While You Were Out

There’s a home decorating show on TLC where family members surprise a vacationing homeowner with a redecorated room.  Well, my sister Lisa got to experience a similar phenomenon this week as I spent eight days in Georgia hanging out and redecorating three rooms in her house.  

The only problem was that Lisa married one of my best friends, so while she was “out” working (and when we probably should have been working on the house) we were “out” playing.  And when she wasn’t out working, she was out playing alongside us.  The highlights of all the stuff we did when we should have been working on the house:

Bowling.  Japanese Stakehouse.  Local music concert at a rooftop bar.  Tubing on the Chatahoochee.  Six Flags Over Georgia.  Massages.  Rock Climbing.  Frozen Yogurt.  Swimming (at 12:30 am and 2:30am).  Crepes.  Five mile hike.  Apples to Apples (as the host family for four teenage boys from the Utah Valley Children’s Choir).

And the stuff we did when we should have been sleeping:

Made computer mock-ups.  Sewed curtains.  Re-purposed dollar store frames.  Middle-of-the night Walmart trip.  Painted glossy green stripes.  Ate Red Vines and Otter Pops. Painted blue.  Measured.  Crown molding.  Walmart again.  Painted green stripes.  Door/window trim.  Put furniture in every available walkway. Painted craft store block letters.  Chair rail.  Picture frame molding detail.  Dried leaves.  Many just-before-closing Home Depot runs.  More Walmart.  Painted red.  Complained about getting old.  Taped and taped and taped.  Painted blue.  Freehanded wall lettering.  Sawed.  Installed shelf.  Nailed.  Puttied.  Hung pictures.  Un-taped.  Swore off home decorating.

And though Lisa wasn’t “out” in the sense of out-of-town, she was mostly “out” in the sense of asleep in her bedroom.  Well, as asleep as a person can be when the other persons are using a nail gun at 3:00 a.m.

Since I live across the country from my handiwork and won’t get to enjoy the completed projects, here are “before,” “the plan” and “after” pictures for each completed room.

Phew.  I can’t believe we did all that in only eight days.

As for my version of out?  Well, I remember getting on the airplane to fly home today.  And I remember the flight attendant beginning the preflight spiel.  The next thing I knew, I was awakened by a flight attendant offering me an in-flight beverage.  Yep.  Slept right through takeoff on a 10:25 am flight.