Wonderful day with housecleaner. My goodness she is GOOD. House gleaming. Vanilla-lemon-lavender.

Hardi and I added a new pair of curtain panels to replace thew 15-yr old sun-rotted pair I finally threw "out" (saved for other purposes LOL), last year. Not as nice as the ones he will sew when we paint, but good with the bird wallpaper we will be painting over.

It's a great thing when what I CAN do allows me to have someon else's paid help to do what they can do better than we can, and MUCH better than the very little my PT presently allows me to do.

Our system (begun with the Dec. 2000 fire/smoke cleanup) is that we outline the goals, then they're the boss and I'm on their crew. Whether it's putting in a fence or cleaning, and anything in between, I'm that second pair of hands and Hardi knows where all hidden tools can be found, LOL. So THAT part-- being the lowliest member on the crew-- is part of my PT program.

Today I can claim the same 10 hours we just paid her for, because I started hours before she arrived and crapped out (by the same number of hours) before she finished. Ten hours of thank-God-for-pain-meds hopping and bopping--carrying loads of stuff from point A to point B and whatever was at B to C, etc.-- with stuff I can do seated in between. Lots of movement, lots of strength work, lots of walking on flat surfaces per orders. (It probably doesn't sound like a lot unless you know that this crumbling old 1800's farmhouse is big enough to sleep 35.)

Faulkner-dog pre-approves all who work here. And the peeps we choose to work with totally get the concept of bossing me, and reading my face to see when I am getting past my limit. So during their boss-time I get to NOT be in charge, and in that mode I am able to do much more than I might have thought I could do, while knowing that when I have to knock off they will be more than able to carry the task forward on their own.

Katy thinks she can get back here about every 2 weeks for a half day, and that is just about what we really need. Adrian can come ahead of her to do carpentry projects or the heavy-lifting cleaning Katy then finish-cleans.

And we can focus on the more private UPstairs, while the main floor on this plan should now stay company-ready. I'm gonna need solar walkway lights from driveway to step, very soon! I saw THAT done a neat way at one campground-- they stuck them in PVC pipes pounded deep, raising the lights by a few inches and also enlarging the base so the mower doesn't cut off the otherwise-low lights. I can buy 'em one at a time-- and they don't need to match!

Think we got us'ns a parlor now!

~Susan