I'm back. I caught the morning ferry on Thursday, after dropping the kids off at school. They complained that their Dad turns the house into a work-camp when I'm gone. I figured they'd survive. 
Big hugs and off I went.

The ferry was delayed 45 minutes because something was wrong with the "anchor winch." So we all sat in our vehicles waiting and waiting. At the terminal, I ran into my Uncle Pat. He was just heading over for the day to check on his house and pick up the mail. I told him to pop by the cottage on his way home. 

I stopped in Miner's Bay and picked up some milk for my tea at the grocery store...

...went into the Sunny Mayne Bakery and bought a few cranberry-apple scones. I have to say this: unless you've had a homemade scone, you really don't know how they're supposed to taste. They should be fairly small, with a crumbly texture and a toasty golden crust. The scones you buy at Starbucks and other places are glutinous and cakey. They're chewy because there's no air in them. They sit in your gut like a sad lump of dough. 

The Sunny Mayne Bakery makes a proper scone and they're the best I've ever tasted...

Strolled into the Trading Post to check out the movie rentals...

I knew when I arrived at the cottage I would be seeing all the windows & doors trimmed-out and I was so excited that I refused to look at anything until I had a fire going. I just kept my eyes averted. Once the cottage warmed up and the kettle was on, I looked around. Wow...it just looks lovely. Here is the front door and window...(you have to enlarge these pictures to get the full effect)

Here is the north-east corner...

Here are the closets...

Now let's head into the kitchen/dining area...

They look just beautiful. I'm very pleased. You may notice that some of the trim work is painted and some is not; Lorenzo had to get more wood to finish the job and I'm glad because I decided that I hate the trim colour we chose. I went with my favourite white, which is "Mayonnaise" by Benjamin Moore. Home Hardware matched their paint, but the colour turned out slightly peachy. Their recipe is wrong, in my opinion. Peach and creamy yellow clash. I was really disappointed and I spent a few hours wondering if my eyes were playing tricks on me; in some light, it looked fine. In other light it looked terrible. So I went back to Home Hardware and had them mix me up a small can of my other go-to trim colour: Cloud White. I did a sample and it made a huge difference. The Mayonnaise made the walls look a sickly yellow, but against a true white, they look cream - which is how they're supposed to look. 

Sadly, I made this decision after I had taken all the doors off the hinges and applied a first coat. I felt so deflated the first day. And taking solid-core doors off the hinges is really hard, by the way. And then lifting them onto a saw horse is even harder. I think Lorenzo thinks I'm a man.

My Uncle Pat came over and we had a little visit. He sat on my sofa drinking tea while I painted and we had a nice chat. He is 78 years old now...it's hard to believe. He brought me some kindling which I really appreciated, and he told me to start burning all the wood we have stacked outside. I assumed that because it hasn't been under shelter it wouldn't burn, but he said to go ahead. I did, and was quite surprised - it burned fine. I hope it doesn't wreck my stove. Uncle Pat stayed about an hour then left to catch his ferry. I feel an enormous debt of gratitude to my Aunt and Uncle who introduced so many of us to Mayne Island. Were it not for their hospitality over the years, I doubt any of us (myself and my cousins) would have come to love the place so much. I doubt we'd have known it existed - just another a little island dotting the west coast of British Columbia.

I ate soup for dinner, then had my delicious scone with a cup of tea. Bliss. 

The next day was Friday, and it was a beautiful clear sunny day. Because I knew our painter was coming back, I decided to let him re-paint the doors the new colour and finish the trim. I had too many other things to do. I put the doors back on their hinges (I cursed many times) then I began tearing up the laminate floor. This took me several hours...

I pulled out the stove and fridge, ripped up the laminate and the underlay, then put the appliances back in place...

My goal was to do everything I could to make things easier for Lorenzo. We knew we wanted to get rid of the tile foyer, so I decided to tackle that as well. With a crow-bar...

It was at this point that I turned off my Irish music. I needed something heavier, so I switched to Jimi Hendrix. Music really affects my energy level. Anyway, I've never done this before, and it took me a bit to get the hang of it. It was very hard work - probably the hardest thing I've done at the cottage. I was happy when it was over...

There was a lot of mortar left on the sub-floor and I had a very tough time bringing it up - we don't have a shovel at the cottage and the crow bar was just not cutting it. I did about half and had to stop - I was so tired. The pile of crap to be taken away outside has expanded to rather disturbing proportions...

The hard part was moving everything around in order to get to the flooring. I had to move the piano, all of the boxes of hardwood flooring, Lorenzo's tools, etc. So many times I boxed myself in, shouted out curse words... Anyway, it got done, and I re-arranged the living room furniture in such a way that the painter has clear access to the windows and crown moulding. As you can see, the area is boxed-in by the hardwood flooring...

The floor in the eating area is covered by random pieces of plywood - this was the former bathroom, so the floor is a mess. I don't know how Lorenzo is going to level everything...

