# 179 - Reality TV Filming Continues for our Family & Paint Cans Be Gone!

Having a good size house with different people who have different tastes will cause your walls to reflect those differences through color.

After a while, I accumulated too many bulky paint cans that were a pain to open and close, even worse frustrations took hold as I tried to stir the remaining paint at the bottom of the can and store the remaining valuable paint from drying out.

So, I devised my own method to keep leftover paint handy for touch-ups. Recycling old water bottles for this purpose ended up being a fantastic solution. To help mix the paint in the bottle before using, I drop a glass bauble into each water bottle so it can act as an internal beater at the right moment. I just took a morning to stand at the kitchen sink with all of my bulky cans of paint and empty water bottles, then using a funnel, I poured the paint into each water bottle and dropped in that glass bauble. On the outside of each container, I marked all paint information along with the room it related to in the house.

When looking at my job well done, I feel as if Heavenly music fills the room. If you have leftover paint, try it. You'll be glad you did on the day you need to paint a patch over the big scrape made when moving furniture.

Of course, using a paint with an Eggshell finish allows for more blended patchwork painting when needed, so I always use paints with this finish for our interior work, except for ceilings and closets...those get the old-fashioned flat stuff. Satin is a bit too shiny for me, but that finish does work well in a bathroom. My baseboards do get a high-gloss, bright white coat because I like for my trim to POP and to be easily cleaned with a damp rag when needed.



I cannot even express how convenient this paint saving method has been for me. Whenever I need to touch up a bit of paint on a wall from a scrape, I simple shake the bottle, insert a little paint brush and get to touching up. So simple that it makes avoiding this chore less likely. Who wants to dig out the old paint can when compared to this option? Not me.

And all of the different leftover paints can be stored in a relatively small area that's easy to access. I keep my bottles on a shelf in my laundry room. These paints can also be used for other things, if no longer needed for the walls. You paid good money for that paint, might as well make it last for the next painting expedition instead of it drying up in the can.

Meanwhile, Deputy Dave repaired the fence between our garage and house. He had some old fence pickets from the main yard and he used those (trimmed down) so that there would not be a huge difference in appearance.

As for this particular gate, my oldest daughter's Australian Shepherd, Tux, was easily able to jump over it. He's much larger than Howdy and had been a powerhouse of agility and strength when he lived with us. This fence is pretty, but not effective with large dogs.

Inside the house, I am packing up our beloved things. Just things. Antique serving dishes that have been passed down to me for five generations, hand-crafted items my daughters made during their youth, pieces of china that had belonged to my mother and I am taking a trip down memory lane as I pack up our things. Of course, I'm going slower than I had intended, but I'm thorough and careful.

I'm also piddling to clear out the closets and drawers. You do know how buyers LOVE to open drawers, cabinet doors and enjoy taking a good look inside closets.

As a former Real Estate Broker, I've seen some people try to take this home search a step further and make it a snooping fest which I won't participate in whatsoever. I tell the person...please don't touch the bedroom furniture, it is not for sale and not part of the marketing of this home, it is personal property! But, I do know that the kitchen drawers will be opened, the pantry will be searched, the bathroom closets will be inspected and any opening that is included in the sale of the house is available to inspect.

My drawers hold rather bland items. One thing my mother-in-law compliments us about is our regimented way of living. She says that when she comes to our house and needs something...a pair of scissors, a potato peeler, a stapler...it is always in the same place, every single time, through the years. We are creatures of strong habits around here. In fact, if I go to look for my kitchen scissors and they are missing, I'm throwing a hissy fit. We don't like things to be out of place. Yeah, I've got a touch of OCD, for sure. It's fine with me...at least I know where everything is in my house.

Back to painting, as my blog buddies know, I had been painting the staircase and spindles on our curved staircase --- seventy-six spindles of madness! And Howdy, who is NOT allowed on the stairs and NOT allowed upstairs, unless it is a special circumstance, had clearly been checking out my business when I turned my back. The evidence was on the top of his tail, on the side of his body and legs.

