After losing my mom in May of 2019 life changed quite a bit.  I had to resign my design position to get her estate in order.  Going thru cabinets, finding things that were lost.  Numerous trips to the thrift store, cleaning, cleaning and more cleaning.  Than the research and inventory started.  Working over there all day and coming home to do more research.  She didn’t have internet.  This was a very big job.  

 Welsh Cupboard built by my dad styled for the estate sale and sold.

 This is the same cabinet without the top and styled by my mom 9 months before her death.

She was an artist.  Look closely it’s a feast for the eyes.  She kept changing it almost daily for 6 weeks before she was satisfied with it.  She had Alzheimers

 Her master bedroom styled for the sale but pretty much how she had it.

Fireplace surround built by my dad. After the sale.

Wall shelf designed by my mom and built by dad for the kitchen now resides in my sisters dining room.  Moms styling I will admit not her best effort done very late in her life.  Not quite balanced and a bit out of sorts.  Everything on here had been inventoried.

17th Century Welsh Cupboard with just some of the pink and white transfer ware.  Composition done late in her life and a bit out of sorts as well.  You’ll notice from What’s in the Welsh Cupboard Post at my own house a few of these pieces ended up in my home.  No hardship!

We inventoried 3267 items that we put up for sale! Tagging everything.  My sister and I worked non stop from May to September when we had the sale.  

After that we had to unload things that didn’t sell and for the most part these were items that couldn’t be thrifted.  Making some very hard decisions our cars were packed to the gills every single day for 6 months.  Our houses were filling up with no where to go. Most of these items are 18th -19th Century and purchased on the east coast.  We live in Nebraska and unfortunately Nebraskans just don’t understand the value of things that are that old.  Not that they aren’t sophisticated people they are, they just have a more modern vibe.

Then the deep cleaning started and that took from September to December.  By the time Jan 1 rolled around my sister was emotionally and physically done.  I don’t blame her.  But, I knew in order for us to get the best price we could for the house I would have to get some of the wallpaper down and paint all those walls. Five rooms of wallpaper.  The house a 1963 ranch was just too Colonial for modern sensibilities.  I started stripping wallpaper on New Years Day.  Some rooms stripped easily and some rooms went inch by inch.  Like this one.

My grand boys and I stripped my dads bedroom in 20 minutes.  We had so much fun.

Then I lost my beloved dog Coco, who was the best dog ever.  I was devastated.  She was my comfort when I would come home every night.  I’ve cried more tears over her because I think when I lost my mom there was just so much to do. 

 I’ve been moving from one task to another since April of 2019.  Somehow I managed to keep putting one foot in front of the other, and with a very heavy heart I carried on. So when I unexpectedly lost Coco it was just too much.

 Losing mom who was my best friend and the one person on the face of the earth that “got me”.  Losing the home where I grew up and learned so many skills, from sewing to interior design, to woodworking, my mom, my dad, and that house taught me everything.  I was overflowing with grief.

So you know you’re in trouble when your husband for Valentines Day gives you a package not in a box, just wrapped and you open it and it’s a snowy iPhone image in an inexpensive Walmart frame of The House and you burst into tears. We don’t even celebrate Valentines Day!  It was the sweetest thing he has ever done for me.  We had just sold.  That picture is hanging on my wall in my office and probably always will.

 Two Layers of wallpaper here in the foyer.  This is where the black apothecary chest stood.  The apothecary now resides in my entry.

The 20 minute room.  Came down in a snap. 

Yes these are all patches for nail holes.  Hundreds upon hundreds of nail holes.  The whole house was this way.  Mom didn’t believe in measuring and she could tell you up until the day she died if something was off 1/32nd of an inch.  She just kept pounding until she got it right.  Then when the mood switched, down everything would come and up something different would go.

Once while stripping wallpaper in the family room about 30 years ago I started counting nail holes in a space about 2″ wide and 56″ tall.  There were 67 nail holes just in that space.  I can still hear her saying “stop it Shelley” and I just laughed.  That wasn’t even the worst!  She liked having plenty of inventory to change on a whim. We used to joke that when we took everything off the walls that the house was going to just fold in on itself.  

After working every day and night for over a month we finally got the house on the market and closed on the 6th of March.  One week before Covid.

On March 8th the plans started for our own house. The first battle was to finish our kitchen we had started in April of 2019.  We managed to get to a good place with the kitchen but by  mid May of 2019 it was clear my mother needed all my focus.  There will be a post!

After the kitchen was completed we tackled the flooring in the living room, kitchen, and the 2 offices.  Of course as long as your doing that you might as well paint, right?  So all those rooms got a new coat of paint.  

Then we decided we needed a breather.  Spring, planting, fun in the sun!  Our deck is ready for some work too, but we decided to wait until fall.  One morning the husband and I are having coffee on the deck and he says to me which would you rather do next, the deck or the bathroom.  Well of course I said bathroom.  I say when do you want to start thinking we still weren’t done with our “breather”.  He said whenever you’re ready, so we submerged ourselves again.  

Aah the bathroom!  Wallpaper take down, just what I wanted to do.  That wallpaper was a beast.  Inch by lousy inch!  Took forever.  Like 3 weeks forever. Gross right.

 I could only work on it for small increments of time. Then decisions made for the bathroom effected the master bedroom which caused some minor decisions to be made in there.  I’m still working on that space.  Which lead to changes in the lower level room, which leads to Christmas Styling and all that fun.

I would say Covid has been very good for our home.  We are both still healthy, and for small victories the Husband just informed me that we managed to stay married!

What I have learned in 2020?  That the whole world can grieve at the same time, that flexibility eventually will get you where you want to go, and the smallest acts of kindness from a family member can be your undoing. 

I learned that I am strong enough to do the hard stuff.  The really really hard stuff.

I’m going to try to do things differently in 2021 and see if I can’t find my way to where I want to go.  I think I now know where I want to go, so I just have to figure out how to get there.

Thanks for sitting through this babble of 2020.  I know it was long and not very entertaining but know it was written with honesty and love.  You are enough too.  

Shelley