Tag Archives: Writing

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Grief, Religion, and Other Unmentionables

I had a friend that for about 7 years that I spoke to daily, and though (as geeky as this sounds) we had only known each other from playing a game together, he was a very cherished friend and a big part of my life. I posted a while back about his death, 6 months to be exact. Normally when someone I knew passed away, it was just a person that died and that was that. My husband, always remarked my terrible habit of never actually grieving. What was grief? It was just being sad that someone passed. What good would that do? Someone died, and that was that. I’m far to analytical to think any more of it than that. You go to a wake, you go to the church service, you stand around a coffin in the middle of thousands of coffins already in the ground, and then you go to some reception afterwards and eat and forget the whole thing happened. That’s what happens. Then they are put in the ground or burned to ashes, and that is what happens when you die.

I don’t think I need religion to be a good person, though some would argue that I’m not even a good person and I might actually agree with that fact. People try to console one another when someone dies: God made a choice to make an angel because they were such a good person and he needed him. First of all, who are we to assume that God is a “he” or even a “she”? We shouldn’t put a pronoun to this notion because God is an ideal first and foremost not a person. If you are religious, you would believe that God created people and how could he have created people if he was a person already? Wasn’t Adam the first person? Therefore God is not a “he” or a “she” because that applies to mammals and other creatures with gender which was also said to be created by God. Tangent on God = ended. This isn’t to discount people who have faith, I just can’t get behind things that I can’t find logical. (Don’t worry, I nail Atheists too.)

If God was so attentive to pick a loved one to be an angel to help up in Heaven, why isn’t he attentive enough to stop a toddler for being murder by some punk kid? If God was going to take an innocent child, shouldn’t it be done in a less horrific way? Fine, that’s only one child and that God can’t be everywhere at once. What about mass genocide? I’m supposed to believe that a loved one was taken from me because it was in some greater plan but genocide is some horrific act that can’t be stopped? There’s no comfort in any of that for me.

And so religious people do not feel attacked (and I hope that people don’t assume that I’m someone misguided by grief, that would assume that I went through a grieving process, I assure you that I unfortunately did not and probably would feel better if I had), I actually dislike that National Association of Atheists more not organized religion. I’m a non-believer and that’s my choice as it is yours to believe. I actually admire you for having the ability to trust in something so intangible. I don’t even mind atheists but as a principle, I have a problem with this group claiming atheism. Atheists are people who argue whether or not a God exists, not feign offense at a cross  in legal battles. Atheism, in this form, is no better than religions that place their beliefs above others. That’s not atheism and it makes you no better than those Westboro Baptists that do things for the sake of free publicity and sue people to fund their idiocy. Atheists also don’t agree with organized groups based around religion, and as a result their being a group of Atheists fighting for a cause with a leader is in itself hypocritical since if your main platform is a non-belief in religion based groups you are still a group based upon a religion. A lack of religion, sure but it still involves religion. Moral of the story: You can be a non-believer without being an asshole. If someone wants a cross up, let them fucking have it. No one tells you that you can’t put a spaghetti monster shrine up, don’t knock them down because you want to make the evening news.

My rant go out of hand, but it felt necessary as I wrote it. So why do people die? Because tragedy and illness exists. Because people need to because of overpopulation. Because sometimes your best friend has to die and you have to be okay with that and move on. 6 months has passed and somehow I still expect him to show up and give me some geeky speech about in-game lore or how I’m not a true geek because I have not seen Lord of the Rings or Star Wars. I still expect him to show up and let me throw ideas off of him for stories or vent about how something happened and it sucked. But he won’t, and we have to learn that you can wish it to happen and you can dream that they are in Heaven watching to make sure you get the house that you wanted or that job that you wanted or the you were saved from something because they were watching if that makes you feel better. And I sincerely hope it does.

