First off, we discovered that Stephen was most likely reacting to something in my parent's house, more specifically their bedroom. They had graciously moved out of their bedroom and given that to us to sleep in until we could start sleeping in the tiny house. After three nights of Stephen being uncontrollably itchy and getting overheated, we knew we had to try to sleep somewhere else to see if it made any difference. I was also getting my itchy throat symptom at different times in their bedroom. We borrowed an air mattress and slept out in the tiny house. That night, Stephen didn't get uncontrollably itchy at all. So, apparently there's something in my parent's house that bothers him. It also makes sense now that he regressed last year when we spent a month in their house/bedroom when he was so bad right after Ruth was born.
We were able to sleep in the tiny house about a week, and then we were ready to start painting. Our plan was for painting to take a weekend, and during that time we would sleep at my grandparent's house that is about 25 minutes away. I was also off work that weekend, so it was going to work out perfectly.
Except we hit some snags. We kept finding things that needed to be done before paint could go up, like filling in some holes we missed, sanding down a few things, and then we had to paint over all of the knots in the wood with oil base paint so that they didn't show through the paint. So the primer coat got delayed, and then when my dad started using the sprayer, there were also a few things that didn't go as planned. Since it's such a small space, he was having trouble with the primer covering evenly in all the spaces, and then some of the primer started running. Primer went up on Saturday, and then all of this week has been sanding down the drips and touching up places that didn't cover well.
We also found out last weekend that we weren't going to be able to stain everything that we wanted to. My plan was to stain the ceiling and one of the walls of the bathroom for a place to hang my cast iron skillets. We knew there was a lot of wood putty showing because of all the holes and nicks in the wood, so we were sure to get a stainable wood putty. To be extra safe, we got a piece of scrap wood and put some wood putty on it and tested some stains. Unfortunately, it did not take the stain well and the wood putty showed up like a sore thumb. So there went our stain plans. Instead, we will paint the ceiling white as well, and paint the cast iron wall a darker color yet to be decided upon. Instead, we were able to tape off part of the bedroom wall where the stairs are going to be for the loft, and we will stain that. I am also going to stain part of the inside wall in the bedroom so that it will look more like a headboard. So stain is still part of the plan, just not where we originally planned. ;)
But when I walked in and saw the paint on the wall, I was so excited! It is really looking like I envisioned it. I feel like I'm living the shiplap dream! It's so neat to see it all coming together! The bare bones of our bed frame is done, and Ruth's bed frame is started, so that's super cool. We've even been looking at cabinets and working on getting that ordered. So all of the important stuff to be able to live there are coming together!
To be honest, it's been a really hard week. Driving back and forth between our sleeping place and our living/eating place plus making sure we get there in time for me to go to work in the mornings is not for the faint of heart. This week feels like just a week of surviving. It's been a week of trying to be content and patient, and being honest here, there are days when I don't think I'm succeeding. We are just so ready to be settled in one place and I hate that Ruth has not had longer than a few months at a time of a set routine this year.
Ending on a positive note, OUR PURPLE MATTRESS GOT DELIVERED TODAY!!!
If you don't sleep on a Purple mattress, we feel sorry for you. ;) Before we got married, we were looking for a non-toxic mattress, and Purple fit that bill, plus being excellent for your back. So we LOVED having our Purple mattress, so we were very sad that we had to get rid of our barely two years old Purple mattress when we cleaned out our house. Thankfully, we were able to use my savings bonds that my grandparents gifted me throughout my growing up years to pay for a new Purple mattress. So, basically, we can't wait to sleep on our new mattress.
