

Now they are saying that none will be delivered even to this country until the 29th of June and that it will take a week or two after that to get the counter tops made and sent out to us to be installed.

So we have a complete house except for kitchen counter tops and, oh yeah - no sink or running water in the kitchen.  (Except in the ice maker on the new fridge, which was delivered last Tuesday, too.)

At this point, even if I picked out something else it would take a couple of weeks to get it ordered, built and delivered for installation, so we're talking about huge setback.  But - and here's the good news - our builder said that if we want to go ahead and move in next week (this week they need to finish up a bunch of stuff, plus we're going off to the Mississippi Press Association summer convention Wednesday afternoon for the rest of the week), he will build us temporary plywood counter tops for the kitchen to use and will go ahead and have the plumber put the sink in temporarily in the plywood so we'll have a basically functioning kitchen.  More or less.

At this point, less is preferable to none, so that's what Tom and I have decided to do.  Anyone have any old pieces of oil cloth lying around that we can cut and tack to the plywood tops to make us nice counter tops?   

The house has pretty well been cleaned up, but still needs some touch up painting done and the bottom kitchen cabinets need to be cleaned out real well.  In thinking about moving in (we have it scheduled for a week from tomorrow on Tuesday, June 26), we will want to go ahead and put the kitchen back together by filling the cabinets and drawers, I'm sure, but whatever we put in the lower cabinets will get all messed up again when they come out to finally install the counter tops. 

So, I'm not sure what we'll do about that.  I'm still thinking about it all.  Any ideas? 

I guess that's about it for this morning.  Be sure and scroll back up to the top of the page here and click on the tab "Creating A Home" (or here) and go down to the June 17 photos and commentaries because I posted about nine new pictures yesterday from this past week that show the grass outside, the garage doors, the carpet and wood flooring, etc.  The house is looking beautiful, so we're getting really excited about finally getting to move in.

Please continue to pray for me that I'll remain in good spirits and not grow weary.  From the time we first cleared our lot, it's taken us more than 10 months to get this house built and it's looking like the total will be 11 months by the time it is completely finished.  It's been fun, but a difficult journey, too, and a lot of hard work lies ahead in the physical and emotional move itself.

As for all of you - thanks for dropping by and hanging with me for a while today.  Cheers & Blessings to you all today!  Dee

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