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Remodel: The Living Room

 

Before

Before

When I picked colors for this house, this color seemed perfect for what I had in mind. I opened up the paint can with a little bit of fear that maybe I had gone a little too far. I

Before

Before

stuck to my guns. I had a plan. That first day I had cracked open the paint can and started painting. With every visitor that wanted to stop by and see the new house on our first day, I saw the look in their eyes as they commented with “really?” or “repaint it white”. Luckily, I have never lived my life defined by what other people expected of me, and though I was starting to question myself, I knew that they were just unsure because they didn’t see the big picture.

I joked that the color “Carnival in Brazil” was my homage to Tom Brady and the world’s highest paid supermodel. I knew that with the children, (before we even considered the second dog), that a dark couch was going to be my best option. Anything lighter, and it wouldhave been destroyed in a week. I knew that the rest of the furniture was going to be darker in color. With the sun shining in, I saw my vision on the wall.

After

After

This color was a very prominent one in my wedding bouquet, which I had because it looked like fall foliage and my husband and I are huge fans of fall. I would like to think that it was fitting to choose orange for that reason, this is our home we built together and it made sense when I saw that giant window of mine let the sun take over the walls. I was confident that I was right.

The floor was in surprisingly good condition, considering how awful the shape of the carpet was. It was a long process to pull of the carpet in here, and it took weeks before we finally pulled up all the staples. Don’t worry, my unlucky feet that always find the danger was the victim and not my children.

My office, which isn’t pictured hereis located in this room. It’s a “writer’s area” that is completely covered in bills, various other paperwork I need to have at hand, and Post-it’s

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After

that are stuck everywhere. It wasn’t “photogenic” enough to land itself here.

The coffee table was a clearance steal I had to put together from Kmart. The “oriental” rug was from Wal-Mart. The television stand was a hand me down, as was the recliner. Our living room also has the front door located in it, as most do. The living room door is painted with a nicer, lighter color than the living room with a more yellow-orange color and a beautiful “fall” wreath that I keep up just because I love it.

Monday, should be the tween’s room, filthy or not.

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Remodel: The Kitchen

This one is short and sweet. Just like my kitchen? Har har.

Before

Before

When we first saw the picture of it on the website we were searching for homes on, everyone winced at the picture. I understood; it was pretty tiny and I love to cook. How was this ever going to work?! It turns out there was a name for this kind of kitchen: a galley kitchen. When we saw it in person, we acknowledged how small it was but it wasn’t as small as we thought. The pictures certainly made it look like it was too small for more than one person to stand in it. We can fit most of our family in it at a time, so that was

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Before

fine. Being that I am the only one who really cooks in the family, the fact that it was small wasn’t really a big deal to us.

The only real change in terms of remodeling was the floor. It was simple adhesive stick on tiles that you can just grab boxes of at Home Depot. It is both very inexpensive (bought 3 boxes at $27 a box) and it is quite lovely looking. The cabinets received several cleanings before I felt it was ready enough to just leave it be. Originally it was discussed to paint them, but the lovely solid wood was really hard to part with and with the urging of family members, we left it alone. The pass through in the wall is incredibly handy and I love how classic it is. That, along with the shudders on both the kitchen and dining room window, provided a lot of charm that I felt should stay because it’s something you can’t buy in a more modernized house. I love how unique it is.

After, showing off my awesome mixer

After, showing off my awesome mixer

The other big changes are the appliances. The oven didn’t work so we had to get a new one, and we wanted to upgrade to an energy saver fridge

and not leaving the 1960’s appliances in. The 1960’s hood range still exists. We are too poor to replace it, and quite honestly it is still in very much working condition. Which is the same that I could say about the washer and dryer that was left. Old, but in working condition. I’ll take it.

Friday, the living room. Monday, will come the tween’s bedroom clean or not. I suppose showing it a

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After

mess will give a realistic picture of the tween lifestyle.

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Not Again!

