Delayed and Couldn't Be Happier

The painter showed up this morning around 7:30 - he had scheduled to come by this morning to get the colors for the painting they were going to start on Tuesday.  Somewhere in the conversation, he said 'I'd like to ask something and you can say no'.  J. said 'I was hoping he wanted to delay' - and he did!  Bumped our job back two weeks.  (Could have been the week of the 22nd but we are in Reno/Carson City for a few days that week). 

He also confirmed THEY will clean all the walls before painting (something I thought we would be doing) and move furniture as needed.  Whew!  Big, huge overload of worry lifted just like that. 

J. was working up in B.'s room most of yesterday and I finally decided to go check it out.  He kept reassuring me 'it's not too bad'.  It was horribly bad.  So much stuff....but we got to sorting and trashing - items to donate, items for trash, items to reconfirm with B. that he truly doesn't want (and then trash or donate).  His entire childhood and elementary/high school educational years gone in a poof.  I felt sad that he was letting go of so many of those memories....but then I reminded myself that when my mom passed away, she left me a box of stuff - most from grade school - and I let it all go.  Those memories are intact no matter what 'stuff' relates to them - and stuff is just stuff.  So...guess I'm sort of glad B. is able to let go of the stuff. 

There are a few boxes we have been asked to keep for him and we will move those to storage in the upcoming weeks. 

So instead of today being a completely frantic, super overloaded Sunday, it's going to be a very productive but no panic required kind of Sunday - which is much preferred. 

A friend and I are meeting for lunch tomorrow and both enjoying that we can do that on a weekday.  During school time, she babysits her grand kids and when I was working, weekends were my only option - so we're looking forward to getting together on a weekday to catch up - it will be fun. 

Tuesday lunch with another friend here in town. 

A third friend posted on Facebook how much she missed our chats - to which I replied - call anytime.  I've pondered a lot about friendships these past few days - 'cuz I've had plenty of one-way friendships where it feels like I'm the only one making any effort...and I really hope the friendship with this friend won't be like that.  But maybe it will.  I'll have to wrestle with the 'do I keep being the only one who initiates contact'...and that makes me sad.  I didn't think we were 'work friends' that would stop being friends when we changed work status - but perhaps we are. 

We have so much recycling to offload that there are now 'recycling' boxes lingering around full to the brim with stuff we can't put in our bin until after the Wednesday morning pickup.  Trash is looking the same.  It feels so great to be getting so much 'stuff' out of the house....really, super great. 

Goals for today include sweeping the garage and organizing our empty box collection - many small boxes available but I finally broke down and ordered 10 medium boxes from Amazon.  Also a goal to start packing up the china hutch contents - every item a treasure and incredibly fragile.  Hoping to get most of those very fragile pieces safely in a storage unit so the painters can easily move the hutch without fear of damage. 

H. worked today and will possibly work another shift later today - getting to work at 3:15AM this morning on his first day back in a week was hard but he did it!  He's back on the schedule and hoping for lots of hours - he'll know at the end of today when they post the schedule.  He's been a huge help!