While today is a lazy day, I do have to take a moment to add a picture of a more energetic time. Rick took a few shots of the Mardi Gras parade on his phone. While most were dark and difficult to see (since it's hard to take a clear shot in a jostling crowd), these pirate ships that filled the street show the exuberance of the evening.
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| One of two pirate ships coming down the street during Mardi Gras. |
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| The back of a pirate ship. Note the skull between the two upper lights. |
Rick has been working non-stop on the laundry room, so he is dead tired. I have been trying to help while also keeping up the daily chores of keeping the house clean, so my energy is lagging today also. Maybe God sent this day as a reminder that it is OK to not work so hard.
Rick still started the day by putting on the final coat of paint on the pocket door and then going out to put another coat of drywall mud on the laundry room walls. I'm amazed at how much wall surface -- and corners and seams -- a small room really has. Rick said he hopes that this is the final coat of mud, and that all that follows is the sanding, sanding, sanding, sanding, primer, and then paint. Finishing the walls certainly will be a relief.
We also tried to work on reupholstering my chair today, but we discovered that even with the electric staple gun, the wood used on the chair bottom was way too hard for the staples to adequately hold the fabric. I started to research upholstery shops in Dunedin while Rick worked on the laundry room. What did one do before the Internet? I found two shops online for Dunedin, and both are in this neighborhood. The closer shop of the two specialized in reupholstering cars, RVs, and boats with the idea of furniture as an afterthought in their advertisements. I did not get a warm, fuzzy feeling about them.
The second shop was a shop that only advertised refinishing and reupholstering furniture. I thought, "What do I have to lose?" I took the seat and material, drove a few blocks, and turned into the small strip mall where the shop was supposed to be located. Disappointment filled me as I noted that none of the shops bore the name of the reupholstery shop I sought. I decided that the best way to point my car in the correct direction was to drive toward the rear of the strip mall to turn around. As I did so, I found a small building nestled behind the strip mall bearing the name of the shop I was seeking.
The upholstery "shop" truly lived up to that name. I walked through the open door into a workshop filled with finished and half-finished pieces of old furniture. That large room had two doors on one wall through which sounds of someone working were clearly apparent. I yelled, "Hello" as I went through one of the doors. Both doors took me into another workshop, this one holding two large work tables, bolts of cloth, hand-tools all over, a large compressor on the floor, and an elderly man with a chisel and wooden mallet sitting at a workbench removing the covering on an ornate chair. The room screamed "tradesman" in the best of the tradition. No fancy office or counter, no gleaming cash register, no snobbish attendant trying to look too busy to take an order... just a hard-working craftsman doing what he loved to do. The room rather reminded me of scenes from Santa's workshop where tools of the trade were scattered about, and I half-expected to see elves lurking in the corners, waiting for the human to leave so they could get back to work.
Jim, the craftsman, asked me what I needed. I admitted that I did not have the right tools to complete the job. He looked at the chair seat and told me that he could cover it for me. When I asked how much, he crocked his head a little while he calculated time and labor, and said, "Eight bucks." He then told me I could have the seat back by this afternoon. Since my pessimistic husband had me ready to hear that a craftsman would charge me anywhere from $50 - $100 to recover the seat, I was shockingly surprised at both the rate and the time. I agreed, signed my name and phone number into his school-ready notebook, and left.
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| My desk chair before... |
Since today is Valentine's Day and since I had a pie crust left over from a previous meal of quiche, I decided to research pie crust recipes so I could make Rick a two-crust cherry pie. I found a promising recipe (by that I mean one that required only ingredients that I had in the pantry or refrigerator!), and I set to work. By early afternoon, the pie was in the oven. I have not tasted it yet, but the attached picture shows that it at least LOOKS like a good pie. (Steve and Chris, if you want to come over for a little Valentine's dessert, this is your invitation.)
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| My deep-dish, cherry Valentine's pie |
Of course, as I was waiting to get the pie out of the oven, my phone rang. Jim was calling to tell me that he had the chair seat ready. I have to say that I am very pleased with the results. I actually tipped him for his work by giving him $10.00 and telling him to keep the change. If I had had to order out a pneumatic stapler that I would probably never use again, I would have had to pay over $100. I figured that even at $10.00, this job was the deal of the century.
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| ... and after the reupholstery. |
While there was nothing wrong with the original fabric of the chair, it did not match my tropical coastal theme in Gladys. Rick is diplomatically not saying anything about the new fabric, so I know that he does not really care for it too much. Too bad. I think that it is a fun print with wild, tropical colors that includes the blue of the Florida room. Somehow, I think that Gladys approves. It's a girl thing, gentlemen, so just go with it.
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