On Wednesday’s post, I promised more remodel posts. That will have to wait until next week. Change of plans, sorry. Let’s continue the saga of the dog search instead.

Last week, my husband and I fell in love with this black lab that ended up in a place 40 minutes away from us. My husband doesn’t get out of work until 5, so we could only go to any of the shelters on Thursday, when they are open until 7:30. When we called the shelter the dog we loved to make sure it was there before traveling out there, the lab was being adopted. We were sad but we kept up hope.

Wednesday, we found a pointer mix that was absolutely adorable if you recall my last post. Well, in the morning I discovered this dog was also sent to the other shelter 40 minutes away. Discouraged, we decided on an English Setter mix. Right before my husband called to say he was on the way home and to get everyone ready to head to our local shelter, I checked to make sure she was still in our Springfield shelter, which is the next town over. I was relieved to see that she was. Until my gut told me to double-check, when I discovered she too was sent to the other shelter. Just our luck! My husband called to see if the setter was there, because the pointer mix wasn’t on the site at all anymore. She was, so off we all went to find our newest family member.

As soon as we walk in, a very nice but busy worker and the only on staff that day, told us to go right in. But that one of them was in the process of being adopted so not to fall in love with it. “Which one?” I inquired. “The English Setter” was the response. My husband looked completely done, every dog we liked was transferred here before we could see them and we always missed out. We made the trip, so we walked in anyways to see what they had. I almost thought that at this point, my husband was just going to pick one to make the trip worth it. I was half right.

We saw the setter my husband liked, and we didn’t feel that connected to it when we saw it. But in the case right next door, something caught my eye. It was our pointer mix that we had originally wanted all along. She laid there quietly, wagging her tail in the saddest but most hopeful way. I’m not going to lie; I fell instantly in love with her. I looked at my husband, not willing to get my hopes up and I saw the same look in his eyes. We both, in sync, knelt before this beautiful puppy. She immediately licked our hands and leaned against the cage where we were sitting. We didn’t take long to head back out to the staff member and say “let us meet her”. She was great with the kids, and while Zoey was Arya's first nightreserved with her, Zoey seemed fond of her new friend. Well as fond as Zoey is of any dog that is near her, I suppose.

And that was it. We had this connection to the dog and it was like they wanted us to walk right in and grab her right up. Just like with our house, it was meant to be. And I shall introduce you to our little Arya. Well, as little as a 10 month old Pointer/Black Lab mix can be. I would love to thank the Dakin Adoption Center in Leverett as well as OPA,  the rescue organization in Texas that saved her and has seemed to train her so well. You guys do great work, and we love our newest family member.

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Then There Was the Dog?

Monday’s postings have become hard to accomplish. I wish I could use the excuse of Monday fatigue, but my son’s developmental specialist comes over and that occupies much of when I would normally publish this. Friday, I will do the Remodel: Kitchen addition, which was my favorite since that is really “my room” of the house. Until then, let’s talk about dogs.

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My “forever puppy”.

When we first bought this house and moved in, we took our precious princess Zoey away from her buddy Tank. She didn’t seem bothered by it at all, until she realized that all she had for a playmate was a toddler. She likes being the center of attention, so we were forced to make a decision: get her some puppy friends or adopt a new member of our family. Finally it was decided to add to our growing family. With a puppy or dog, I’m not quite ready for another child in diapers yet. So the discussion was “what are we looking for?”. I’m a sucker for the “forever puppies” (my phrase for small dogs), like my Maltese-Shih Tzu mix Zoey. My husband, who has a good foot on my petite frame, loves black labs. Since we already had a forever puppy, I caved and decided to start our hunt for a black lab which we found one we loved. Only with my husband’s work schedule, it was adopted the very day we were going to make the trek to get him.