I guess it was around 7:30 pm when I finished and cleaned up. My muscles were twitching and I was so tired that I was starting to do stupid things - putting something down, then spending ten minutes trying to find it, putting the kettle on and then forgetting about it... I staggered upstairs and had a shower, figuring I'd turn in. But then I got my second wind. So I re-arranged the furniture, just to see how the sofa will look in different spots. Here it is on an angle in the north-east corner...

I don't think it looks it very good. So I tried it against the wall...

I'm not keen on this either. 

This is a hard room to figure out. The north-east corner is where the piano is going to go; maybe we can put a comfortable arm chair over here...

I didn't get to sleep on Friday night until about 2:30 in the morning. I assumed I would sleep well, given how tired I was but I didn't. I couldn't sleep, and then I had my recurring nightmare which I experience every three or four months. I dream that I'm my age now, but I don't have any children. I haven't been to school, I have accomplished nothing in my life. In my dream, my mum is alive and she is disgusted by what a failure I've turned out to be. I am overcome by panic and regret; I forgot to have children and now it's too late! The feeling of desolation is so intense.  I wake up relieved that I have my children, I have a husband, I've got my degree, everything is fine...

I have consistently disturbing dreams on Mayne Island. Lorenzo says he does, too...it must be a combination of stress and fatigue. The cell phone reception is usually non-existent and sometimes I feel very isolated not knowing what's going on at home. Maybe this plays into it on a sub-conscious level. The last time Lorenzo was there, he dreamt that his car was surrounded by four or five guys and he had to fight all of them. He woke up feeling as though he'd swum the English channel. But in his dreams, he wins! That's right - Lorenzo takes on a gang of marauders and comes out victorious. In my dreams I can't even tie my shoes.



When my mum was alive, I'd tell her about the awful dreams I'd have about my kids - that I'd lost them in a store or that I'd forgotten all about them, only to find them starving somewhere. She said, "You're going to have those dreams for the rest of your life." Motherhood. Before kids, I had great dreams. Dreams about hot looking men, dreams about lying on a sandy beach (with hot looking men), dreams where I'd be soaring high above the clouds with the eagles...

Now I dream about confusing things; I can't find my keys, something is wrong with one of my kids, I am in high school and I can't find my class.... And lately, I'll dream that I'm in the company of young people and I'm feeling happy until I realize that I'm old - I'm not young anymore! It's so depressing.

Woke up this morning (Saturday) feeling like I hadn't even slept, and decided to catch the 5 pm ferry home. I gathered up wood on the property for Lorenzo and stacked it on the front deck. I  looked around our property...there are a lot of trees that I want gone...

I can envision how this could look with blossoming trees of various heights and foliage. Maybe some dogwoods and flowering crab-apples.. And the end of the property could be a lovely sitting area with a camp fire. I love trees but we are so hemmed in that even on a sunny day it still feels rather dark. And my brain needs light - without it, my serotonin dissolves and I start to feel like I'm pushing through mud. Lorenzo agrees with me - he isn't sentimental about trees the way I am and figures if we're replacing them with other living things then we've offset the damage, so to speak. I just wonder about the little birds in their nests when the guy shows up with his chainsaw. Speaking of animals, I didn't see a single deer on this trip, and that has never happened. Strange.

I cleaned up the cottage and organized a paint-station for Freddie the painter, then I noticed that I had a couple of hours to kill. I popped in the screen that came with our wood stove to see how it looks. Not bad! This allows you to enjoy a fire on a summer night without over-heating the house...

Then I played the piano...

This piano was given to me by my cousin. It was sitting in Uncle Pat's house not being played and she suggested that we take it. Thrilled, Lorenzo and I somehow managed to load it into a rickety trailer and bring it into our cottage. I don't usually like playing most pianos except for my own, but this one has a lovely warm sound. I played for about an hour - no interruptions, no phone ringing, no dog scratching at the door... I can hardly express how much it means to have that instrument there. We even renovated the cottage around it; Lorenzo made sure we had a wall span of 63-inches. Hence, the single French door instead of doubles. We chose music over design. 

Lorenzo plays too - he's very good. When we were in Las Vegas, he decided to play the piano at the Bellagio. Which was against the rules. As you can see, the other guests were thrilled. Check out those two miserable faces in the background...

And then I took the road home...

When I arrived at the house, Lorenzo walked out to the truck to greet me followed by my dog who was going nuts. We talked for a few hours and hashed out the next sequence of events: he has to level the sub-floor and fill in all the areas where walls were taken out, then put down an underlay, and then the hardwood... He looked at my pictures and was very pleased that the flooring was all taken up. He says I've saved him a whole day of work. 

I said, "When this cottage is finished, what the hell are we going to talk about?" He said, "Oh, there's still so much to do - I have to put up new gutters, we have to deer fence the property..." In other words, we have many months and years of gruelling work ahead of us to keep the conversation going. In any case, we're getting closer...

(I hung a sheet on the window for privacy)

*     *     *     *

There was a full moon tonight. It's damp and cold outside and the ground is wet...my thoughts are turning to spring. I really need winter to be over...

Until next time...