If you like slapstick comedy...

Laurel and Hardy were funny weren't they?!! They were truly gifted although the mean streak got old didn't it?
Pam & I are pretty funny too, especially when we are working on renovations or moving large and heavy furniture. We really should sell tickets. No matter where we live people always seem to comment about how we do so many things. We paint, drywall, lay floors, put up ceilings, lay cement blocks, haul gravel by the tonne with a weeny wheel barrel, etc. but never without laugh your socks off antics!
Today we were putting the large shutters back up (had them down to paint) and then taking down the shutters from the second floor. To do that we needed to extend the ladder almost as far as it would go. Now you need to understand that Pam and I have a hard enough time trying to maneuver this ladder when it is as short as it goes let alone when it is stretched out as far as it can go. We are also awful judges of where to put the 'wing thingers' in the sides of the ladder so that you don't bend the gutters. Yup we had a job getting the ladder up. No windows were broken during this escapade (Thank you Lord!!). Between our attempts at putting the ladder up against the house, the bugs that insist on making your life more difficult because it's really hard to hold/climb a ladder while you're doing the 'AHHHHH' there's a bug on me dance we did actually get the job done. Yup and I'm sure we entertained the neighbourhood while we were at it. Laughing is good for you though so we're supplying an essential service at the same time.
After completing the outside stuff and both still being in one piece we decided that we would move the office from one room to another to make room for Jenn's arrival.
Pam has a lovely desk, really she does but it's freaking huge and weighs a ton! It's also very wide and too long to leave the room it's currently in without being tipped up on it's side. We decided that while we both had a few knuckles unscathed we would have to tip it up on end. Done! Put an edge on a blanket and slide it down the hallway while balancing it precariously so that it doesn't scratch the hardwood... the blanket we had slid under it was too small so we had to kind of keep it up on a tiny little edge.... now we get it to Pam's room... there's already a fair amount of bedroom furniture in there to which we now are adding a whole office... You're thinking yeah so? Well Pam and I are not tiny people. We are fairly well padded shall I say. So you've got a small amount of room with which you have to get the desk in while being able to get behind it and also putting the hutch back on - did I mention the hutch weighs almost as much as the damn desk? Oh the fun... it's not so hard to lift it, say waist height, but try lifting it almost chest high... yeah it's heavy and we're bent like pretzels, a bum bumped a wonky bookcase which was full and falling toward a nearly full glass of pepsi, with much grunting nothing fell!!!... too funny thank goodness the fly on the wall didn't have a cell phone camera! Anyway now it's done and other then a little early onset rigor mortise we are grand!
We're thinking that when I have to haul myself back up that ladder to rehang the upstairs shutters we'll sell tickets, $19.95 for unlimited laughs?
On a serious note though we have accomplished a lot since arriving 13 months ago...

• put down tile in a family room in the basement and painted the room as well (Steph's crash pad)
• we learned how to move, store and split wood and heat with a wood stove
• moved half of the office downstairs to make room for guests (much anticipated!)
  
• gave the front trees and bushes a major pruning
  
• leveled out the major bumps in the front yard and actually have grass growing amidst the clover this year!
• dug a trench (a very long and deep trench), made it into a french drain with a dry well at one end
• lined the trench with landscape cloth, filled with rock and then covered it with cloth and more rock
• leveled out the worst parts of the backyard with the dirt from the trench
• neighbours chopped down one dead tree
  
• built 5 planters
• scraped, caulked, painted main floor windows and garage doors
• placed sidewalk blocks strategically around the gravel with intermittent pots of flowers, birdbath etc.
• landscape ties - surround gravel and follow much of the fence line to Olivia proof the backyard
• removed and painted garage shutters - rehung
  
• removed the shutters and spray painted them with half a dozen coats each (6 main floor, 4 upper)
• scrubbed the siding to remove dirt, algae, moss etc.
  
• Built a very large wood shed for the firewood
• fixed the lawnmower - the wheel fell off, only after chewing a great hunk of my good grass out
  
• went on a chinch bug hunt and attack
• cleaned and stained the front and back 2 decks (spindle railings look pretty but are a huge pain the the butt to stain!!)
• rehung main floor shutters
• MORE to come !!

Mewahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!