We considered getting on a wait list for one of the many local lab rescues to find one for us, but we felt a little guilty at the idea of adopting from so far away when there are ones that could be killed up here. That was not something that we wanted on our conscious. We decided to be less picky. We wanted a family dog, having one to take on runs with me would be awesome. We have a very nice sized yard, so we have plenty of room for one to just run free if he or she wanted to. We have the room and love to give to another furbaby, we just need to find the right one.

Yesterday, a new one was added on the site of our local shelter. She was younger than we wanted, but she looks so sad and adorable. She is a pointer mix. We’re hoping she doesn’t get nabbed us as quick, because we would love to meet her so we don’t miss another opportunity. We will continue this search and hope for being able to find the perfect dog to welcome into our new home. What better way to celebrate getting a new home than going broke for a puppy in need, right?

Remember that for your next furbaby addition. Shelters are full of sad little dogs that need love too. If you can’t find a specific breed and  you go elsewhere, don’t forget about them and donate your time or other things they might need so that they can continue to do the good service they give those dogs.

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Why I Won’t Do the Ice Bucket Challenge

The title should be self-explanatory. Do I think this makes me a terrible person?  No, but it probably makes you think I am and I doubt if you’ve already reached that preconceived notion about me solely on a blog title, that you even know me well enough that I would care about your opinion about me. I have not been nominated for it, probably because my friends know I would ignore it and not even care about paying the $100. I don’t have $100 to give every charity that needs help. I hope someday I do have a lot of money that I could spread across to all kinds of charities, but until then I have to pick.

Call me a cynic and blast me with hate comments, but we are all about viral trends in America. Sadly, right now ALS is the “charity du jour”. I can’t deny the amount of money it has raised for charity, but what happens when the trend stops? They will start struggling again while another trend will take waves. I hate to compare it to “planking”, but let’s be honest in that it will be forgotten as quickly as it spread. I don’t mean to take away from those people who did it, kudos to you for raising awareness. But in most of the videos, there was no mention that it was for ALS or even a place to send donations. How does that help spread in the awareness of a very serious disease? “Tuesdays With Morrie” had more of an effect on me wanting change than watching people dump ice on themselves. Also a note: I have only actually watched 2 videos. My brother’s and the one where the woman pulled out papers to protest this idea rather than actually dumping water on herself.

During this whole thing, the Jimmy Fund Telethon did its usual marathon to raise money to help the Dana Farber  Cancer Institute to help fight cancer and raised just over $3 million dollars. While people were dumping ice on themselves, this charity needed money. My cousin every year tries to raise money for awareness for TSC (Tuberous sclerosis), a disease that I had never even heard of until she started fighting for the cause and her family. (Shameless plug to help her out: http://giving.tsalliance.org/site/TR?px=1001886&fr_id=1122&pg=personal) I hope that helps her cause and I hope they don’t need a “take a swim in pudding” video to get the awareness that this cause does so desperately need.

We shouldn’t be made to feel guilty for not participating. I loyally give to the Jimmy Fund every year, in some way or another, and I don’t have much else to give. I take part in the Relay for Life. I have donated my time at a soup kitchen. I don’t need to splash my good deeds around to make myself feel good. The fact that I did something is enough for me. It’s the little things that you do in your daily life to make a difference some place that matters, not whether you dumped ice on yourself. If my son chooses to do it, will I discourage him? No, it’s his choice and it makes him feel like he’s making a difference in the world. I have no right to judge him for doing it anymore than you have the right to judge me for not. If it makes you feel good, then you should do it. Just make sure that you are doing it to raise awareness by spreading the word about what it’s for and where to send the money and not just do it because someone dared you to.

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Remodel: Mama’s Room

Only a few more rooms left when it comes to seeing the transformation of this 1960’s ranch into the LaRochelle abode. We’ll have a fun time getting my oldest son’s room, as he is a tween that does not seem to understand the phrases “Clean your room” and “make your bed”. Even I make my bed everyday. They say it’s the best way to start the day for whatever psychological reason they have concocted. Despite that, it does give a sense of accomplishment doing so, even if that was the only thing I managed to do for most of the morning.

