Five stages of dealing with a contractor

1. Denial: "We met with her in March. It's June. Why hasn't she contacted us? She must have something personal going on. Maybe she's sick. Maybe her dog died. Something has to be going on, because reasonable business owners like making money."

2. Anger: "What a terrible contractor! What's wrong with her? Doesn't she want our money? If anyone else would come to Claremore, I'd fire her immediately! I'm going to email her every day."

3. Bargaining: "Maybe if we go ahead and give her half of the payment right now, she'll get started on demolishing this stupid pool."

4. Depression: "She's never coming. This backyard isn't going to be finished for our friends' visit over the Fourth of July. Why bother mowing the yard? Who care about weed eating? We might as well let the weeds overtake the yard; I just hope the dogs don't get lost in the jungle. Or maybe I do."

5. Acceptance: "The yard will get done when it gets done. I suppose I don't mind not having a Memorial Day cookout. Or a Fourth of July party. Or spending afternoons reading in the sun. The pond-like habitat of the pool is kind of nice, right? It's like a whole little ecosystem for frogs!" 

Paint Colors

Our insurance claim repairs finally finished up last week. Two of the bedrooms were painted (the pink room and the master bedroom) and we're really pleased with how they came out. The pink room is painted a lovely shade of gray. It's the same color as the other small bedroom. 

The color is 'Gentle Rain' by Behr. It's a much lighter gray, both in person and usually online. (I don't know why it looks so dark.) 

In the master bedroom, we went very bold with Sherwin Williams' Jargon Jade.

The painter asked me if I was sure this was what we wanted. Our contractor's business partner asked me if this was the color I'd intended the room to be painted. Johnny asked me if anyone would buy the house with the bedroom such a wild color. (I pointed out he bought a house with a purple room.) 

The colors came out beautifully; I'll have photo evidence once the rooms are back together and looking like people who aren't squatters live in them.

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We Looked At A House

Somehow, we've become obsessed with the idea of buying a fixer-upper in a neighborhood we really like.

Now, you're probably all thinking this is a terrible idea. After all, we're the people who took months to replace a toilet (hey, it was grouted to the floor!), still haven't filled in our pool (we're waiting to hear back from a contractor!), and didn't paint our hideous pink and purple room until water damage forced some subcontractors to paint it for us.

But we've been doing better, really! I painted one bedroom before the water damage debacle. Johnny and I have been working diligently on the front yard. And we've both found reserves of willpower we didn't know we had thanks to doing this wacky Whole30 diet.

So last weekend we went to look at a house in the historic Maple Ridge neighborhood in Tulsa. The location couldn't be better. The house...Well, the house could be a lot better. We knew it was probably in rough shape, as it's being sold as a short sale and there were no pictures of the interior.

At first glance, it looks like an ordinary little bungalow that needs some love. However, the real estate agent was right when he said "I hope you have your brave hats on" before we went inside.

Front bedroom, complete with bizarre extra room.

Back bedroom, with a tampon applicator on the floor,
writing ALL OVER the walls, and "MURDER" written in
large letters. Fun!

Living/dining room.

Bizarre huge closet off the back bedroom. Totally baffled
as to its original function.

Kitchen, which has clearly seen improvements in the last
decade or so. 

As if the interior weren't terrifying enough, the exterior was somehow more frightening.

The foundation is definitely not in good shape. One of the basement walls had caved in completely, and it was easy to feel the slope of a ruined foundation while walking inside the house.

Now, the property is priced very cheaply and thus, is very tempting. But do a couple of people who have trouble not giving up on installing a toilet need to tackle a project of this scope? Sadly, the answer is "probably not". But that hasn't stopped us from reading all about home renovation...

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Learning About Homeowner's Insurance

Whoa, it's been almost a year since we posted anything on our blog. We almost forgot we had one.

Just kidding. We remembered, and felt overwhelming guilt for not updating it.

What have we been doing in the last year? My two best friends got married (not to each other, gross). We went on vacation to Colorado with two of our friends (who are married to each other) and Johnny rode a horse on a trail ride (without falling off). I quit my job. Johnny got a new job.

