Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

This Saturday will be the first event at our house, a housewarming party, which will also serve as my 35th birthday party, my birthday coming up the middle of next week. We've been working hard to prepare for it, and there's still more to do.

When we were moving, we were both depressed by the clutter in our previous apartments. We decided up front not to do that in the new place. So my first priority was going through the boxes of stuff in my office, most of which I'd actually moved myself in the months prior to our moving day.

I had to decide whether I was keeping everything and what to do with it if I wasn't. Just yesterday I dropped off two boxes of household and kitchen items at the Salvation Army.

This has been a trend over the past few months, even though I was conscientious about going through things before the move and even held a yard sale. There simply wasn't enough space for everything.

Some things that had survived the move went into the trash: such as a broken desk lamp and a set of fairy wings with holes in them.

And of course, I continue to go through my clothes and pull out items that I don't wear or that no longer fit me to sell at the consignment store or donate to the Salvation Army.

But as far as the stuff we were keeping, we had to figure out how to display it in an attractive way. We made several trips to IKEA for home organization helpers, such as CD and DVD racks or storage boxes for my office. Eventually, we had most everything under control.

We had to buy a cabinet for dishes in the kitchen; the existing cabinets being just big enough for dry goods and pots and pans. The Gryphon had to fix the kitchen shelves, which our landlord had installed wrong and which had crashed to the floor when I loaded them up with our cookbooks. But now the shelves are fixed, and the cookbooks are back in place.

And of course, we had to buy a refrigerator, because the old one had been so bad the landlord had thrown it out. The stove, however, was new, as is all of the flooring and carpeting.

From IKEA we also got curtains, which had to be shortened and hemmed with an easy iron-on tape. However, because we split one curtain to use in two places, we used up all the iron-on tape and I had to buy more at Wal-Mart.

I have a little table we've been using as a coffee table because of our limited space. The finish has seen better days, so I used some spare material from the curtains to make a little tablecloth.

Other projects included reupholstering the kitchen chairs to match each other (since they come from different sets) and recovering my mushroom-shaped footstool, which previously had been covered with a hideous flowered pattern. We bought the new material for both projects at Joanne's Fabrics.

Of course, one of the first things we had done was to select a couch cover for his old couch. But we discovered, sadly, that no matter what we did the loveseat would not fit in the room, so we ended up getting rid of it. We donated to the Salvation Army the Queen sized box spring that wouldn't fit upstairs, and a table that proved to be one table too many, since we had two already. But it had been given to me by a previous landlord and wasn't the fanciest thing going.

We had to get tablecloths for the dining room table, because we only had one that kind of fit it. I decided to make the filing cabinet look nicer, since it's so ungodly heavy it can't be moved anywhere else. I covered the ends with gold paper, threw a gold cloth over the top and took some carefully chosen pictures, using double-sided tape to tape them to the front and end.

I wanted the decorations to be removable, because I've determined this filing cabinet will not make another move with us. Instead, I'll sell it to anyone willing to pick it up.

Then there were little touches, like picking up silk flower arrangements to put in the empty vases and bowls we had on display. They can always be removed in favor of fresh flowers, should they be available.

Upstairs wasn't quite so tricky. It was just a matter of finding ways to put things away neatly. This was a challenge until I found some under-the-bed storage containers. But there's still more to do in the bedroom, which I intend to get done today.

Other last minute tasks include organizing my tools into containers I bought in Wal-Mart for storage in the basement. I'm also going to make sure to mop the floors and do basic cleaning.

The upstairs bathroom was sort of under construction during our moving day. It's been completely. The shower has been installed, and it's quite nice.

One of our last tasks is to finish hanging up prints and paintings around the apartment. Mom actually gave me a few for Christmas we'll be hanging up, such as some roses in the living room.

A portrait of my dog, Una, will hang in the upstairs hallway. In my office, I'm going to put up a collage my sister did for me for Christmas as well as a couple other things. Our bedroom has a large garden scene, which we got from one of his office mates. We're going to add my Georgia O'Keefe print, for which we got a frame at IKEA. Eventually, I might find a frame that will allow me to display family pictures.

So we're getting there. In addition to last minute house chores, we must prepare the entrees we promised for the party. I have all the ingredients for my vegetarian chili. It will go in the crock pot tomorrow morning on low. The Gryphon will prepare a special dish he's come up with himself. He's already done a few samples and let me taste it, and it was yummy.

I'm excited to host our friends in our place, which is rapidly looking more like a home and less like just a place for our stuff.

Copyright 2005 by Alyce Wilson

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