Encompassed as just 1 thing on our chore list: one very clean apartment. I said clean enough for the Queen but, in light of recent royal world tour announcements, she can forget it. What nerve to send Camilla in her stead. Horse-Face can mop the place herself. Doing a non-stop blitz could take all day, [...]
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Twelve days to Christmas – wahoo! We gave ourselves a Christmas deadline a month ago: as of Christmas Eve we could put the apartment on the market that minute. Welcome, Ugly Baby buyer! Joy to the world! Feliz Navidad! Wash your hands, please. Mince pie? We’re not selling quite yet – certainly not while I’m [...]
367 days? They came and went. Going by that metric, today is Day 432 but you’ll notice they’ve disappeared from my header. The basis of the operation was always: enjoy first, everything else second. Turns out that we love it here, and we plan to stay awhile. But that’s crap! I demand daily drama, further [...]
Our apartment: before and after. A year ago we bought Vancouver’s ugliest apartment – in hopes of one day having a backyard and a big dog (in a city where crack houses run $800k and up). Today we’re celebrating our ugly baby’s first birthday (read more on why we call it that) – join in, [...]
Ready to roll? It’s Ugly Baby birthday season. Absentee parent returns with presents: I basically had rickets by April. Live in, work in, renovate, and blog about the very same 700 square feet – you will never, ever see the outside world. Went outside – neglected to return. Absentee parenting has its perks, but you miss the [...]
Compare, contrast… 2010: Can’t even sit on the couch, it’s at once our linen closet, my desk & half our bed. UGHHHH. Would try to escape but the front door doesn’t open. Have to hurdle a table saw to brush teeth. 2011: Planted remarkable specimens of heirloom vegetables, before pausing to polish the silver. That we [...]
With the kitchen came various first-timer’s terrors: decisions, designs, measuring, electricity, brass nipples, plumbing and sundry panics. Do I know how to renovate a kitchen? No!! Ahhhhh!!!!!! Gin bottle, I need you! Google, go damn it, go! All cylinders please! YouTube? Hold my hand and rock me. How not to plan a small kitchen renovation [...]
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas … a kitchen! Toys in every store Joys in every drawer… It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas … a kitchen! Toys in every store Noise in every chore … But the prettiest sight to see is the holly that will be… the poly that won’t be…by our own front door. 8 [...]
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The guests are gone. Was I more than slightly stressed before their arrival? Ahaha. All my own invention – I wanted our apartment to be different. Not quite so ugly. Did they care? Not a jot. Rather than polished, magazine perfection – we put the ‘Welcome to Hell’ mat out front. The double mattress in the [...]
This is how I imagine HGTV presenters fill their project prep and eventual 23 minutes of screen time. It’s not all dust and disaster. Day 51 today! I’ve got 316 days left to conquer this project in full. Surely there’s room for a few days off? That’s lesson #1 – the harshest and sharpest – in [...]
