As predicted, it snowed a lot this weekend. A LOT. When it was all said and done we ended up with around 45 centimetres; the snow in the backyard was so high by Saturday afternoon that when Oliver tried to walk in it all we could see of him was his shoulders and head. He lasted about seven minutes and came inside sobbing, and when I got him undressed I could see why: he had so much snow packed up his back and sleeves his skin was an angry red colour and he winced when I touched it.
By Saturday morning we’d already gotten something insane like 20 centimetres; Dave was out shoveling before 8am and was in line at Canadian Tire with one of those giant scoop shovels in hand before 9, as the thick layer of ice underneath the snow had cracked our piddly little plastic shovel in half. By 11 we were all back out there again, Dave and I with our shovels, Julia and Oliver outfitted with brooms, and as we piled snow upon snow upon snow we cast wistful, resentful glances at the bright orange snow blower sitting in the garage in all its broken glory.
Just as I was beginning to wish we hadn’t bought the house with the driveway the size of a fucking provincial park our neighbour took mercy on us and appeared at the foot of our driveway with his blower. He did the bottom half of our driveway several times that day; to say we were grateful is an understatement.
Saturday was a long, long day; by about 3pm, after exhausting movies and board games and crafts and ourselves with shoveling we were all beginning to go a bit shackwacky. Come 6pm we were all ready to strangle one another and once we'd eaten dinner Dave and I practically threw the kids in their beds before making a hasty beeline for the case of beer on the back porch; when we heard about the "menacing winter storm" that was headed our way, we made sure we had the essentials: milk, bread, frozen pizzas and BEER.
We did, however, manage to do something other than shoveling and pulling our hair out this weekend: we started on the downstairs bathroom. It’s what my mum would have called a water closet – a very small room with just enough space for a sink and a toilet, but it is Fugly, my friends…Fugly with a capital F. The ceiling is yellowed with age and so is the grandma-style flowered wallpaper, and while the brown linoleum floor is in good shape it’s just, well, fugly. The worst part about the bathroom, however, is the mirrored corner. The section of wall from the bathroom doorway to the window above the toilet was covered in individual mirrored squares, so no matter where you stood you could never get a clear view of yourself and you'd find yourself wondering if you'd time traveled and were revisiting 1982.
(Dave only cut his hands in four spots while prying the mirror squares from the walls, because although he played it safe and donned goggles, wearing gloves while removing glued-on mirrors from the wall is apparently for PUSSIES.)
My vision for the bathroom is simple: a crisp coat of white paint on the ceiling and windowsill, lime green paint on the top half of the walls, white wainscoting on the bottom. New linoleum on the floor – preferably black and white checkered or honeycomb, a new mirror above the sink, a small medicine cabinet and a few funky pictures for the walls. I can see it in my head and I think it’s going to RAWK; for some reason I have always wanted a lime green bathroom and I am pumped about this project. Pumped!
Once the mirrors were off I started on the wallpaper and while it came off easily the glue underneath didn’t, so while the storm raged on outside I spent a good portion of Saturday afternoon soaking the bathroom walls with wallpaper remover and scraping the glue underlay off with a putty knife.
So there you have it, our weekend in a nutshell: snow, shoveling, snow, shoveling, a case of the shackwack and wallpaper removal. GOOD TIMES.
39 Comments, Comment or Ping
Yeah… we were a little “shackwack” as well come Sunday.
But, good for you for doing something productive. I spent Sunday making “renovations” to the snow fort outside that my daughter now has no interest in playing in. Yay me.
March 10th, 2008
Wow. I feel like such a slug… Your bathroom is going to be adorable when it’s done!
March 10th, 2008
wow, that IS a lot of snow … poor baby with snow up his back. OUCH!
Yet … reading this made me SO GLAD that I don’t live anywhere where we might get even a HINT of an accumulation. I’ve shoveled enough snow in my lifetime to know that it’s pretty when it comes down, but it’s a bitch to clean up.
March 10th, 2008
Good one, Dave! You’re a legend, Dave!!
Seriously, could you send Dave to work on my bathroom?? I’m short a Dave.
March 10th, 2008
Our definition of housebound does not include home renos so you ROCK. Can’t wait to see how the green dream works out – I’m sure it will be very spa like.
March 10th, 2008
I don’t know why, but I’ve always called the giant scoop shovels Fred Flintsone shovels. (no idea why i felt i should share that either) also think it’s your neighbourly duty if you have a snowblower to help people out, but apparently our neighbour with a single car driveway who KNOWS i’m pregnant and saw Dave and I out there shoveling furiously this weekend several times (and actually asked how the pregnancy was going) didn’t think so. I think I’ll let the dogs pee on their lawn sometime. I’m sure the bathroom will look wicked when it’s done. Muah ha ha ha!
March 10th, 2008
look at liv kickin’ out the Conchords reference.
Dave does kick ass.
March 10th, 2008
Oh. My. God.
We were house bound too, but because of the heat. In your lingo it was 105.8. It was too hot to let the kids go to the pool because they’d burn to a crisp. I cooked and they had a friend over and played Playstation and Wii games.
The cool change arrived, but only for a day. For the rest of the week we’ll be enduring similar temperatures. (I’m a bit over it.)
March 10th, 2008
Ooh, I love bathroom remodels. Keep the pictures coming. I love seeing other people’s toilets.
March 10th, 2008
Renovations suck, we bought a house that was only 6 years old at the time, and four years later it is slowly recovering from the bad tastes of the previous owners.
We got lucky and had heat in Alberta all weekend, right now? Almost +10! Jealous much? (granted we had like 2 feet of snow in one day last month, but I have blocked that crap from my memory!)
