2024 Highlights @ BHOM

I’m sorry it’s taken so long for me to post. 
It’s hard to believe how fast time is flying.
It’s December! Merry Christmas!

Here’s Emmie!

I got a new dog!

She’s some kind of mix, I’m not sure what. They called her Matilda (yuck!) —I call her Emmie.

She was billed as a Westie mix, but she’s not any kind of Westie that I can see. Everything is different. Coat, legs, tail, head, ears, eyes, everything is different. Maybe I’ll get a doggie DNA test…out of curiosity. And even though I had Westies for 35 years, I don’t care if she’s not a Westie… she’s cute (and sweet, when she’s not being fearful.)

I rescued her at the end of May from a rescue organization, Rescue Ranch in Yreka. She’s now about 1-1/2 years.

I think she was living wild for awhile. She’s happy in the backyard but can be fearful in the house. When the mulberry tree was dropping berries she was having a field day. She foraged for other edible fruit in the yard, too. Neither of my other dogs wanted to eat mulberries…

She barks ferociously when my renters come in or go up and down the stairs. Not a good thing, but she’s getting better every day. She was hiding under the bed a lot at first, but now she’s more comfortable and doesn’t hide very much.

I’m going to take her to obedience classes. She’s pretty wild and won’t even come if I call her. Sometimes she won’t even take treats out of my hand, I have to put them on the floor, especially if she is some distance away. I think she had been tricked by someone using food to bait her and trap her.

But she’s not totally wild, lets me hold her and she sits in my lap. In fact, she’s more of a lap dog than Westies ever were. And she sleeps on my bed with me.

Speaking of renters…

Carin, one of my renters, moved out at the end of August. She paid off her car and wanted her own place, so she rented an apartment a few miles north of here.

When she gave notice I started thinking about the room situation upstairs and reflecting on how little I use my office, since I have a computer in my bedroom, too. And how much more income I could create by renting the larger room. (Twice as much!)

I looked into the office from the doorway and what I saw was storage. Most of the stuff in the room was storage! THREE filing cabinets!  (Well, one did hold up the end of the desk…) And supplies! Office supplies, art and design supplies, sewing supplies and books!

Flipping the Script

So after careful consideration and planning, I downsized and moved my office into the small room (formerly Carin’s room). I gave myself a month to do it and my plan worked perfectly. There was only one piece of furniture that I had to put into attic storage, a drop-front desk. I tried to give it to David, my other renter, to use but he didn’t want it. Oh, there was also my Elfa desk but it is just two metal tubular legs on one end, and as I said, a filing cabinet holds up the other end, and a flat melamine covered panel for the desk top. So I broke that down and slipped it into the attic, too.

Here’s my (not so pretty) planning sketches:

Then I reorganized and redecorated the former office (the “cute” room—now called “La Jolie Salle” — formerly L’Atelier [workroom]) with a new rug and a little bistro table and chairs. Everything else I already had. I didn’t manage to move everything of mine out of the room, however. I left some books and half of the drawers still contain office supplies.

Everything that wouldn’t fit or need to be in the smaller office either went into the attic or the basement (and 3 empty filing cabinets into the garage). I had to have help moving the bigs things so KayeDon, my friend, came over and helped me. 

I also reclaimed the stair hall closet to use it for storage of household items like air conditioners, cleaning supplies, etc. I had let Carin use the closet because the one in that room is so small.

Here’s  ~La Jolie Salle~

The New Atelier

This room is about 10×10…

Fixing the Wall

I broke down and hired a handyman to fix the wall in the upstairs bathroom. I had been contemplating doing it myself but… I wanted it to be fixed before I rented the room. Don’t ask how it got damaged…

Much better!

He tore out the whole panel below the window and replaced it with drywall. He did a great job! Better than I could ever do. (Well, I painted!)

I also added a printed, water-resistant, peel-n-stick tile backsplash I found online above the vanity to spruce up the vanity area in the upstairs bath.

So, what else is new?

The Shower Leak Saga

Around the first of the year 2024 I discovered that my first floor master bath shower was leaking into the basement below. Ever since it was installed as part of my bathroom remodel in 2014-2015, one corner was low, because the shower pan was not correctly leveled when it was installed. Nine years later, this low corner is where the leak appeared to be emanating from. I did fairly extensive tests to verify that this was the source and came to the conclusion it was. I couldn’t ignore it, even though it wasn’t leaking very much; I had to get someone to fix it, or so I thought.

The first quote I got to fix it was almost $9,000! Not happening.

I ended up hiring my neighbor/contractor for about half of that, but he did a less than perfect job. I found out (the hard way) he’s not a detail guy… There’s a bit of a difference in skill level between re-building a fence and demo-ing, re-building and re-tiling part of a shower. 

And the worst of it was…it still leaked! 

BUT

It was a week or more after it had been “fixed” by the contractor and it was still leaking. I even called him to come back and he put some more grout in the corner, thinking that would fix it—after what he had already done to fix it— but, of course, it didn’t…

So, in my desperation, I cried out to God and told him that I know He can fix it… AND HE DID! 

I prayed — and it stopped leaking. PRAISE GOD!
I’d call that a miracle!

My Project for this year

Small but significant…

I carried out my house number plaque plan that had been on the drawing board for awhile. Here it is and how I did it.

• I glued and clamped two pieces of 1×8 fir together to make the board large enough. (Pre-made wood rounds weren’t the right size.) (Sorry, I didn’t take more process pics)
• I cut it into a circle on my band saw.
• I sanded, primed and painted it then applied the custom printed, exterior, weather resistant, adhesive-backed vinyl “decal,” for which I created the layout and uploaded the art to the sign company to print.

Voila!

Looking Ahead

I think I’m going to be “retiring” from my design business at the first of the year. I won’t be taking on any new projects, especially websites, but I may continue to do maintenance for the few clients whose websites I currently manage. Renting my rooms makes up for any income I will lose from not doing design work.

I look upon maintaining this house as my main job now. It’s my big investment. I’m its caretaker.

Merry Christmas and have fun in the new year!

Diane