It took some persuasion...

...but over the Easter Bank Holiday weekend, it did happen. A four day, basement clear out.

I understand why you might question a blog post on this topic but trust me, the occasion merits it. It's taken me since October 2008 to persuade the Fella to do it and the job did take a full four days to complete.

Why did it take so long? Well, my husband has lived in this house for more than 20 years. During that time, he's managed to accumulate and stack so many things in his basement that it resembled something out of a particularly grim episode of 'Hoarders'. The basement had become such a huge problem that the very idea of trying to tackle it froze the Fella to the spot. I offered to help with it constantly but I could not deal with it on my own as I did not know what was important to keep or what to throw away.

Why now? We have been talking about the need to renovate the basement for some time as we need more usable living space. It is ridiculous that most of my belongings are in a rental studio 12 blocks away when we are sitting on top of about 1000 square feet of under-utilised space. Mind you, this said, nothing had happened downstairs despite the fact that we've been talking to a builder and have had some 'As-Built' floor plans drawn up recently. So then we had the break and enter.

This proved to be the final motivation that the Fella needed to tackle his basement. You see, he needed some receipts from the basement to prove that he owned some of the things that were taken. He knew that they were in the basement...somewhere. So he hired a 30 cubic yard skip (bin) which was about 19ft (long) x 8ft (wide) x 6ft (high) and we set to work.

Please excuse the crappy mobile (cell) phone images but my camera was stolen in the burglary and my little Samsung point and click camera was AWOL.

The Fella and the garage in progress:

The garage and skip (bin) after the Day 1 clear out:

The shelves at the bottom of the stairs, the scullery cupboards and the laundry/darkroom:

The shelves were emptied and placed in the skip. The things on them and in the scullery cupboards were either binned or given away. We spent quite a bit of this day recycling the things that could not be put into the skip. E.g. a broken freezer, a truck load (literally) of paint (some of which predated the Fella's purchase of the house), a truck load of obsolete electronics (including 30 ancient walkie talkie radios that he'd picked up at some government surplus auction and never fixed plus the 60 rechargeable batteries that went with the 30 radios).

As a result, the skip (bin) did not look much different at the end of Day Two:

The biggest task of the weekend was the home office. Here is the Fella hard at work:

Here's the home office at the end of Day 3 (we found the receipts that the Fella was looking for) and the skip after the end of Day 4 when we'd dragged some old metal lockers out of the Fella's storage room:

From this angle, it doesn't look very full, but trust me, it was rammed full behind those lockers!

The next step is to hire a storage container to pack everything that is left so that the basement is completely empty and ready for the builder to start work. I think that this task is planned for this weekend. Otherwise, we had the asbestos/hazardous materials survey early this morning and at the moment, there is a door fitter downstairs replacing the two doors that were damaged during the break in.

This time, the doors will be steel rather than wood and I am doing my best at trying not to feel like a prisoner behind them.

Congratulations & Happy Valentines Day!

It is almost 11am here in Vancouver. I have not received any news from the UK yet so I am assuming that the celebration for my sister's wedding is in full flow!

Congratulations Amy & Bas, married today at 4pm (GMT)
May your lives together be filled with fun and happiness!

As for everyone else, no matter whether you are single or not, please make the most what looks like it might be a rainfree Saturday - get out there and enjoy your day! We plan too!

My Very Own Excitement?!

I said yes, that is, after I stopped crying. (Is that a normal reaction?!)

The Big House Countdown to Christmas

We do have a few things left to finish but in the main, December has all been about completing Phase 1 of our house clean up and redecoration project.

It has been about getting ourselves organised and getting the house ready for the holiday festivities and our second Christmas together. It was very close, as the Fella put up the mantelpiece on Christmas Eve, but we just about made it!

So, this meant that:

• curtains were adjusted and hung *;
  
• furniture was retrieved from storage, cleaned up and repositioned;
  
• some new furniture was acquired and assembled (that took a lot of gin and tonic); and
  
• a wreath, a Christmas tree, lights and decorations were put up.

The photos below are simple 'before and after' snaps of the hall, the Kid's room and the living room. They should all enlarge if you click on them for a closer look!

The full slideshow of our Phase 1 work can be seen if you click here. The photos are grouped so that you can see the rooms before, during and after our attempts at DIY.

Hall - Before:

The two photos on the left were taken with a flash, so the hall appears brighter than it really is - the photo on the right is a shot of the hall without a flash!

Hall - After:

Both of these photos were taken without a flash.

The Kid's Room - Before:

The photos of this room looked better than they were in real life, so I have inserted a close up of the trailing plug to illustrate what state the walls were in when you got close to them.

The Kid's Room - After:

The colours and the new furniture were chosen by the Kid.
All he needs to do now is personalise it a bit with some pictures and things!

Main Room - Before:

Main Room - After:

There are lots more photos of the room before, during and after decoration on the slideshow!