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Before

The room was pink. (Bleh.) Not even like a tolerable baby pink. I’m talking like salmon colored meets coral colored meets gag me with a spoon. The carpet was the same nasty 1960’s shag carpet that was located in all the bedrooms. It needed to be gone. And it needed to be gone very soon, because I was not looking at those pink walls any longer. The only thing worse would be if the color was yellow. /shudder.

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Before

So the painting immediately began. We had nice brown curtains in our old room that my busy husband has yet to put up, so those were not in the picture. But you can imagine how nice a pair of brown sheers with a black curtain rod would be hanging in that room. The blue, luckily, matched the blue I had in my previous room exactly. And in case you didn’t notice, I love blue and that was going to be the color of the master bedroom. It almost feels very spa like and relaxing in there. The carpet was easily just torn up without any real issue, and again we were lucky to see that the floor was in next to immaculate condition.

The comforter set came with the pillows, and I have owned it for a long time. We purchased it in the clearance section at Bed Bath and Beyond. There’s really not much else to the room. Not pictured is this beautiful Victorian Styled electric “oil” lamp. Also not pictured? The step stool I need to actually get into bed without my husband having a heart attack from watching me climb up. #shortpeopleproblems.

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After

The furniture set was one we bought just before we got married from Bob’s Discount Store. They get a bad reputation but that set is still has sturdy and in the same condition as the day we bought it. Well mostly, which led to some very inappropriate jokes that caused my husband to blush.

So that was the easy room. Friday, we will get into that small little kitchen of mine that I adore, even though everyone else thinks I’m crazy.

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Remodel: The Throne Room

Alright, so it’s really the bathroom though it would be pretty awesome to have an Iron Throne toilet. It probably won’t be the most comfortable toilet in the world, but it would be pretty cool looking.

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Before

The bathroom had grey and black tiles and we were stuck on what color would actually go with that set up. Since I had chosen pretty much ever other paint color in the house, I let the husband decide here.

So with that, all that we really needed to do in here was pull that god awful wall paper down and repaint. Soon we will get up the energy and funds to retile, but until then everything still seems to work out just well. The wallpaper seemed to come off easy until the painting started and we discovered a thin layer of paper that we didn’t notice after pulling off the wallpaper so we needed to make use of that wallpaper removal gel we had bought a huge bottle of only to not need it in the kitchen and dining room. Then, the painting started.

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The After

I was in charge of the decor in the whole house, which I was very happy to do. My husband conceded that I was much better at that than he was. So I thought about all the other decor in the house and realized that my husband did not have a room of his own. Then I decided, what better room than the bathroom! The color on the wall inspired me to give it a superhero theme, which the boys absolutely loved. Bed Bath and Beyond had classic comic book artwork on a wooden panel which helped add to the vintage effect. I picked them out and surprised the boys with it. I cannot stress how awesome it was to see their faces when seeing it.

 

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Remodel: Toddler Room

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Before

We had a scheme in our head for this room. Our toddler’s favorite things in the world are “Thomas the Train” and “The Chica Show”. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find a Chica wall decal and we’ve just ordered a set of decals, hooks, and a toy chest all “Thomas”. We also ordered a very lovely “Thomas” toddler bed which ended up being lost in transit by UPS and apparently not sold in stores anymore so we had some really super awesome luck there. I hope your read this Toys ‘r Us and UPS, we really wanted that bed for him!

Back on point. Originally it looked as though this room was used as a den/office from its previous owner. The carpet was this disgusting shag carpet from the 1960’s (which was in all the bedrooms) that since my son and I suffer from allergies we knew it absolutely had to go. Again, there was a gamble on what we would find underneath upon pulling up this carpet. Luckily there was hardwood floor underneath the carpeting. Unfortunately, there were some  spots that had some water damage but in general, this wood floor was in pretty good condition. Score one: LaRochelles!

