Pictures of the office progress

When my husband's home, I just don't get a chance to sit down at the computer much. First I'm embarrassed by how much time I spend here and how little time I spend cleaning, cooking and other housewifey things. Second, I feel guilty that I'm not standing right there helping him, even though when I do try to help, we end up arguing because I can't read his mind and don't understand what he's trying to tell me to do! He thinks after 34 years of marriage I'm supposed to know what he means when he says, "Hold this up". Hold what up? Where do I hold it? I can't reach that. What can I use to hold it up? Or I should know when he says, "Hand me that ......" and trails off not saying 'hand him what', that I should know exactly which tool he wants. Then I'm not strong enough to do the work of a burly man and cause him to get hurt. No, I was not the cause of the board to the head the other day!! Couldn't have even prevented that one.

At the same time I don't think I should be here at the computer, I'm also not allowed to help much - for the reasons mentioned above. I'm also not allowed to paint. Except trim. I'm "allowed" to paint trim. He says he doesn't like the way I roll paint on. I think that's just the easiest part and he "allows" me to do the hard part. In the end, he's just a control freak. I've accepted that, he's accepted that and we generally know how to behave.

Here is a before picture of the little utility room. I didn't get one of the built in cabinet and shelves. Wish I had. Those have been torn out leaving holes in the walls. The view from that window? His workshop. I wish now I'd said go ahead and block it up, but I didn't, so it's there. Guess I can put some pretty curtains up there. Maybe even a big picture and pretend there's a nice view.



Here it is with the first coat of paint. This paint is Navajo White from Sherwin Williams. On our kitchen cabinets it looks white. In this room it looks yellow. Not what I'd wanted, but since I'm not doing the work, I'm not going to complain. Besides, it's not bad. I can work with this. Doesn't the room look tiny? It is, but somehow looks smaller in the picture.



My sweetie goes back to work tonight. He's an electrician at a paper mill. All his life he's never had to work shift work, but the plant manager decided a few years ago that almost everyone would work rotating shifts. He's enjoying it, but it sure messes with my time. He and a couple other guys swap out shifts and have long weekends. He's been off five days this time. A mini vacation! That's good, sort of. It's great if we go somewhere and good that he can work on these projects, but bad that I can't keep a normal routine.

I saw there's going to be an estate sale in town tomorrow and I'm still broke! I haven't had a chance to put anything on eBay for some quick cash 'cause we've been working on this room. Boohoo! I'll scrape up something. I've never let being broke totally stop me before.