Tales From a “GREEN” Minivan

It feels like I’ve been burning the candle at both ends this past week, but things are almost prepped before we head on vacation for a week. It’s pretty bad when you’re drinking cans of Coke at midnight!

I have almost completed last weeks list and actually added one more project! We got an estimate to have our roof done in April, but the waiting list was going to be late June early July before the work could be done.  Just after the dumpster arrived last week, the roofing company rep paid me a visit late last week and told me as soon as that dumpster is gone, they’ll bring theirs in and do the roof!

Everything had been lining up nicely, the students I hired in the Spring arrived last Friday and painted the stairway halls (I didn’t want to attempt these 20ft walls) and Ciaran’s room upstairs.  We wanted to do this before putting down the new hardwood floors.

The biggest prep work was removing the carpets, I’m happy to say as of 2am last night we are carpet free and rid of the very dusty rose!  We’ve been having to wait until the kids are in bed to do most of the work and last night Finn just would not settle!  It was about 11pm when he finally reluctantly drifted off with Andrew singing to him. Ciaran has been displaced to our room and actually slept through all of the work we did last night.

Our bedroom and walk-in closet was the last of the carpets and baseboard.  If you ever have to do this here’s two tools that I recommend you having:

A Stanley Wonderbar and I’m not sure of the other tools name, but I have been calling him the Staple Chomper, or Chompie for short!  The Wonderbar is awesome for removing baseboards and also the slats of carpet tacks attached to wood around the perimeter of the room.

We were making so much noise I can’t believe he didn’t stir at all!  So now I’m waiting for the dumpster to be hauled away.  We cleared some things from my inlaws basement as well, and actually used up quite a bit of room in the dumpster!

Tonight’s task is fixing the squeaks in the floors by adding some more floor screws into the joists.  Wish me luck I’ll be loose with a drill!

Oh and I forgot to mention we bought a new van,  a Salsa Red Toyota Sienna!  I’ll write more about him next week! Two more sleeps until vacation and we’re out of this DUST!

This morning I met with Professional Organizer, Elaine Shannon from Organizing Plus! for my first consultation.  The morning went great, she left me some DVD’s to watch (they can also be seen on her website http://organizingconnection.com/ ) and we toured my house room by room and devised a plan to work for our family’s lifestyle.

This meeting could not have come at a better time as we’ve been thinking about selling our house.  Last week I met with a real estate agent and I actually pulled and all-nighter and stayed up cleaning and partially decluttering.  I tweeted on Twitter periodically throughout the night whilst my followers overseas were just getting started with their work days. Then at 6:42am I received a new email that I had a new follower.  It’s always exciting when someone new follows you and immediately I checked out her Bio in her Twitter profile.  It was like Elaine was sent to me from a higher power.  I’ve been struggling for too long and was she the sign I needed.

I direct messaged her and said that her “Follow” could not have come at a better time.  She was a little confused by this and I explained that I was meeting with a real estate agent later in the day and that I would most likely be needing her services in the near future.  We messaged back and forth and then I finally called her a few days later, and she “got me” right away over the phone and we set up a time to meet!

After my meeting with the real estate agent (we’re still undecided about moving) we decided that a huge priority and something that we will greatly benefit from whether we stay or go will be replacing the dreaded dusty rose wall to wall carpets in the second story of our house with hardwood floors. Within days I had someone at the house measuring and we had a contract signed and the floors will be installed in 2 weeks!

Obviously this doesn’t give me a lot of time, but honestly I work so much better under pressure, especially if I have to have it done for someone else.  This is why I decided that hiring a professional organizer gives me that accountability and forces me to complete the tasks to report back to someone else.  I also secretly like the praise as well!

Here’s what I need to get completed before we go away late next week (yes I planned it this way, so we could be away while the floors are being installed).

1. Sign for Dumpster

2. Drop off unwanted items at the Boys & Girls Club (Elaine suggested them)

3. Remove all furniture from the second story and store in living room (except beds)

4. Remove all Carpets, underlay and staples/tacks

5.  Paint Ciaran’s room

6. Have stairs painted and stairway walls painted (already contracted some students to do this)

7. Remove all moldings,  chart and number them so it will be easier to reinstall them after the floors are in

8.  Lastly dismantle the beds and bring downstairs. Our last night before vacation we’ll camp out.

I also have 3 meetings and 2 school field trips that I’m supposed to attend next week!

Yikes! When you put it all in list form it seems like a lot. Luckily I have us 90% packed for our trip, but I do have some work deadlines that need to be completed prior to going away, so I think I’m going to have some late nights! I’ll post some photos soon!