The Bench-mark
ProjectsI decided to do something really special for my wife for Christmas (2007). She has been going through alot of emotional turmoil lately. The house she grew up in, for 20+ years, was being sold. And to add insult to injury, the buyers were going to tear it down instantly and build a $4,000,000 mega-mansion in its place.
In the process, she lost one of her favorite places in the whole world. Right outside the window to her room was a huge crape myrtle tree, and under that tree, a bench. Her father bought it years ago, and now it was rotting and rusted, but she still loved it. She would sit and listen to the cicadas in the summer, or just watch the cars go by. It was simple, and perfect.
So my friend Dan and I went to the house the day before demolition and stole the bench, and I spent the next few months refurbishing and rebuilding the bench so that she might keep a little piece of her childhood intact. Sounds romantic, but in reality it was a whip. I learned alot in the process, though, and I think the end product is pretty awesome.
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Home Office
ProjectsMy wife went out of town last weekend on business, and I took the opportunity to embark on a minor project I have been brainstorming for a few weeks. No, it is not the cat tower. Courtnye and I have been trying to update our home office for a while now, especially because she works from home.
More specifically, we wanted to have a home network for file sharing, a fax/printer/scanner, a shredder for those secret files she is always working on, a monthly calendar that we can erase and add notes to (and I can use to mark my on-call days), and a dream or goal board.
'What is a dream board?' you ask. A dream board, also known as a goal board, is where you put pictures or phrases that you are aspiring to achieve or own, so that they are constantly in your mind. It is one way that the people who actually get rich and successful reach their goals, as opposed to whining about not having what they want. For example, when you see someone driving a shiny new Porsche Cayenne, instead of saying, "Why can't I have that?" you say, "I will get one someday" and put a picture of it on the board. Just an example.
I also did something we have been meaning to do for a long time to help get our bills in order. I wrote down all our monthly bills, how much each payment is, and when it is due, and put it up next to the dry erase board. Each bill gets a box, and when the bill is paid, we check the box. Just a way of communicating about money, so we both know how much we owe (or in Courtnye's case, how much we can't spend shopping. J/K!). I call it a Bill Summary Sheet. Or BS sheet for short...
I also got a filing cabinet, finally, to put away all those documents that we know we can't throw away, but don't really need to have handy. Birth certificates, insurance, that kind of stuff. I don't know why, but just having a filing cabinet in my place immediately makes me feel old.
The best part of the project, my wife had no idea what I was up to. I told her I 'fixed' some things in the office and she got worried. I think she was pleased with the results though.
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