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After, exact shot as before.

We went with a calm blue/grey color in here called “Rest and Relaxation”, again a Clark+Kensington paint. I laughed hoping that a color with that name would surely tame the beast that is my precious toddler, alas I was wrong. The bed is his crib converted. We did manage to get a nice set of “Thomas and Friends” bed sheets, comforter and pillow case set that he loves. The chair was my “feeding” chair that we used to comfort and give the baby his bottle, which will remain in the case of turning this room into a nursery. Not pictured is a nice whale lamp we got for $5 on clearance at Babies ‘r Us and a lovely 3 drawer oak chest that matches the crib also from Babies ‘r Us clearance for about $50. The rug was from Target and just screams “boy” and was very soft to the touch.

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A toddler’s sleeping heaven?

In this other, more artistic shot, my photographer husband wanted to share what the room looks like at night. Not pictured is a monkey nightlight but what you do see is a turtle sleepy buddy that glows stars of 3 different colors on the ceiling. The blue photographed the best, so that was the one we went with.

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After, to show the floor and area rug.

I hope you enjoyed this edition of our remodel.

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Remodel: The Dining Room

Today is the first day in the series of the “remodel”. It was pretty funny to look back and see the old pictures of the house.  I could definitely see why people told me not to even bother looking at this house when we were looking to buy. However, we did and we all know the story there. We knew it was going to be when the house came back a second time. I can’t wait to show off the results of this, and I will give a step by step detail of process that went in though most of the process would be self-explanatory.

The dining room and kitchen were the first things on our “to-do” list. This was important, because our house had cracked asbestos tiles that we knew were there and could pose a health hazard for our younger child and possibly our forever puppy Zoey. We didn’t want to paint or remove carpeting or anything else until the tile was up and the dust was out of the air.

before shot

before shot

Before Shot

Before Shot

The next step was the removal of the wallpaper. This was easier than anticipated, but it turns out this ease came at a price. The wall started coming off with the wallpaper, leaving chunks off our wall. We quickly plastered the wall and realized that we were going to end up with a textured look to the wall. Luckily, it looks like it was done on purpose and as far as I know no one noticed this. We painted while all the old flooring was doing to use it as a drop cloth while praying for hardwood underneath. It was a gamble that we really had no choice in. To get the double color, we measured out the tape in what would be an even line around the center of the room. After the paint had dried, we pulled the tape off and retaped it on the top color to finish off the bottom color. The paint was Clark+Kensington brand, which was fairly inexpensive but it had the primer in it, and was think and easy to apply. That seemed to work perfectly fine. (I’m not the greatest painter in the world and even with tape I managed to get it everywhere. I am still too tired to care so much about it though.)

Upon pulling up the tile, it had this very thick and sticky adhesive on the floor but we noticed that underneath that adhesive was beautiful hardwood floor. Despite our best efforts, the adhesive was too strong to be pulled up, so our hopes of saving money on buying flooring was quickly dashed. The flooring was that simple wood laminated that you piece together yourself like a puzzle to put in. It was a long and tedious process. The flooring was supposed to go into the kitchen as well, we will get into that story on Wednesday when we get into the kitchen.

Before Shot

Before Shot

Next was the fun part: decor and furniture. The table and chairs were both second-hand gifts from family. The carpet was a pretty inexpensive one purchased at Wal-Mart, as were the small pictures on the wall. The clock and “Kitchen Rules” pieces came from Bed, Bath and Beyond. My favorite feature in the dining room? The little pass through window that leads into the kitchen. It has surprisingly come into more use than you would think, and not just being decorative. Sometimes I even reach across to that counter to grab things I forget to bring to the table when we eat dinner. The wooden shudders that are on both the dining room and kitchen window add a nice personality and charm to the house, so it was decided to leave them up. Hope you enjoyed the first edition of my home remodel.

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DSC_0293After Shots:

 

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