March 10th, 2008
OMG I have been there with the crap wallpaper that has a paper layer underneath and has to be scraped inch by bloody inch. There was a lot of it in the old house, and the new owner has no idea how many hours of my labour she is paying for in getting a nice looking second floor hallway! Of course, ours was accessorized with brown shag carpet – now also gone. Ugh.
And yes, we also had a hell of a weekend, stuck together and making each other fucking nuts. So, so happy it’s MOnday. Don’t hear that often, do ya?
March 10th, 2008
Ooh, I love the idea of lime green. I want a room that’s chocolate brown on the bottom half and that green above the chair rail. Have fun with the renovations (though it’s hard work, I know).
March 10th, 2008
I really enjoy doing things like scraping wallpaper glue with a putty knife. I would do it even if it wasn’t snowing.
March 10th, 2008
Okay. I’m definitely coming to your house. I LOVE lime green walls with black and white floors. My own house is done in various combinations of black and white, lime green, and red. A little crazy, but so am I.
Can’t wait to see pictures of the finished deal.
And tell Dave I said thanks for wearing the goggles, would ya?
March 10th, 2008
oh good lord. no shit? it’s doing that weather shit there?
if i say i wore flip flops all weekend it scares me that you might want to hurt me, so i’ll not mention it. er, wait.
March 11th, 2008
oh i LOVE the idea.
i cannot WAIT to see it :-D
and as for the snow, i am so fucking over it.
love youuuu.
March 11th, 2008
I suspect that if we were housebound and I appeared with a putty knife it would be taken away from me, because I get a little stabby when the snow won’t stop falling. Especially since it’s bloody March and winter started in November this year and when will it end???!!!
I can’t wait to see pictures of your bathroom. And the colour scheme has inspired me… we’ve been in our house for a year and the one room we haven’t touched is the bathroom. It is without a doubt the most hideous room in the house. I’ve done nothing with it because I can’t decide what colours to go with. Would you think I was stalking you if I went for the lime green? Because that sounds very very cool.
March 11th, 2008
is it wrong that I want to faceplant into that snow?
March 11th, 2008
I can’t wait to see the finished product.
March 11th, 2008
The snow is killing me.
I am all over the gas station bathroom girlie. Really.
So let me get this straight, you are handy and hawt?! Not fair.
March 11th, 2008
Powder room makeovers are always the best. The room is small so it is relatively inexpensive and it goes quick!
March 11th, 2008
I love snow but that is a lot even for me, WOW!! Bathroom remodles are so much fun. It’s one of those rooms like you said that you can totally cut loose and make funky.
Keep us updated, I love seeing the progress!
a.
March 11th, 2008
We were huddled in with the sick, except for the 45 minutes that K spent outside shovelling and gettign miserable. Needs us a snowblower.
March 11th, 2008
My hubby spent a fortune on a blower this fall ’cause we just moved into a house with a provincial park as a driveway too. I was pissed about the money he spent – but this winter proved how much he needed it.
I love your bathroom idea – we need to update ours too!
Visit me @ http://www.momontherun.net
March 11th, 2008
That is an excellent project. I did a similar face lift on my 70s nightmare but gave myself a terrible cut while removing the mirrored tiles.
ah the mirrored tiles. Who the hell ever thought that was a good idea?
March 12th, 2008
shackwack – love that, gonna have to steal it (but credit you of course – lol)…
blessed be the snowblower neighbours. I have Cdn Tire Gift Cards for BOTH of them. AND, scoop shovels rule.
March 12th, 2008
When I read “shackwack” all I could think about was “Caddyshack” and now I want to see the movie again.
Yes, enough with the snow–I have a four-car driveway, but I only shovelled two-cars worth this last snowfall.
I notice that there’s a heater beside your toilet–is it used to burn off all the splashed urine? Just asking.
March 12th, 2008
So how deep was that snow in “American.” Haha, just kidding!
That’s a lot of snow! I definitely do not miss it!
March 12th, 2008
Shackwack. I like that.
Sorry about all that snow. Those pictures made me shudder with fear.
March 12th, 2008
Oooh, I’m so excited for you. Your bathroom will look great once it’s finished. I love the feeling of accomplishment after working hard on a project and seeing the results. I’m hoping once we get back to Toronto the snow will have magically melted and spring will have arrived….I know wishful thinking.
March 12th, 2008
I haven’t seen snow like that since I was a child….
March 12th, 2008
I think it is going to look awesome! What a fun project (when it is done anyway)
I am sick of snow!
March 12th, 2008
By the time the storm got here, the snow had turned into 12 hours of freezing rain, mixed in with some wet snow, and some of that corn meal texture crap that I know the Inuit must have a word for but I don’t. The result was that our entire city now resembles a shiny, white armadillo shell that simply CANNOT be shoveled. The city is built on a steep hill, though, which makes it a great place to live if you’re training for the 2010 luge run in Whistler.
Ho hum.
March 13th, 2008
I can’t wait to see what it looks like when it is done.
And I’m killing myself laughing that you guys got hammered with snow while I enjoyed sunshine and plus 10 temperatures.
Life is GOOOOD.
Hee hee.
March 13th, 2008
Thats alot of work. Can you come and work on mine?
March 14th, 2008
OMG! I cannot wait to see your new updated bathroom. I wondered how long you would be able to deal with those mirrors. I felt like buying you a disco ball to put in there. Or an 80 year-old woman, I couldn’t decide which!
March 16th, 2008
IDK…I kind of like that ‘gas station’ look. LMAO ;)
For reals, I’m excited you are redoing it.
March 25th, 2008
loved your stories just happened upon them at 0400 in the morning at work, would love to read more but can’t figure out the website your at, could be just to tired. have been locked in a 3×5 room for 36 hrs in the last 3 days!! but your short stories were just what i needed!! thank you so much!!!!
November 10th, 2008
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