Reactions from some family/friends have been a little bit mixed - it seems that they have a deep seated fondness for pine cladding. However, the Fella is delighted with our progress and loves the results so far. His son never used to spend any time in his room and now it is difficult to tempt him out (although admittedly that could just be teenagedom and a batch of new Christmas computer games at work).

The best validation that I have received on our work on the house to date has come from quite an unexpected source - from our Canada Post mail delivery woman, actually. When I was out shovelling snow yesterday, she stopped, introduced herself and said thoughtfully as she looked over at the house,

"You know, I used to wonder if anyone actually lived here. Except - he does get a lot of post - too much post for an empty house. You can tell that a woman lives here now - the house - it has a spirit again."

With that, I kid you not, she quietly stepped away into the snowy slush and continued her postal round. I stood there for a moment, watching her walk away, wondering if I had wandered into a Coen Brothers movie set!

*Notes: Mum, do you remember this Christmas gift that you gave me 5-6 years ago? I am happy to show that it is alive, well and has given me staunch support and companionship throughout a month of drapery adjustments!

A New Memory of Snow

My apologies for a lack of blog posts - I am so very far behind! Here is the first in a batch of catch up posts!

I feel compelled to start my big blog catch up with the unusual weather that has graced Vancouver since the 14^th December:

Approx 7am, 14th December - about to set off for my uni course

When I say 'unusual weather', it is important to note that Vancouver is more famous for its average annual rainfall of 46 inches than it is for any kind of serious snowfall. Just as context, Vancouver's rainfall compares with an average of 22 inches of rain per annum in London.

Approx 8:30am 17th December - taking the Fella to work...ahhhh, so sweet!

In fact, a local radio station advised that this is the first White Christmas that Vancouver has experienced since 1998. In the run up to Christmas, the temperature averaged between -7 and – 4 degrees Celsius. I did hear some East Coast Canadians quipping to West Coast Canadians, "Welcome to Canada!"

Wouldn't you love to be a fly on the wall when these geese caught up with the bright feathered spark who persuaded them that there was no need to migrate this year as Vancouver never gets any snow?!

Now I did not see the weather channel on Christmas Day so I am not sure whether Mother Nature pulled it off or not. However, as a result of snow here, Canada was set to experience something that has not happened since 1971: a coast to coast White Christmas. I can hardly get my head around that. Canada is a country that is big enough to span a number of different time zones and the idea of it (and a whole nation of people) being completely (or even mostly) under snow is just mind boggling.

It is not just the geese who have been bemused by the snow - many Vancouver residents have been scratching their heads about what this white stuff is and how best to deal with it and get on with their daily lives!

I must confess that it has not all been a big happy Bing Crosby though. As snow is fairly infrequent here, Vancouver is coping just about as well as London would in the same situation - i.e. not especially well. Only essential roads have been ploughed and none of the pavements (sidewalks) have been cleared or gritted, except where individuals have cleared them in front of their homes and shops. We are only in the suburbs and my car has been snowed in since the 20^th December.

At one point, I swept the car so it was ready to dig out - I gave up. The snowiest car photo is after I had swept it clear. I finally dug it out today!

So the inclement weather and the city's inability to deal with it over such a prolonged period of time have made things a bit difficult, particularly for the elderly and commuters. The other group of people very badly hit by the weather are the city's homeless, who are a very visible part of the urban landscape here. There has been a push to open more emergency winter shelters that allow people to bring their belongings into safety with them.

Yet, despite all of the problems and misery brought about generally by the snow and cold weather, I have to admit that I love it in just the same way that I did when I was a child - it is just magical.

I love the way that it changes how everything looks and sounds. How familiar objects and landscapes can appear totally alien - even in and around your own garden and street.

I suspect that my enjoyment is helped by the fact we have power and are only a short trek to shops / buses on ploughed streets. I suppose that I might feel differently about the snow if this was not the case? Otherwise, this snowfall has helped me to chalk up another, truly authentic Canadian experience - not only did I rake leaves this autumn, I have now shovelled snow!

I have found that the only problem with shovelling snow is that:

It snows again. So it must be shovelled again:

And again - we paid an enterprising teen $10 to shovel and salt it on Christmas Day! And lo, it was shovelled again today.

Trust me, authentic as the experience is? The novelty wears off after a bit!

So, it is now the 29^th December and while we still have snow on the ground, I think that we are headed towards a thaw. The temperature has risen to +4 degrees Celsius and when I was outside this morning (digging my car out of its snow bank) it started to rain.

I appreciate that many people will be relieved to see it vanish but I have thoroughly enjoyed it. It has provided me with a new, fresh memory of snow to draw on each and every year until nature gifts me another snowy yet cozy Christmas:

So whatever weather you are having this holiday season, I hope that you are enjoying it thoroughly and that you are having a wonderful time!