And in the midst of all of this housework to get it ready for the real estate market, we had several great meals this week. One meal, chicken fajita tacos, had been made with the below photographed bell peppers from our garden. The scraggly old bell pepper plant had a few peppers growing at the tippy-top...free from ravenous chicken's beaks. I sure do like having home-grown bell peppers. They were small, but they were MINE! And I managed to harvest them before we had freezing temperatures hit our area for a couple of nights during the week.

And you can bet, as I had my garden scissors by my side, the chickens were eagerly on my heels, each surrounded and watched me, as if they were hawks and not chickens, while I harvested these goodies.

They eyeballed my bell peppers in hand with their greedy stares, and I make a bee-line for the back door. BACK CHICKENS, BACK!!

On that note, after harvesting small bell peppers from my scroungy garden with barely anything left in it...I cannot tell you how eager I am to get our veggie garden started in the country. It will be a priority so we can have fresh veggies this growing season. And I will promptly put up a sign in the garden that reads, "NO CHICKENS ALLOWED."

So, for all the work we're doing together, it looks like our house will go up on the market as of February 6th. We are running a month behind schedule, but for good reason...we are incredibly busy with prepping the house to be sold.

And the other news is...the reality show, "Randy to the Rescue" wants us back for more filming. As for my stress level, it is rather high. I do not photograph well, I need to lose weight, my clothes are shabby and not chic, my hair is unruly (as you well know) and the last filming I ended up crying like a mourning mother of the bride ---- yes, I SAID IT. In my family, we women mourn a woman getting married. We're weird like that, but we try to put on the customary smile. It's in our DNA to be less domesticated and to actually prefer working. However, that said, I am also very thrilled that my daughter has kept her priorities in order so that she can marry and still be fulfilled as an independent woman.

Oh goodness...marriage can be tricky for the women in my family, but that's an entirely different blog. Let's just say, my mother put an end to that streak. Anyway, my point is, the show will probably highlight my contorted face as I break out into that famous UGLY cry. I'm darn glad that Heather won't be standing in her wedding dress for this continued filming because nothing else, hardly, can make me cry. Well, the producers of the show might suddenly decide to be cruel and have her eerily parade back and forth in front of me while wearing the dress as the cameras are two inches from my face and the producer is saying, "Mom...there's your baby, in her wedding dress, the one that signifies the start of an entirely new way of life...you won't share last names any more...her uterus is going to be more important than her brain...she's going to end up resenting that remote control...she's melting, she's melting away..."

Oh...I'm back. Did I mention that women in my family have issues when it comes to marriage. Did I mention that my sister didn't get married until she was 30 years old?

Regardless, as for me crying while being filmed, they already have endless footage of me blubbering openly. So, this additional filming is taking precious days off of our schedule to get the house on the market. However, I'm excited for my daughter because this adventure to find her wedding dress will be a story to pass down through the generations. No boring shop talk around here, that's for sure.

And all scary marital issues aside, I am very happy that my daughter is ready to be married. She's taken her sweet time during this long engagement to make sure she's doing the right thing.

She is rather pleased with her fiance, for good reason. He is truly a nice man and we are glad to have him as a member of our family. Furthermore, he's well aware of how strong and defiant the women in our family can be at times; he's had a few experiences that he survived and still kept his hat on. He's impressed me. In fact, I've taken Henry under my wing and he's beginning to feel like one of my own kiddos. Yep, he'll do just fine for my son-in-law.

The good news is...even with the filming continuance, we are still not too far off track with trying to get our house sold. Once we get a buyer, it will be much less bothersome to get packed because of all of the hard work we're doing right now. So much will be accomplished already. It will still be hard work to wrap it up, but much less painful.

We are thinking of having one of those storage containers delivered to our house once we are in the solid stages of a real estate contract. Here in Houston, those containers are called a "POD." We will have it delivered to our driveway so that we can carefully load up the furniture and boxes, bit by bit. Then, we'll have the POD picked up and delivered to our land for temporary storage. 

In our situation, this furniture moving method is much less expensive and practical than it would be to hire movers. Once the POD is on our land, we can then unload it and either put the furniture in our workshop for the time being or we can keep renting the POD month by month. I guess we'll have to see what works for us once we get to that stage of the process.

Until then, I will continue packing our belongings and dreaming of the not-too-distant-day when that POD will be sitting in my driveway but I continue to dread my television debut.