Most recently, we learned about homeowner's insurance! Why? Because a pipe burst and flooded half of our house. Super fun.

The weather in Tulsa has been totally insane throughout the winter; for example, yesterday's high was 52 degrees. Tomorrow's forecast calls for a high of 24 degrees and ice pellets. Ice pellets!

WTF are ice pellets?!

Anyway. While washing cars last Saturday, we noticed the water pressure was kinda low. But whatever, we figured it was some wacky Claremore thing. Until Johnny went into the house and immediately dashed back outside to tell me there was water everywhere. Everywhere wasn't a huge exaggeration: all three bedrooms, plus the hallway and hallway closet were underwater.

Awesome.

We drove to Home Depot, naively thinking we could perhaps dry the carpet out ourselves. Johnny called his mother first, who is like, our home repair/DIY/diet/exercise guru. She advised calling in the professionals and even Googled someone for us. She is seriously the best.

The first place we called was totally booked for the weekend, so they sent us to someone else. Jerry was totally awesome and on the scene in like...an hour. With fans. And a dehumidifier.

In Lucky's lair

In the pink room

In the bedroom

Johnny wasn't into filing an insurance claim. His reasoning? "I just don't want to mess with it." Well. After talking to Jerry for like...10 minutes, we decided an insurance claim was a better option than paying $1500+ out of pocket for this mess.

Turns out, the nice people at Progressive can't tell you things like what your deductible is. Is that something you're just supposed to know? Oh...it is? Oh... We read our policy like grown-ups, and discovered our deductible was, in fact, cheaper than paying out of pocket, and that it totally covered water damage from leaky pipes, and that it wasn't really that much stuff to mess with.

So Jerry (who is totally awesome) brought by something like ten more fans, ripped up a corner of carpet in Lucky's lair, and cut out some drywall in the master bedroom closet, the master bedroom, and the pink room to facilitate insulation and stud drying.

Here's kind of a rough timeline of events:

• Saturday: Pipe bursts, water floods half of house. Decide to dry carpet ourselves. Talk to Johnny's mom. Decide not to dry carpet ourselves. Call Jerry. Jerry drops off like 4 fans and a dehumidifier. Jerry convinces us to file an insurance claim.
• Sunday: Jerry drops off like 10 more fans and puts up a plastic wall to prevent machines from dehumidifying the entire house. Checks moisture levels, reassures us the carpet should dry in a couple of days. Noise and heat and smell are so bad that Johnny sleeps on the kitchen floor and I sleep on the sofa.
• Monday: House smells like a wet carpet a dog has peed on, because that's what it is. Area behind plastic wall is 90 degrees. Jerry comes by to check moisture levels. Heat and smell are so unbearable that Johnny sleeps on the kitchen floor again. I sleep on the sofa.
• Tuesday: Party at our house, as insurance claims adjusters, Jerry, Jerry's business partner David, Johnny and I all hang out. House is slightly less hot and smelly, so Johnny and I sleep in the bed. We wake up a lot.
• Wednesday: Plumbers come by in the morning to replace broken pipe. Jerry's son Josh comes by to pull up the hallway flooring and measure the moisture. Josh also drops off carpet samples.
  
• Thursday: Johnny and I are watching TV at half the max volume. Animals have given up, are spending almost all day outside. Josh comes by the measure the moisture and drop off carpet samples.
• Friday: Jerry comes by to remove all equipment! HALLELUJAH, THANK GOD. It's eerily quiet. Animals are deeply confused.

Now, the good part of all this is that we are getting like...home renovation. The rooms in which drywall was removed will be repainted when the new sheetrock goes up. The carpet in all three bedrooms will be replaced. (Thank god, because that pink carpet is HIDEOUS and Lucky's lair is covered in urine.) We'll get new flooring in the hallway. All for the cost of a deductible!

Homeowner's insurance, y'all. It's kind of awesome. (Fans are not awesome. At all.)

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