Let's start with the floors. Every day when I come home I am surprised by how much of the floors are done! So much has been going on with them. Matt is a flooring-MACHINE!
Recently, the living room was finished. You saw that. And put back together! YAY!!!!! Then it was on to get the dining room and kitchen ready. While Matt was installing a new sub-floor and fixing the squeaks, he discovered that one of the beams supporting the kitchen had a huge crack in it. So he fixed it. Like, duh. He bought a new beam and supported it. I got to help.
Then we opened up the boxes of knotty (I thought it was naughty, just kidding!!) wood that we got on clearance. In the store it looked really good. They had a little 3x3 area sample on the floor, and we liked the variations a lot. Then we opened up the boxes. They were all 12 inch pieces with 1 or 2 2 foot planks thrown in. No wonder they were clearance priced! Garbage. So we returned them and bought more of the beautiful wood from the living room.
Then it was Memorial Day weekend! I thought I would give Matt the house to himself to be able to keep installing the floors to his content. But the wood had to acclimate to the house, and it was delivered on Friday. So by Sunday, he was happily back to work. And by Tuesday night, the dining room was done!
And now it is Friday. And Matt was hard at work all afternoon. He finished half of the kitchen, then installed molding in the dining room and one side of the kitchen. I hope that this is the last weekend of floors! HOPE HOPE HOPE!!! He told me we could put the dining room and island back tonight! Oh wouldn't that be a Friday miracle!
Which leads me to Story #2. Recently, we had a disturbance in the force. The disturbance is not important. The outcome is very important. We are at that point in our lives where things that haven't really mattered are becoming more important. We are deciding what rituals are important and how we want to deal with them. Tonight I brought home dinner. And dessert. But most importantly Challah. Tonight we celebrated our "First" Shabbat. We are going to be more observant. This was important (wow how many times have I just used that word) enough to me to stage a small war between us before we got married. We will be raising Jewish children. It was important to both of us to raise children in one faith not both.
Both is too confusing and makes children choose between their parents. We are not okay with that for our children.
Before I tangent too far off, we had a picnic tonight. On the new floors between the kitchen and the dining room. We ate burritos. And Challah. And Mondal bread. And B&W cookies. I lit the candles (first duh) and said the blessings. We didn't bless the wine (or beer) because Matt would be using more power tools after we ate, and that just didn't seem safe. And we sat on the floor and talked about the day.
The weirdest part? After dinner, and after we welcomed Shabbat, I was able to sit down and relax. It felt natural. It felt right. It felt like coming home.
Good Shabbos. May your life be blessed with joy, love, and happiness.
I have some very fond memories of shabbat at the Stones'. I think Stone family shabbats will always be a bit of a hallmark for me of what a loving, spiritual, family shabbat can be.
ReplyDeleteDeb and Matt,
ReplyDeleteWe are so proud of you. Always. But this is special -- you are beginning to bring this ritual to your home, and I promise you, you will begin to treasure it more and more. For me, growing up without this ritual, I found it awkward at first. But it became centering. AFter a while, it became the way we marked time. And it brought me such peace.
Carla, thanks for your sweet words. I'm glad it worked for you!
Love to you all --
Mom