Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Extreme Makeover: California Edition

Tess & I had a great flight to Utah and made our way up to Idaho. No sooner had I arrived when Dad, Mer, Maur & I packed up the car and headed up to Northern California to see Ryan &; Miranda's new house. They had a fierce battle with the California real estate market and finally proved victorious with a cute fixer-upper in San Jose, minutes away from Ry's job at Apple.

After a VERY long 15-hour drive (with the best entertainment proving to be Maureen's 5th-grader book, Diary of a Wimpy Kid), we took on a whirlwind of a 48-hour home makeover. We tackled project after project and were quite pleased with how much we were able to get done, including: replacing wood paneling with a real wall; lots of patching; painting the living room, kitchen, dining area and bathroom; new locks on the doors; new roof on the shed; new light fixtures in the kitchen & dining area; cleaning & refinishing the kitchen cabinets; new knobs on the cabinets; and installing a new disposal.


The first night we knocked off before sundown to see Half Moon Bay, a beautiful but FREEZING cold oceanfront state park.  We were so cold that Dad resorted to wearing Miranda's jacket and a towel over his head.

The drive home was more eventful than we bargained for.  Some blamed me for gloating about how we had missed all the construction traffic; some blamed Maureen for commenting how she'd never changed a tire before; some blamed Meredith for hitting a major pothole amidst miles coned-off road.  I think in the end we all agreed to blame the cursed state of Nevada for the TWO flat tires that brought our good time to a screeching halt.  Fast forward two hours of hanging out in the Nevada desert with only rolling mice heads and difficult tow truck dispatchers for entertainment, and we were finally towed an hour to Twin Falls where we spent the night.


We were happy to have made the trip and even happier to be home.  I think Mom (who bravely tended Tess & Lauren during our 4+ day absence) was relieved to finally see us.  We've been sticking pretty close to home because no one is anxious to get back in a car again.

Ryan comes tomorrow--I think we'll be up for more fun by then!

3 comments:

Nana and Papa said...

Very impressive re-do! And in such short order, too. Sorry about the trip back. Seems like no road trip is complete without a whole lotta angst somewhere.

xo W.

Miranda said...

Thanks for all the help! We couldn't have done it without you guys. It was so awesome!

The Hillbilly Banjo Queen: said...

Oooh! Rolling mice heads! My favorite! The re-do was amazing! I can keep using exclamation points all day!!!!!